AMTX — Q2 2026 Financial Report Analysis

Overview

Aemetis turned a $10.7 million operating loss a year ago into a $5.8 million operating profit in the second quarter of 2026. Revenue rose 20% to $62.7 million. The biggest single reason was not fuel sales. It was $8.6 million of federal Section 45Z production tax credits (PTCs), which Aemetis now books inside revenue each quarter. These are credits for making low-carbon fuel, and the company sells them to other taxpayers for cash. A year ago it was already earning the same kind of credit, but it waited until the fourth quarter of 2025 to recognize all of 2025's credits at once. Take the credits out and the company still lost $2.8 million at the operating level. Then about $15 million of quarterly interest, on debt that keeps growing, produced a net loss of $9.4 million. The 10-Q still says there is "substantial doubt" the company can continue as a going concern.

At a glance

• $8.6 million of tax credits inside $62.7 million of revenue. Without them, revenue grew 3.6% and operating income would have been a $2.8 million loss, not a $5.8 million profit.
• Ethanol margins really did improve. The Keyes, California plant sold 12% more ethanol (15.5 million gallons) at $2.19 a gallon, up from $2.01, while its corn cost fell to $6.07 a bushel from $6.42.
• $973 thousand of cash against $415.9 million of debt. $269.6 million of that debt is owed to the senior lender, Third Eye Capital, and the lender can demand repayment at any time.

Results

Gross profit is revenue minus the direct cost of making the product (corn, energy, labor, plant depreciation). Operating margin is the share of revenue left after those costs and overhead, before interest and tax.

What drove each business

Aemetis reports three operating segments.

California Ethanol (Keyes plant). Segment revenue rose 41.8% to $52.9 million. That includes $6.5 million of tax credit income; sales to customers alone rose 24% to $46.4 million. Ethanol sales were $34.0 million, up from $27.7 million, and wet distillers grains (a cattle feed left over from the process) were $9.7 million, up from $7.8 million. The plant ground 5.4 million bushels of corn, up from 4.7 million. Cost of goods sold rose only 7.1% because each bushel was cheaper. Ethanol makers earn the gap between what ethanol sells for and what corn and natural gas cost, so a higher ethanol price and lower corn cost in the same quarter is the best case. Even before the credits, this segment made about $2.4 million of gross profit, against a $3.8 million gross loss a year ago.

Dairy renewable natural gas (RNG). This business captures methane from cow manure in digesters on 15 dairies and cleans it into pipeline gas. The gas itself is nearly worthless here: it sold for an average $1.51 per MMBtu (a standard unit of gas energy), down from $2.75, and gas sales were just $222 thousand. The money comes from environmental credits. Aemetis sold 1.3 million D3 RINs (federal Renewable Fuel Standard credits) at $2.54, which brought in $3.2 million, and 27.5 thousand California Low Carbon Fuel Standard (LCFS) credits at $66 each, up from $55, which brought in $1.8 million. Another $2.1 million came from tax credits. Volume rose 38% because more digesters are running. Seven of the twelve digesters now have approved "provisional pathways," a California rating that earns more LCFS credits per unit of gas than the temporary rating the other five still use.

India Biodiesel. Revenue fell 78.9% to $2.5 million. The 10-Q says this was "primarily due to OMC contracts not received during the second quarter." The plant sells biodiesel to India's government-owned oil marketing companies (OMCs) through a tender process, and none bought in the quarter. Biodiesel volume fell to 1.4 thousand metric tons from 9.4 thousand. Over the full first half, segment revenue was down only 10.6%, because Q1 was strong. This business swings from quarter to quarter with the timing of government tenders. Aemetis is preparing a possible IPO of the Indian subsidiary.

What the headline numbers hide

• The year-over-year comparison flatters 2026. In 2025, Aemetis recognized all twelve months of its 45Z credits in the fourth quarter. Starting in 2026 it books them each quarter, inside revenue. So Q2 2025 shows zero credit income even though the plants were earning credits then. Of the $16.4 million improvement in operating income, $8.6 million is this timing difference. The rest, about $7.9 million, is real: better ethanol prices and volume, cheaper corn, more RNG, and higher LCFS prices.
• Credits earned are not yet cash. The balance sheet now carries $12.2 million of 45Z credits earned but not yet sold, up from $5.5 million at year-end. The company says it has sold its ethanol credits through mid-June 2026. Until it sells the rest, part of the reported profit exists only on paper.
• Operating cash flow looks better than it is because interest is going unpaid. In the first half, operations used $12.4 million of cash against a $31.1 million net loss. That smaller cash drain was helped by a $21.3 million rise in accrued interest, meaning interest that was charged but not paid in cash. It is added to the debt instead. Total debt rose $34.1 million in six months, to $415.9 million, and $26.7 million of that increase was accrued interest.
• Interest consumes everything the business makes. Interest expense on borrowed money was $13.3 million in the quarter, up 18.5% "due to higher variable interest rates and higher debt balances." That is more than twice the $5.8 million operating profit, even with the credits included.
• Adjusted EBITDA includes the credits. The company's $9.7 million adjusted EBITDA (earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortization, with some items excluded) also counts the $8.6 million of credit income. It is a measure before interest, which is this company's biggest cost.
• The loss per share improved partly because there are more shares. Weighted shares outstanding rose 23% to 70.9 million, mainly from at-the-market stock sales: 2.6 million shares for $7.1 million in the quarter. Net loss narrowed 60%, and spreading it over more shares makes the loss per share narrow 68%. Selling stock is also how the company pays for operations. Shareholders' deficit (liabilities above assets) widened to $322.1 million.
• There was no help from tax this year. Q2 2025 had a $0.5 million tax benefit and Q2 2026 had none, so the comparison is slightly cleaner on that line.

Takeaway: The operations improved in a real way: ethanol and dairy gas together made about $7.9 million more than a year ago before any tax credits. But the swing to an operating profit depends on tax credits the company has not yet fully turned into cash, and $13.3 million of quarterly interest on a growing, on-demand debt load still leaves a net loss. Whether Aemetis survives depends on refinancing, not on one good quarter.

Outlook

Aemetis gives no revenue or earnings guidance. It names these milestones:

• Two more dairy digesters are expected to start in the third quarter of 2026, and six more biogas pathways are "nearing approval." Both would raise RNG volume and the number of LCFS credits per unit of gas.
• The mechanical vapor recompression (MVR) system at Keyes is expected to start running in 2026. It uses electricity instead of natural gas and should cut the plant's fossil gas use by about 80%. That would lower energy costs and the fuel's carbon score, which in turn would raise LCFS and 45Z credit income per gallon.
• Financing: the company is preparing a long-term financing for the Keyes plant, raising money for more digesters, and working toward the India IPO.

Our read: the next quarter's operating result depends mostly on the ethanol-minus-corn spread and on whether India's OMCs resume buying. Both are outside the company's control. The things to watch are whether credit receivables turn into cash, whether total debt keeps rising by roughly $17 million a quarter, and whether Third Eye Capital keeps extending its loans. The 10-Q says future extensions "will continue to be at the discretion of the lender." The MVR start-up is the most important operating milestone, because it would raise the credits earned on every gallon. Until a refinancing is announced, shareholders should expect more dilution from stock sales.