NVIDIA shares before quarterly figures: Citi sees buying opportunity and expects outperformance

• Citi analyst Atif Malik reiterates a buy recommendation for NVIDIA with a price target of $270
• Malik expects Q4 revenue of $67 billion, above consensus of $65.6 billion
• For the April quarter, Citi forecasts guidance of $73 billion

Citi Expects NVIDIA Sales Above Consensus

Major US bank Citi has reiterated its buy recommendation on NVIDIA shares and maintained a price target of $270. As per a client note published on February 17, 2026, citing Investing.com, Citi analyst Atif Malik expects revenue of $67 billion for the January quarter, above the market consensus of $65.6 billion. For the following April quarter, Malik forecasts guidance of $73 billion, compared with analyst expectations of $71.6 billion.

The central driver is the ongoing ramp-up of the B300 platform and the upcoming launch of the Rubin architecture. Malik expects sales growth to accelerate in the second half of calendar year 2026 to 34 percent in a half-year comparison, after 27 percent in the first half of the year. The stock is attractively valued at current levels and is expected to outperform in the second half of 2026 as demand visibility increases into 2027. For the 2027 financial year, Citi expects a gross margin of around 75 percent with an increase in operating costs in the high 30 percent range.

Record figures in the previous quarter as a basis

The expectations are based on strong operational dynamics. As shown in NVIDIA’s official earnings release dated November 19, 2025, the company achieved record revenue of $57 billion in the third quarter of fiscal 2026, up 62 percent year-on-year. The data center segment also reached a new high of $51.2 billion, growing 66 percent year over year. Non-GAAP earnings per share came in at $1.30, beating consensus of $1.26. CEO Jensen Huang called Blackwell demand exceptionally strong, citing fully utilized cloud GPU capacity across all generations.

For the fourth quarter, NVIDIA itself had forecast sales of $65 billion (plus/minus 2 percent) and a non-GAAP gross margin of 75 percent. In the Q3 earnings call, CFO Colette Kress estimated the combined pipeline for Blackwell and Ruby chips from the beginning of 2025 to the end of calendar year 2026 at around $500 billion, of which around $150 billion had already been delivered at the time.

Analysts look beyond the numbers

According to TipRanks analyst summary as of February 24, 2026, NVIDIA stock is rated at a Strong Buy consensus based on 32 Buy recommendations, no Hold recommendations, and one Sell recommendation. Wall Street consensus expects adjusted earnings per share of $1.54 (up 73 percent year-over-year) and revenue of $66.11 billion.

However, many market participants are already looking beyond the pure quarterly figures. As Malik points out in his note, many investors’ focus is on the annual GTC conference in mid-March 2026, where NVIDIA is expected to present its inference roadmap and provide a first look at AI sales for 2026 and 2027. UBS analyst Timothy Arcuri raised his price target to $245, according to TipRanks, citing a healthy supply chain and a favorable setup ahead of results.

Despite the widespread confidence, there are risk factors. US export restrictions on high-performance GPUs to China remain in place, and NVIDIA did not record any significant data center revenue from China in the previous quarter. Rising costs for high-bandwidth memory (HBM) could weigh on margins, and major cloud providers are increasingly developing their own AI chips. After a price rally lasting several years, expectations are correspondingly high, which could cause volatility if the forecast is even slightly cautious.

D. Maier / editorial team finanzen.net

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