Nearly every commercial satellite that photographs the Earth and sells the pictures belongs to one of four listed companies. Over eight days in early August, three of them opened their books. The answers had almost nothing in common.

The reports landed after a brutal summer, in which the selling had been indiscriminate: through July the whole listed space complex fell together, driven by financing and launch news rather than lost demand — a $1bn convertible raise at AST SpaceMobile, a Starship abort. The recovery since has been just as undiscriminating, and that is the problem.

Planet Labs: the growth arrived, and so did the shelf

Planet Labs runs the largest commercial imaging constellation — more than 150 satellites photographing the world's landmass daily — and sells the feed by subscription to farmers, insurers, mapmakers and defense ministries. In the quarter ended 30 April, revenue grew 42.1% to $94.2m, an acceleration from 32.6% two quarters earlier. Backlog rose 72% to more than $900m. Existing customers spent 114 cents for every dollar they spent a year earlier.

The shares fell about 24% anyway. Alongside the results Planet filed a shelf registration and launched a $1.5bn at-the-market equity offering, and guided full-year gross margin down to 52-54% from 56% with $80-95m of capital spending on its next-generation Pelican and Tanager satellites. Dilution was already running: diluted shares reached 345.5m, up 15% year on year, before the new program is drawn on.

That leaves the widest gap in the group between the business and the price. In early May this desk recorded Planet at 39.4x trailing sales and 70.2x trailing gross profit. It now trades at 24.5x sales and 44.1x gross profit, or 18.9x and 34.0x against forward estimates — a compression of roughly 38% while reported revenue sped up. Consensus models $436m of revenue this fiscal year and $570m next, with no profitable year before fiscal 2029. Planet is also the only member that has not reported since June, so its August gain rests on no fresh disclosure of its own.

BlackSky: real subscriptions, a multiple that went up

BlackSky sells on-demand satellite tasking — point a camera here, now — with AI analytics on top, mostly to defense and intelligence agencies. Second-quarter revenue rose 50.1% to $33.3m, reversing a 29.7% decline the quarter before. Subscription revenue hit a $100m annualized run rate, and adjusted EBITDA was $4.7m, a 14.2% margin, against -$2.8m a year earlier. The company reaffirmed 2026 guidance of $130-150m, raised $150m through an equity offering and won an eight-figure National Reconnaissance Office (NRO) award to accelerate its AROS mapping system.

It is also the only one of the four that is dearer than in May — 11.6x trailing sales against 10.87x — despite shares 26% lower over three months, because trailing gross profit shrank. One caveat: the vendor data records second-quarter gross profit as -$7.8m, identical to operating income and implausible against margins above 70% in prior quarters, which inflates the gross-profit multiple. The concentration to watch is elsewhere: international customers now account for 80% of funded backlog, with US business flat.

Satellogic: the record quarter Portugal paid for

Satellogic builds compact high-resolution imaging satellites and sells the data to governments for border security, agriculture and disaster response. Revenue rose 258.5% to $15.9m, gross margin reached 82.3%, and operating income turned positive for the first time, at $0.27m.

The mix is the catch. Europe supplied 58% of the quarter, principally an $18m contract to deliver satellites to Portugal's CEiiA — a hardware sale, not a subscription. Recurring data and analytics revenue was $7.1m, though that grew 54% sequentially. The company reported $80.7m of non-cancellable remaining performance obligations and $112.8m of cash. Against that: diluted shares rose 45.9% year on year to 150.6m, the heaviest dilution here; the chief financial officer departs on 21 August; and its historically barter-based arrangement with Palantir has not been renewed for cash. The multiple has roughly halved since May, to 25.0x trailing sales from 49.8x.

Spire: revenue that is actually shrinking

Spire Global operates satellites tracking ships, aircraft, weather and objects in orbit, and sells the data to governments and businesses. Reported revenue fell 5.9% to $18.0m, gross margin compressed to 34.1% from 48.9%, and adjusted EBITDA was -$8.6m. The 16% growth management cited requires excluding the divested maritime unit. It has $92m of cash, no debt, says 85% of full-year guidance is contracted, and on 14 August won a $3.7m National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration contract for weather data, with a larger renewal in negotiation. Its multiple slipped only from 8.59x sales to 7.28x — a modest de-rating against genuinely falling revenue.

What the month was

From 17 July to 14 August the four gained 29.0% on an equal-weighted basis. Weighted by size it is 15.3%, because Planet is 77% of the group's $10.7bn and moved least. The gain was not one gap day — no session exceeded 13.5% — but it was concentrated: the four averaged -4.2% to 31 July, then 34.6% after. Remove each name's two best days and Planet turns to -1.6% and Spire to -2.9%, while BlackSky holds 14.7% and Satellogic 21.1%. Over three months the group is down 30.7%, and all four sit 40-52% below their 2026 highs; the 50-day averages of Planet, BlackSky and Satellogic crossed below their 200-day lines in mid-August, describing the crash rather than the bounce.

Underneath sits a floor that is contractual rather than episodic: the NRO's Electro-Optical Commercial Layer, awarded in 2022 to Maxar, Planet and BlackSky, runs ten years — five guaranteed, five in options.

The setup

Where it stands — A post-earnings bounce inside a much larger three-month drawdown, with only Planet and BlackSky showing growth in recurring revenue.

Would confirm — Satellogic's data-and-analytics line growing again in Q3 without another one-off satellite-delivery contract in the mix.

Would invalidate — Planet's next quarter growing below 30% or backlog falling, which would make the 42% acceleration a peak.

Watch next — Planet reports fiscal Q2 in early September; Satellogic's Merlin constellation targets a first launch in October 2026.

Valuation — Planet at 24.5x trailing sales and 18.9x forward, against 39.4x recorded here in early May.