Luis von Ahn, CEO and cofounder of Duolingo (Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images)

Duolingo has run into stiff headwinds this year.

15m

Duolingo reported Q3 earnings after the close on Wednesday.

The language-learning app posted:

Q3 adjusted EBITDA of $80 million vs. Wall Street expectations for $71.2 million.

Q3 sales of $271.1 million vs. estimates for $260.3 million.

Daily active users of 50.5 million vs. expectations for 51.1 million.

Full-year sales guidance of between $1.028 billion to $1.032 billion vs. expectations for $1.018 billion

Duolingo has struggled to regain the market momentum it started the year with. The stock was up nearly 70% for the year by May, before a company memo posted on LinkedIn about Duolingo’s AI-first strategy, which laid out plans to replace some outside contractors with AI, provoked a social media backlash.

The stock began to sputter amid signs that user activity was slowing. Shares got a brief respite after Duolingo posted a strong earnings report for Q2, but the sell-off soon resumed. Through the end of the daily session on Wednesday, the stock was down nearly 20% for the year and at its lowest level of 2025.

From Wall Street’s perspective, the epicenter of concern seems to surround Duolingo’s ability to recover its former growth in daily active users, a key measure of user engagement.

Lucid dips as it lowers its full-year production forecast

Shares of Lucid are down more than 4% in after hours trading on Wednesday following the luxury EV maker’s third-quarter earnings results.

Lucid, which delivered 47% more vehicles in Q3 than in the same period last year, posted an adjusted loss per share of $2.65, compared to the $2.29 per share loss Wall Street analysts polled by FactSet expected.

The company also:

Booked $336.6 million in revenue, up 68% from last year and above the consensus of $349.5 million.

Updated its full-year production outlook to 18,000 vehicles, the bottom of its previous range of between 18,000 and 20,000 vehicles. Wall Street expected the company to build 18,940 vehicles on the year.

Lucid shares sold off heavily during Q3 as the company executed a 1-for-10 reverse stock split that took effect in early September. The stock remains lower compared to highs earlier this year and is down more than 40% year-ro-date as of Wednesday’s close. That’s significantly underperforming larger rivals like Rivian and Tesla.

Lyft slides after reporting earnings miss

Lyft fell after it reported earnings results that missed Wall Street estimates.

The company reported earnings per share of $0.11, compared to the $0.24 analysts polled by FactSet were expecting. The company reported gross bookings of $4.8 billion, slightly more than the $4.7 billion the Street was expecting. It reported revenue of $1.7 billion, in line with analyst expectations.

Its top competitor, Uber, reported revenue numbers on Tuesday that beat expectations, though its stock still took a dip on the news.

Joby posts a deeper-than-expected Q3 loss but its cash pile holds steady

Air taxi maker Joby Aviation reported earnings after the bell on Wednesday, and its shares were roughly flat after the report.

Joby posted a loss per share of $0.48, deeper than the $0.19 loss expected by analysts polled by FactSet.

The company also:

Ended the third quarter with $978.1 million in cash (and cash equivalents), down about 1% from Q2.

Said it’s now 77% complete with the fourth stage of its five-stage certification process, up from 70% in the second quarter.

Earlier this week, reports of a possible delay in Joby’s UAE commercial flight timeline and an IPO by rival Beta Technologies sent its shares lower. In August, Joby announced that it would buy helicopter ride-share business Blade. About 40,000 passengers flew with Blade in Q3, according to Joby.

AppLovin modestly exceeds sales and earnings expectations in Q3

AppLovin rose after the adtech company reported top- and bottom-line results that modestly exceeded expectations, along with guidance for the current quarter that strikes a similar chord.

The Q3 results:

Revenue: $1.41 billion (compared to an analyst consensus estimate of $1.34 billion and guidance for $1.33 billion)

Adjusted EBITDA: $1.16 billion (estimate: $1.09 billion, guidance: $1.08 billion)

Q4 guidance:

Revenue: $1.585 billion (estimate: $1.54 billion)

Adjusted EBITDA: $1.315 billion (estimate: $1.27 billion)

Shares are up about 3% in postmarket trading as of 4:15 p.m. ET.

After its Q2 report, CEO Adam Foroughi said that the real “fun” starts this quarter, as the company began to open its self-service ad portal on a referral basis on October 1. Bank of America analyst Omar Dessouky is especially bullish on this channel, expecting the company to book 4,000 large advertisers after the portal becomes fully available for onboards in the first half of 2026.

However, Q4 has not been fun for the adtech company thus far. Shares are down about 15% since the end of September, with the bulk of the decline catalyzed by a report that the SEC is investigating its data collection practices, which was followed by another report indicating that multiple state regulators are also looking into the same matter.

“Legal risk lingers: AppLovin has denied short-seller claims about its Array product, which was later shut down amid possible probes by the SEC and some US state regulators,” Bloomberg Intelligence technology analyst Nathan Naidu wrote ahead of this report. “A related class-action suit filed in March could cost up to $750 million if it proceeds to trial.”

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