Broadcom Inc. (NASDAQ: AVGO) is set to report its first-quarter fiscal year 2026 results on Wednesday evening, March 4, with investors and analysts closely watching whether the semiconductor and infrastructure software giant can extend its nine-consecutive-quarter streak of beating Wall Street estimates. The earnings conference call is scheduled for 5:00 p.m. Eastern Time.
Consensus expectations call for Q1 revenue of $19.21 billion, representing 29% year-over-year growth, with non-GAAP earnings per share of $2.02 — a 26% improvement from the prior-year period. The options market is pricing in a move of approximately 8.6% in either direction around the announcement, reflecting meaningful investor uncertainty about both the results and management's forward guidance.
The central focus for the quarter is Broadcom's AI semiconductor division, which is projected to deliver roughly $8.2 billion in revenue, essentially doubling the figure from Q1 FY2025. This explosive growth stems from Broadcom's leadership in designing custom AI accelerators — known as XPUs — for some of the world's largest technology companies. In the prior quarter, CEO Hock Tan disclosed that Anthropic placed an additional $11 billion order for delivery in late 2026, following a $10 billion order in Q3, bringing the company's total AI backlog to $73 billion expected to be fulfilled over the next 18 months.
RBC Capital Markets analyst Srini Pajjuri expects Q1 revenue of $19.1 billion driven by networking strength, and projects Q2 to reach $20.4 billion. He noted that Anthropic's planned procurement of up to one million TPUs resulted in $21 billion in rack orders for Broadcom, scheduled to ramp in the second half of 2026. Broadcom also recently commenced shipments of its first 2-nanometer custom compute system-on-chip, manufactured using its proprietary 3.5D eXtreme Dimension System in Package architecture — a breakthrough that positions the company at the leading edge of advanced packaging technology.
UBS analyst Timothy Arcuri maintained a Buy rating and a $475 price target ahead of the print, arguing that recent share price weakness — AVGO is down more than 20% from its December peak — reflects multiple compression across the software sector rather than any fundamental deterioration in the chip business. He identified potential headwinds in the VMware infrastructure software division, including customer attrition at license renewal dates and the possible displacement of workloads by AI-driven development tools.
Broadcom's infrastructure software segment, which was transformed by the 2023 acquisition of VMware, delivered $6.9 billion in Q4 FY2025 revenue, up 19% year-over-year, with software gross margins of 93% and operating margins of 78%. Analysts will be watching whether these metrics are sustained in Q1 as VMware customers cycle through renewed contracts. For the full FY2025, Broadcom reported consolidated revenue of $64 billion, up 24%, with adjusted EBITDA of $43 billion and free cash flow of $26.9 billion — up 39% year-over-year.