Pulmonx has spent the past year turning a crisis call into a credible repair job. Costs are down, margins are up, the balance sheet has been refinanced and the sales force has been restaffed. What the company still has not shown is the one thing a turnaround ultimately needs: a top line that grows. Management has promised that US sales will reaccelerate to double-digit growth by the end of 2026, and the third-quarter report, due after the close on October 27, is the first real checkpoint on that promise.

The Street is not asking for much. Consensus calls for revenue of about $22.0 million, up only 2.4% from the year-ago $21.5 million and slightly below the $22.8 million posted last quarter. The expected loss of $0.26 per share would be a solid improvement from the $0.34 loss a year earlier, though a touch wider than last quarter's $0.24. The whisper number sits at a $0.24 loss, a modest signal that some investors expect the cost discipline to hold rather than slip. Management continues to guide full-year revenue to $90 million to $92 million, and consensus of $90.88 million sits almost exactly at the midpoint. That guidance was reaffirmed, not raised, and it implies essentially flat sales against the $90.5 million booked in 2025.

That flat outlook is where the tension lives. If Pulmonx is truly going to exit the year growing at a double-digit clip in the US, the third quarter should show the slope changing. US sales declined 11% in the fourth quarter of 2025 and 7% in the first quarter of 2026, a trough that management framed as the bottom. A US number that moves clearly toward flat or positive would validate that view. Another mid-single-digit decline would make the year-end target look like a heavy lift concentrated in a single quarter. The leading indicators are encouraging: new US treating center additions climbed from 9 to 10 to 15 over three quarters, and the company said turnover in a sales organization that lost roughly half its people in 2025 has stabilized. The catch is that new reps typically need six to nine months to become productive, so this quarter should start to reveal whether those hires are converting centers into procedures.

International results carry their own swing factor. China, roughly 5% of revenue, has been absent all year while the company waits on a registration certificate renewal that management expected in the second half. Confirmation that distributor shipments have resumed, or at least a firm timeline, would remove a nagging drag on overseas comparisons. On AeroSeal, investors should look for continued enrollment progress in CONVERT II, the publication status of CONVERT ONE and any clearer sense of when a European launch could begin, since none of that has a firm date yet.

Profitability is the more reliable part of the story. Gross margin hit 78% in the first quarter against a 75% full-year guide, and operating expenses are targeted at $113 million to $115 million versus $120.8 million last year. Holding the line there, and staying on pace for roughly $23 million of 2026 cash burn, keeps the path toward eventual breakeven intact.

The market has already moved ahead of the evidence. Shares have climbed about 27% since the last report against a 3.7% gain for the S&P 500, and bullish sentiment has roughly doubled from 27.1% to 57.5%. At $1.78, the stock trades above its 200-day average of $1.66 but well below the $2.59 high reached after the last report, suggesting some of the early enthusiasm has already been tested. With cost cuts largely credited, the stock now hinges on whether US revenue finally bends upward. A clear improvement in US growth would make the double-digit exit rate believable; another quarter of declines would leave the turnaround looking like a well-run cost story still waiting for its growth chapter.