Shares slid $0.46 to $9.94 on April 22, a -4.5% drop that bucked a broad market rally (S&P 500 +0.86%, Nasdaq +1.40%), as traders sold ahead of Nokia's Q1 2026 report due before the bell on April 23. The selloff distills a central tension: a stock that has rallied roughly 50% since late January on AI-networking hype now faces a quarter the company itself warned would disappoint.
• Nokia Told Investors This Quarter Would Be Soft — and Ericsson Just Proved Why
In January, Nokia projected full-year 2026 operating profit of €2.0–2.5 billion but flagged that Q1 sales would "dip more than the usual seasonal drop off after a strong Q4."
Last Friday, Ericsson — Nokia's primary Western competitor — fell short of Q1 profit expectations, pointing to pricier semiconductors driven by AI demand and a sluggish North American market.
J.P. Morgan flagged that Nokia could face similar North American headwinds. That read-across gave nervous holders a concrete reason to lighten up.
• The Stock Has Outrun the Near-Term Numbers
Nokia climbed from around $8.00 in late March to just under $10.00 by mid-April — a sharp move for a slow-moving telecom equipment giant.
Consensus expects just €250 million in comparable operating profit on a thin 5.5% operating margin for Q1. With the stock trading well above the $8.83 consensus price target, SEB cut Nokia to Hold and Santander downgraded it to Underperform, both arguing the easy gains are over. Today's selloff is the market agreeing.
• The Bigger Bet Is on AI Networking — and That Story Hasn't Broken
AI and cloud orders in 2025 reached roughly €2.4 billion against only about €1.2 billion in recognized revenue — meaning a large backlog is waiting to convert into sales. Bank of America, which upgraded Nokia to Buy on April 13 with a $12.40 target, called the Infinera acquisition the "missing piece of the puzzle" for high-end optical technology as AI workloads demand unprecedented bandwidth.
The bottleneck is manufacturing capacity: Nokia's new California fab, offering roughly 20x capacity expansion, isn't expected to begin production until late 2026 or early 2027.
• Tomorrow's Report Will Reveal a New Financial Blueprint
This is the first quarter under Nokia's new segment structure, splitting the business into Network Infrastructure and Mobile Infrastructure , giving investors a cleaner view of where AI spending is actually landing. Adjusted EPS is expected at €0.04, with operating profit seen jumping ~62% year-over-year from a weak prior base. The real tell will be order intake — the pipeline of future revenue — not the headline profit number.