Electric car startup rolls out second-largest US IPO after Facebook
Shares of Rivian Automotive continued to rise on Thursday, following the electric-truck maker’s outstanding Nasdaq debut on November 10. It’s now on track to be the most valuable US automaker after Tesla.
The stock surged 8% in the US premarket to well above $108. This comes after a jump of more than 29% during its first day of trading.
The Amazon-backed company raised nearly $12 billion during the listing, which was the biggest globally this year, and the sixth-largest ever on a US exchange.
Rivian’s market value briefly touched $104 billion, before closing at $85.9 billion. It thus ranked ahead of General Motors ($85 billion), Ford Motor Company (around $77 billion), and Lucid Group ($65 billion).
“The transition to a public company [and] the growth in our capital base” enables Rivian to develop “promising products and volume and growth in terms of new segments and new vehicles that we’ll be going into,” Rivian Chief Executive R.J. Scaringe was quoted as saying by Reuters.
The manufacturer of electric pickup trucks and SUVs was founded in 2009. The company has so far delivered just 150 of its electric R1T pickup trucks to customers (mostly employees) and has little revenue to report. Rivian rolled out the R1T – its first vehicle – in September and will launch its electric SUV, the R1S, in December. Prices for the pickup truck start at $67,500, while the SUV base package starts at $75,500.
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