Plug Power (PLUG) shares rose aggressively today after the hydrogen fuel cell specialist posted better-than-expected revenue growth and a narrowing of losses for its fiscal fourth quarter.
Additionally, investors applauded PLUG when José Luis Crespo, who was named the company’s new CEO in October, officially took over this week. Investors are betting that this leadership transition could be the beginning of a new era for the Nasdaq-listed company.
In the post-earnings rally, Plug Power stock broke above its 50-day moving average (MA) on Tuesday, indicating that momentum may continue in this clean energy name that is still down about 14% from its year-to-date high.
Plug Power offered plenty of positives in its fourth-quarter earnings release: Loss per share narrowed to $0.06 (significantly less than the expected $0.10) as revenue rose more than 17%. Furthermore, the gross margin also turned positive (2.4%), indicating genuine operational progress.
Still, caution is warranted when buying PLUG stock at current levels, given that the company has roughly $368 million in unrestricted cash alone against a significant operating cash burn of about $536 million in 2025 alone.
This means Plug Power has less than a year of cash flow, creating significant financing risk that could require dilutive capital raises if execution fails on its profitability timeline.
Plug Power shares also soared this morning as management reiterated its commitment to turning adjusted EBITDA positive by the final quarter of 2026. However, this enthusiasm should be tempered by historical context. The clean energy company has a history of disappointing investors by failing to meet its projections.
While the forecast sounds exciting today, it may turn out to be a major setback if PLUG ends up facing any delays in reaching set profitability milestones. Essentially, the margin for error is minimal given liquidity constraints, which is why options traders continue to warn of a sharp pullback in its share price to $1.46 by mid-June.
However, it is worth mentioning that Wall Street remains somewhat bullish on PLUG stock even though it failed to break above its 100-day MA today.
