IREN (IREN.US) Q1 AI Cloud Revenue Surges 182% QoQ, with US$20 Billion Order Backlog in Hand

IREN Ltd (IREN.US) released its fiscal 2027 first-quarter results for the period ended September 30, 2026, after the U.S. market close on November 5. The company reported quarterly revenue of US$228 million, up 66% quarter-over-quarter, beating market expectations of US$221 million; net loss of US$263 million, significantly narrower than US$684 million in the previous quarter; adjusted EBITDA of US$66 million, up 247% quarter-over-quarter, with an adjusted EBITDA margin of 29%; loss per share of 66 cents, versus market expectations of a 48-cent loss per share. AI Cloud Business: Revenue Nearly Triples QoQ, Gross Margin 86% The AI cloud business was the absolute star of the quarter. AI cloud revenue reached US$200 million, up 182% quarter-over-quarter (US$71 million in the prior quarter), of which AI cloud services revenue was US$135 million and AI cloud leasing revenue was US$65 million; the AI cloud segment gross margin reached 86%, flat with the prior quarter. The core DRIVE behind the revenue jump was the delivery of the Horizon 1 data center. The company's operating IT capacity (IT-MW) increased 127% quarter-over-quarter, from 41 MW to 93 MW (approximately 0.1 GW). Forward-looking indicators were equally strong: Operating ARR (annualized run-rate revenue) reached US$1 billion, doubling quarter-over-quarter (US$500 million at end-June); Revenue backlog reached US$20 billion, up 22% quarter-over-quarter, of which Microsoft Corporation accounted for US$9.6 billion (47%), NVIDIA Corporation US$3.4 billion (17%), and AI developers/frontier labs/channel partners US$7.2 billion (36%); approximately two-thirds (US$13 billion) came from investment-grade counterparties; New contracts signed in the first quarter of the fiscal year had a weighted average remaining term of more than 4 years, with 5-year contracts priced at US$22 millionUS$40 million per MW (IT) (short-term contracts newly signed after the quarter were priced at up to US$40 million/MW). It should be noted that the company pushed back its target of reaching US$4 billion ARR from end-2026 to January 2027, citing customer-requested changes and supplier delivery pacing, and cautioned that it could be delayed to as late as end-February 2027. The quarterly report also disclosed that after the quarter ended, the company reached a capacity expansion partnership with a frontier AI lab, and newly signed H100 contracts were priced 100% higher than the prior Prince George contracts. Data Centers and Power: 0.8 GW Under Construction, 5 GW of Power Secured, 35 GW Development Pipeline The company emphasized its three-layer vertically integrated model of "AI clouddata centersland and power": data center assets carried at approximately US$6.6 billion, with a design life of more than 20 years, cash-funded and unencumbered; more than 30,000 acres of land secured. 0.8 GW of capacity under construction across multiple campuses including Prince George, Mackenzie, Childress, Sweetwater 1 and Canal Flats, of which the initial 0.3 GW has entered the final construction phase; More than 5 GW of power secured, plus a development pipeline of more than 35 GW (as of November 5, 2026, at various stages prior to signing grid connection agreements, speculative projects); Execution speed leading the industry: Horizon 1 took only 14 months from groundbreaking to commissioning the GB300 cluster (construction began June 2025, completed November 2026), versus the industry benchmark of 18 months (for civil construction excluding GPU deployment); The company has ordered GPUs for an additional 0.3 GW of AI cloud capacity, and the expansion plan for this phase is fully funded. In addition, the company had US$5.8 billion in cash and restricted cash at quarter-end, with net debt rising to US$4.43 billion; of the remaining US$15 billion in capex for FY27, US$6 billion remains to be financed. Bitcoin mining revenue fell to US$28 million, with mining machines continuing to be retired. As of Thursday's close, IREN fell 17%. After the earnings release, the stock rose more than 6% in after-hours trading.