Rivian shares rallied Friday to one of their best days ever, continuing a strong stretch for the Tesla rival following the election and bucking conventional wisdom about what President-elect Donald Trump’s cold stance on electric vehicle subsidies may mean for Rivian stock.
Rivian stock has been a surprise post-election winner.
Rivian stock rose about 23% to over $16 by mid-afternoon trading, pacing toward the second-best daily percentage gain since the company went public in November 2021.
The California-based automaker registered its highest intraday share price since July.
The rally followed Rivian’s morning report revealing slightly better fourth-quarter car delivery data than Wall Street expected.
The 14,183 vehicles delivered last quarter topped consensus analyst estimates of about 13,000, according to FactSet, while Rivian’s 51,579 deliveries across 2024 edged out the consensus forecast of about 51,000.
Friday was a strong day for American car stocks across the board – Tesla rose 7%, reversing Thursday’s 6% loss, and shares of Ford and General Motors gained 2% and 1%, respectively, after each legacy firm reported its best annual car sales since 2019.
54%. That’s how much Rivian stock is up since Election Day, outperforming every S&P 500 stock other than Tesla (61%) and the red hot, artificial intelligence-focused defense contractor Palantir (56%). The robust Rivian return moves against initial analyst concerns that Trump’s reported intention to cut the federal EV subsidy would hurt Rivian and other EV players more severely than Tesla, concerns that initially fueled an 8% drop in the first trading session following Trump’s victory.
Shares of Rivian are down 90% from its peak shortly after its November 2021 initial public offering, the largest IPO since Facebook’s 2014 debut. The company’s 52,000 vehicle deliveries in 2024 are just 3% of Tesla’s 1.79 million deliveries last year, and Rivian’s $17 billion market capitalization is just 1% of Tesla’s $1.3 trillion. Rivian has yet to report a profitable quarter in its brief history as a public company, reporting at least a $558 million loss by EBITDA (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and appreciation) in each of its 14 quarters.
Rivian has significant institutional support, scoring a $5 billion investment from Volkswagen in May and a $6.6 billion conditional loan in November from the Department of Energy to build a plant in Georgia. Rivian accounted for about 4% of electric vehicle sales in the U.S. last year, according to Morgan Stanley research. Purchases of most Rivian vehicles qualify for a $3,750 federal tax credit as part of the government’s electric and hybrid vehicle subsidy, a program Trump reportedly intends to repeal shortly after he takes office this month, which could hurt EV demand as it effectively increases the sticker price by the size of the prior subsidy.