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Embattled EV Manufacturer’s Stock Dives After Disappointing Quarterly Numbers

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Nick Pope Contributor
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Rivian, a company that specializes in manufacturing high-end electric vehicles (EVs), posted underwhelming results for 2023’s fourth quarter, prompting its stock to fall on Tuesday, Reuters reported.

The company missed market estimates for deliveries in the fourth quarter amid stiff competition in the EV industry and a high interest environment, with its deliveries miss prompting the company’s stock to lose approximately 10% of its value as of Tuesday morning, according to Reuters and data from Google Finance. The company went public in November 2021 with an initial public offering price of $78 per share, but its stock now trades for about $21 per share.

“We’ll talk in greater detail on Q4 results during our earnings call in February. However, it’s worth noting our CFO’s commentary on the Q3 call,” a Rivian spokesperson told the Daily Caller News Foundation. “She stated that because Amazon limits the intake of new commercial vans during its peak holiday delivery period, we expected a more significant gap between production and deliveries in Q4 relative to prior periods in the year. Consistent with this, the vast majority of finished goods inventory built in Q4 was associated with commercial vans.” (RELATED: Electric Vehicle Startups Running Out Of Juice As Demand Lags, Production Stalls)

Rivian delivered 13,972 EVs in the fourth quarter through Dec. 31, a number that is 10% lower than its deliveries executed during the prior quarter, according to Reuters. Market analysts anticipated that the company would be able to deliver more than 14,400 EVs in the quarter.

The company received a massive $1.5 billion subsidy package from the state of Georgia in 2022, and the company’s R1T model pickup truck is eligible for the $7,500 federal consumer tax credit, according to Bloomberg News. The starting price for Rivian’s R1T pickup is $73,000 before taxes or additional fees, while its R1S sports utility vehicle starts at $78,000.

Rivian rolled more than 17,500 EVs off the line over the last three months of the year, an increase of 7.5% from the third quarter, according to Reuters. The fourth quarter’s results brought overall production for the year over 57,000 EVs, which exceeded the company’s forecasted output of 54,000.

The company lost about $33,000 on every EV it sold in the second quarter of 2023, according to The Wall Street Journal. Rivian may be in poor financial shape, but the company believes that it has enough money on hand to keep it afloat through 2025, according to Reuters.

Rivian’s struggles are occurring as the wider American EV industry finds itself in a tenuous position, despite the Biden administration’s efforts to spur the industry with a massive spending and regulatory push to help reach the White House’s goal of having EVs constitute 50% of all new car sales by 2030. Consumer demand is not growing as rapidly as EV proponents had projected, major manufacturers are losing considerable sums of money on their EV product lines and executives are backing away from near-term production targets while the nation’s charging infrastructure remains inconsistent and unevenly distributed across the country, with most chargers located in coastal or densely-populated areas rather than throughout the American heartland.

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