Digital Realty Trust (NYSE:DLR) Posts Quarterly Earnings Results, Misses Expectations By $0.04 EPS

Digital Realty Trust (NYSE:DLR) released its quarterly earnings results on Thursday. The real estate investment trust reported $0.48 EPS for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.52 by ($0.04), FiscalAI reports. Digital Realty Trust had a net margin of 13.06% and a return on equity of 3.81%. The business had revenue of $1.90 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $1.75 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the company earned $1.89 EPS. Digital Realty Trust’s revenue for the quarter was up 20.6% compared to the same quarter last year.

Here are the key takeaways from Digital Realty Trust’s conference call:

• Record leasing activity reached $855 million, with bookings up 20% from the prior quarterly record and total backlog rising nearly 30% sequentially to $2.5 billion. Management said the backlog provides strong visibility into 2027 and beyond.
• Core FFO per share rose 11% year over year to $2.10, prompting Digital Realty to raise its 2026 guidance by $0.15 to $8.30–$8.35 per share, implying nearly 13% annual growth. Same-capital cash NOI and renewal-spread expectations were also increased.
• Demand broadened beyond large AI training deployments, with record colocation, interconnection, and hyperscale bookings across regions. AI-related deployments represented 44% of zero-to-one-megawatt bookings, while inference, agentic AI, and sovereign AI are expanding demand for distributed, connectivity-rich capacity.
• The company closed more than $1.4 billion of cornerstone commitments for a perpetual private-capital strategy focused on stabilized North American hyperscale data centers. Combined with debt and equity issuance, management estimates more than $20 billion of available capital for future development.
• Digital Realty continued investing heavily, spending $1.5 billion on development CapEx in the quarter and expanding its pipeline to 1.5 gigawatts under construction at an expected cost of $22 billion. Management cited supply-chain expertise and a diversified global footprint as tools to mitigate industry-wide development delays and cost pressures.

Digital Realty Trust Stock Down 1.4%

Shares of DLR opened at $180.26 on Friday. The stock has a market capitalization of $66.88 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 75.42, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.53 and a beta of 0.99. Digital Realty Trust has a 1 year low of $146.23 and a 1 year high of $208.14. The business’s 50 day simple moving average is $181.45 and its 200-day simple moving average is $182.91. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.68, a current ratio of 1.06 and a quick ratio of 1.06.

Digital Realty Trust Dividend Announcement

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, September 30th. Stockholders of record on Tuesday, September 15th were issued a dividend of $1.22 per share. This represents a $4.88 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 2.7%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Tuesday, September 15th. Digital Realty Trust’s dividend payout ratio is 204.18%.

Digital Realty Trust News Roundup

Here are the key news stories impacting Digital Realty Trust this week:

• Positive Sentiment: Third-quarter FFO and revenue exceeded expectations. Core FFO was $2.10 per share, beating estimates by $0.10, while revenue reached approximately $1.90 billion—$140 million above consensus—and increased 20.6% year over year. Digital Realty Trust FFO and revenue results
• Positive Sentiment: Improving data-center fundamentals supported the outlook. Record bookings, higher occupancy and stronger rental rates drove double-digit core FFO growth. Management raised its 2026 core FFO outlook to $8.30-$8.35 per share, broadly in line with the FactSet estimate of $8.34. DLR Q3 FFO and revenue outlook
• Positive Sentiment: Analysts raised their price targets and maintained bullish ratings. Wells Fargo lifted its target to $225 from $220, Cantor Fitzgerald raised its target to $223 from $221, and Citigroup increased its target to $234 from $226. Wells Fargo and Cantor Fitzgerald both retained “overweight” ratings. Wells Fargo Digital Realty Trust rating
• Neutral Sentiment: Investor focus remains on execution and valuation. The raised outlook was close to existing expectations, limiting the potential for a major positive surprise. DLR also trades at a high earnings multiple, making the stock sensitive to interest rates and any slowdown in data-center demand.
• Negative Sentiment: Reported EPS missed the consensus estimate. Digital Realty posted quarterly EPS of $0.48 versus expectations of $0.52, despite the revenue beat. The earnings shortfall may have prompted profit-taking and helped offset the stronger FFO and operating metrics. Digital Realty Trust quarterly earnings
• Negative Sentiment: Put-option activity increased. Traders purchased 3,148 put options, approximately 87% above typical volume, signaling increased near-term hedging or bearish speculation.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of equities analysts recently commented on the company. Wall Street Zen raised Digital Realty Trust from a “sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Saturday, July 25th. KeyCorp reissued a “sector weight” rating on shares of Digital Realty Trust in a report on Friday, July 24th. Truist Financial reduced their price target on shares of Digital Realty Trust from $225.00 to $220.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, July 30th. Argus upgraded shares of Digital Realty Trust from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating and set a $212.00 price target on the stock in a report on Wednesday, August 5th. Finally, Wells Fargo & Company boosted their price target on shares of Digital Realty Trust from $220.00 to $225.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Friday. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twenty-five have assigned a Buy rating and six have assigned a Hold rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $221.35.

Insider Buying and Selling at Digital Realty Trust

In related news, Director Mark Patterson sold 200 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, August 27th. The shares were sold at an average price of $193.96, for a total value of $38,792.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the director directly owned 6,322 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $1,226,215.12. This trade represents a 3.07% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Company insiders own 0.15% of the company’s stock.

Digital Realty Trust Company Profile

Digital Realty Trust, Inc is a real estate investment trust that owns, operates and develops data center facilities for businesses, cloud service providers, information technology companies and telecommunications organizations. The company provides the physical infrastructure needed to support data storage, networking, cloud computing and other digital operations.

Its services include data center colocation, interconnection and private connectivity solutions. Digital Realty also offers access to cloud and network providers through its PlatformDIGITAL platform, which is designed to help customers deploy, connect and manage their digital infrastructure across multiple locations.

Founded in 2001, Digital Realty serves customers through a global portfolio of data centers and related facilities across North America, Europe, Asia-Pacific and Latin America.