Shares of IREN Ltd (NASDAQ: IREN) surged 5.46% in after-hours trading on Thursday following the release of the company's impressive first-quarter fiscal year 2026 financial results. The blockchain and AI cloud infrastructure company reported earnings that significantly exceeded analyst expectations, driven by robust revenue growth and a swing to profitability.

IREN reported quarterly earnings of $1.08 per share, demolishing the analyst consensus estimate of $0.14 by a staggering 682.61%. This marks a dramatic turnaround from the $0.22 per share loss reported in the same period last year. Revenue for the quarter reached $240.3 million, up 384.71% year-over-year and beating the analyst estimate of $235.5 million by 2.04%. The company's pretax profit for Q1 FY26 came in at $575.3 million, vastly outperforming the $55.9 million forecast by analysts.

Looking ahead, IREN Ltd has set ambitious targets for its AI Cloud business. The company aims to achieve $3.4 billion in AI Cloud Annual Recurring Revenue (ARR) by the end of 2026, with $1.9 billion expected to come from its recently secured $9.7 billion contract with Microsoft. IREN also anticipates generating over $500 million in AI Cloud ARR from new contracts by Q1 2026, signaling strong growth potential in its expanding data center operations and GPU transition initiatives.

The market's after-hours reaction reflects investors' enthusiasm for IREN's outstanding financial performance and optimistic future outlook, particularly in the rapidly growing AI infrastructure sector.