StockStory Favors Palantir as Software Stocks Outpace the S&P 500

StockStory favors Palantir Technologies among software stocks, citing average billings growth of 76.7% over the past year. The publisher says the growth signals a healthy pipeline of new contracts, and points to the company’s free cash flow and sales spending as strengths.

Palantir’s shares were priced at $190.60 in the article, which put the stock at 47.2 times forward sales. Those figures are from the article’s publication, and StockStory’s view that Palantir may outperform is the publisher’s assessment.

StockStory was less positive on Qualys and Procore Technologies. It cited Qualys’ average annual recurring revenue growth of 10.3% over the past year and forecast sales growth of 8.9% for the next year. For Procore, it pointed to expected sales growth of 13.4% over the next 12 months and a history of operating losses.

The article said software stocks gained 45.2% over six months, beating the S&P 500 by 28.9 percentage points. StockStory cautioned that low barriers to entry can lead to fierce competition across the industry.