Rivian (NASDAQ:RIVN) stock is accelerating higher by about 8% following comments from Chief Financial Officer Claire McDonough at Barclays’ 2023 Global Automotive & Mobility Tech Conference.
For starters, the company plans on launching a cheaper version of its battery pack, called the Standard battery back, for its R1 vehicles next year.
“We’re introducing our Standard battery pack in R1 and that allows us to open up a larger addressable market of consumers for R1 vehicles, given that it’s at a starting selling price in the low $70,000 area. So that’s another important new technology we’ll be introducing into R1 that’s not available today,” said McDonough.
On top of the Standard battery pack, another battery pack that could lower R1 prices as well is in the works. This battery pack is expected to cut costs by thousands of dollars, weigh less and be easier to manufacture than Rivian’s prior battery packs.
These developments are expected to make Rivian gross margin positive in 2024. A side effect of these new developments is that McDonough expects Rivian’s assembly lines to pause for “several weeks” next year as the company enacts the changes.
5 Investors Betting Big on RIVN Stock
Tracking institutional ownership is important, as these large investors provide liquidity and support for stocks. During Q3, 625 13F filers disclosed ownership in RIVN stock, an increase of 30 filers from the prior quarter. In total, these filers own 599.77 million shares, up slightly by 0.72% compared to 595.46 million shares. 10 of these filers own RIVN in their top 10 positions.
Hedge funds, whose data is included in 13F data, were much more bullish. Total shares owned by hedge funds increased by 17.82% to 85.29 million from 72.39 million. Additionally, total hedge fund owners increased to 127 from 120.
With that in mind, let’s take a look at Rivian’s top five shareholders:
- Amazon (NASDAQ:AMZN): 158.36 million shares. Amazon’s stake remained unchanged during Q3.
- Global Oryx Group: 113.93 million shares. Global Oryx’s stake is accurate as of November 2021.
- T. Rowe Price (NASDAQ:TROW): 71.52 million shares. T. Rowe sold 1.77 million shares during Q3.
- Vanguard: 63.84 million shares. Vanguard acquired 408,677 shares during Q3.
- BlackRock (NYSE:BLK): 46.14 million shares. BlackRock sold 9.68 million shares during Q3.
On the date of publication, Eddie Pan held a long position in AMZN. The opinions expressed in this article are those of the writer, subject to the InvestorPlace.com Publishing Guidelines.
