Coherent (COHR) Stock Drops 4% After Hours Despite Record Q4 Earnings Beat

TLDR

• Coherent posted Q4 adjusted EPS of $1.74, beating the $1.62 estimate, with revenue up 34% to $2.05 billion.
• Full fiscal year 2026 revenue hit $7.12 billion, with non-GAAP EPS of $5.61, up roughly 59% year-over-year.
• Q1 fiscal 2027 guidance of $2.2B to $2.4B in revenue and EPS of $1.85 to $2.05 topped analyst forecasts.
• COHR $COHR gained 8.2% during Wednesday’s regular session before dropping around 4% in after-hours.
• The pullback is seen as a classic “sell the news” move after a strong pre-earnings run.

Coherent (COHR) stock ended Wednesday up 8.2%, closing at $355.64, before sliding roughly 4% in after-hours to around $343.81. The move came after the company reported a record fiscal fourth quarter that beat estimates across the board.

Coherent, Inc., COHR

Q4 revenue came in at $2.05 billion, a 34% jump year-over-year, ahead of the $1.98 billion Wall Street expected. Adjusted EPS of $1.74 beat the $1.62 consensus and was up sharply from $1.00 a year ago.

For the full fiscal year 2026, Coherent posted revenue of $7.12 billion and non-GAAP EPS of $5.61, representing roughly 59% earnings growth year-over-year. CEO Jim Anderson called it “an outstanding year” with record revenue and margin expansion.

COHERENT $COHR Q4’26 EARNINGS HIGHLIGHTS

🔹 Revenue: $2.1B (Est. $1.99B) 🟢; +34% YoY
🔹 Adj. EPS: $1.74 (Est. $1.61) 🟢
🔹 Gross Margin: 40.2%; +215 bps YoY
🔹 Oper Income: $446M (Est. $427M) 🟢; +62.1% YoY

Q1 Guide:
🔹 Revenue: $2.2B-$2.4B (Est. $2.14B) 🟢
🔹 EPS: $1.85-$2.05… pic.twitter.com/W1Hrd3FWtw

— Wall St Engine (@wallstengine) August 12, 2026

Guidance for Q1 fiscal 2027 was also ahead of estimates. The company forecast revenue of $2.2 billion to $2.4 billion and adjusted EPS of $1.85 to $2.05. Analysts had been looking for $2.14 billion in revenue and $1.77 in EPS.

Anderson added that data centers are increasingly moving away from copper connectors toward optics, a trend that is driving demand for Coherent’s products. “We enter fiscal 2027 with exceptional customer demand, expanding production capacity, and multiple new growth platforms beginning to ramp,” he said.

Why Did the Stock Drop After Hours?

Despite the beat, COHR fell in after-hours. The reason is fairly straightforward: the good news was already priced in.

The stock had already rallied hard into earnings, partly on the back of strong results from optical networking peer Lumentum Holdings, which beat its own Q4 estimates on Tuesday and issued above-consensus Q1 guidance. That gave investors an early read-through on Coherent’s results.

Options markets had priced in an implied move of nearly 15% around the earnings print. Once the numbers came in and confirmed the beat, many investors who had positioned ahead of results simply rotated out.

Valuation Stretched Heading Into Print

COHR now trades at roughly 39 times forward earnings, up from around 25 times a year ago. That elevated multiple left little room for upside surprise, even with results that beat on every key metric.

Lumentum, trading at 41 times forward earnings, dipped 0.4% in after-hours trading following its own strong report the day before.

The broader market offered little additional support. The S&P 500 and Nasdaq finished Wednesday essentially flat, supported by a tame July CPI reading. Inflation rose just 0.1% month-over-month and 3.4% year-over-year, in line with expectations. That macro tailwind had already been absorbed during regular trading hours.

COHR has gained more than 200% over the past 12 months.

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