Automotive stock market opportunities...?

Do we have a thread for discussing whose stock is up, down, or a potential screaming deal?  Dunno if it's anything anyone follows...

All you'll get is a bunch of opinions and theories. Anyone who really knows anything will be forbidden from replying.

Nobody knows anything, including me. If someone had told me that Tesla was a "screaming deal" when Covid hit, I'd have laughed at them.

Ford is fairly strong, from what I have been following.  Recession hit and everything tanked.  Starting to climb again.

Personally, I'd look at things that supply automotive industry.  Steel, chip manufacturers, etc.

Not Holley . . .

Lucid took a nose dive today.  Rivian's doing layoffs and draining the Amazon coffers.  Ford won't make you a buck.  Chips are up.

Somebody more knowledgeable than me, and that person won't be hard to find, please chime in, but...

I've been wondering about buying options to buy AND sell GM or Ford at today's price in six months. If their prices change, up or down, more than the cost of the options over that time, you make money. You don't care what happens, you just hope that something happens. And that seems to me to be a relatively safe bet.

I'd include Stellantis, but I have no idea how to deal with a stock that's principally listed on the Borsa Italiana in Milan.

kb58 said:

All you'll get is a bunch of opinions and theories. Anyone who really knows anything will be forbidden from replying.

Nobody knows anything, including me. If someone had told me that Tesla was a "screaming deal" when Covid hit, I'd have laughed at them.

Bill Gates is known to have held a large short position on Tesla for years now, which seems like a very sensible thing to do with a small automaker valued higher than the entire old guard of automotive megacorps combined. But the market is often not sensible (see also: how Tesla stock got to where it is in the first place), and if more Robinhood-style "retail investing" becomes popular in the future, it may shatter any vestigial notions of sensibility that were left in the stock market.

So there are really only two types of advice you can get, insider info and tips that might as well be "put it all on red!"

GameboyRMH said:

kb58 said:

All you'll get is a bunch of opinions and theories. Anyone who really knows anything will be forbidden from replying.

Nobody knows anything, including me. If someone had told me that Tesla was a "screaming deal" when Covid hit, I'd have laughed at them.

So there are really only two types of advice you can get, insider info and tips that might as well be "put it all on red!"

Pretty much this. Logic and sound business fundamentals left the market a long, long time ago. 

Your current options are: insider trade, be an institutional investor with billions to bully the market, treat "investing" like the legalized gambling that it is. 

My buddy seems to think Carlotz will pop up to $1/share and then drop back down, but I don't have the fortitude to play with penny stocks, especially ones that are on the verge of being de-listed.

Stealthtercel said:

Somebody more knowledgeable than me, and that person won't be hard to find, please chime in, but...

I've been wondering about buying options to buy AND sell GM or Ford at today's price in six months. If their prices change, up or down, more than the cost of the options over that time, you make money. You don't care what happens, you just hope that something happens. And that seems to me to be a relatively safe bet.

I'd include Stellantis, but I have no idea how to deal with a stock that's principally listed on the Borsa Italiana in Milan.

Over 90% of options expire literally worthless.  You should find out why before ever putting money in.  You can actually watch people/institutions flush millions in options down the toilet every week just by examining open interest at various expiration periods.  Most options plays are extremely sketchy bets that must be watched like a hawk, especially near expiration.

My $.02 and that's what it's worth... Fisker (FSR) if you're looking for a promising electric car company. Not valued anywhere near as high as Rivian or Lucid are/were, but maybe at a more realistic price for where they are now in the production and speculation cycle. 

Looking for automotive stocks in particular reminds me of when I got a job at an auto parts warehouse.

The warehouse job was a warehouse job, and wouldn't have been any different at all if I'd been picking and delivering propane accessories or bowling balls.

None of our GRM specialist knowledge really helps with picking automotive stocks (save for the occasional "I work there and know something but can't share it or act on it"). You might as well look for more general investing advice and appreciate the appreciation rather than focusing on trying to get interest out of an area of interest. (Okay, that was tortured since stock appreciation isn't interest per se, but I couldn't resist.)

And you may be well aware of all that and want to dabble anyway, which is also fine. My wife invested an "totally ready to lose this much" amount in 3D printing tech years ago. 3D printing has gotten huge but somehow we didn't make a discernable amount of money out of the combo of stocks.

nedc said:

My $.02 and that's what it's worth... Fisker (FSR) if you're looking for a promising electric car company. Not valued anywhere near as high as Rivian or Lucid are/were, but maybe at a more realistic price for where they are now in the production and speculation cycle. 

I bet the guys that lost on the original version of Fisker would think otherwise :)

Having watched automotive stock for the last 30 years, it makes no sense relative to the news. Many times when we announced good or great news, the stock fell, and sometimes bad news made it rise. 
 

You would be better off at a slot machine. 

I have a good chunk in Fisker (400ish shares), bought last summer. It's down a good bit right now (but what isn't?) but I fully expect it to take off nicely once production starts. With Magna building their first vehicle (and pre-orders sold out), I expect the production launch should go pretty smoothly and it's a ncie-looking SUV that isn't priced in the stratosphere. I think FSR will end up in the 30s by this time next year (right now hanging around 10-11). It's my long-term bet with my "play money" so hopefully I chose well. 

I also have GreenPower (GP), which is a small EV company (Canadian, but makes vehicles in the US), which is mostly focused on mid-sized delivery vans and electric school buses (now being built in West Virginia and California). Its stock is way down - even though company news has been consistently excellent for the past year - so not sure what the deal is. They already have EV school buses in service with great reviews. It's a good buy right now (IMO) at only $3.25/share (it's been as high as 17.66 in the past year), seems like a well-run and profitable business that will only be growing as more EV buses and vans join the market. It doesn't make passenger cars, only utility vehicles. 

I have a decent amount in EV charging companies (Volta and Chargepoint), both of which are starting to rebound now that the infrastructure deal went through. Also have LICY, which is a lithium recycler, which has stayed fairly level even with the market way off over the past year  - I figure they'll have a big market with more and more EVs out there. 

All that said, these are in my "for fun" account. My "real" stock portfolio is handled by a nameless professional somewhere who probably has a bunch of boring companies that I've never heard of, which have done pretty well even in the down market. My "fun" account is mostly companies I personally am interested in/believe in/want to follow - primarily in the automotive, space, and infrastructure areas.

Steve_Jones said:

nedc said:

My $.02 and that's what it's worth... Fisker (FSR) if you're looking for a promising electric car company. Not valued anywhere near as high as Rivian or Lucid are/were, but maybe at a more realistic price for where they are now in the production and speculation cycle. 

I bet the guys that lost on the original version of Fisker would think otherwise :)

 

 

The original Fisker was a private company, mostly funded by rich Italians and Saudis and some venture capital guys who basically took control of it from Henrik (Fisker) and ran it into the ground (and they lost 300+ cars waiting to ship out during Hurrican Sandy, and insurance screwed them). The only people who lost money on that were rich guys and Fisker himself.

The new company is publicly-traded, and Fisker/his wife basically have a ton of their own money in it (and majority control), and are building with Magna). Totally different design and build structure, and the tech is far more mature now than it was on his first try (early battery builders had some major issues as well). 

Ironically, the original Fisker was bought by China (now called Karma Automotive, part of a big conglomerate), which is profitable and actually selling the exact same car in the US again as Henrik designed back then.....

In reply to calteg :

Damn I  grabbed some carlotz as they're rva based and were ridding up, then they dropped off a cliff.

In reply to Jesse Ransom :

I'd second that emotion. Is Ford stronger than GM, or is GM stronger than Ford? Or maybe there's a dog food or hair tonic or whatever company that will outpace all of them.

So, I see that as a good argument for mutual funds. 

All I can say is that my Ford stock might not be grabbing a lot of attention with its price but their dividends went up a lot

nedc said:

My $.02 and that's what it's worth... Fisker (FSR) if you're looking for a promising electric car company. Not valued anywhere near as high as Rivian or Lucid are/were, but maybe at a more realistic price for where they are now in the production and speculation cycle. 

Balance sheets are frequently full of lies, but Fister's is hysterical.  Their numbers for last quarter make buying NFTs on the street seem like a valid business plan.

johndej said:

In reply to calteg :

Damn I  grabbed some carlotz as they're rva based and were ridding up, then they dropped off a cliff.

You have my condolences.  I lost a boat on Rivian, but at least I had something left when I dumped the bag.  Lotz, if you keep the (nearly empty) bag, may not leave you holding anything.  You bought into a (used car) bubble that was based on illegit business practices (not that logic usually applies to today's market)--clearly, it's not going well now.  Rule one of getting out with any money in stocks is learning to take a loss (many, many times over).

In reply to rustomatic :

Yeah it wasn't more than a handful of shares so no harm done. Had a couple of people I know buy cars from them that went well and some rumors were going around that carmax or someone might buy them out. Funny how their CEO made $16 million last year (a 4176.59% increase) while the company tanked. 

In reply to rustomatic :

I was brought up with this saying from my dad - Figures don’t lie but liars sure can figure.

It figures that after I bag on $LOTZ, Carvana gets pumped to the moon today.  At the same time, Coinbase decouples from the movements of Bitcoin, then pops and drops--applying logic of most kinds just winds up confounding.  Bad earnings reports are resulting in upward pops across the board.  It's all a pump and dump that you have to figure a way through or around.  Sometimes, there's a steady trend (or repetitive moment) that works in your favor . . .

Main tip I'd have is that if you wouldn't buy a car from them, don't buy a stock from them. If there's something wrong with the way they do business, sometimes it's clear to an average customer well before Wall Street figures it out.

Carvana just paid $18882 for my friends low miles 2016 Equinox, a full $5000+ higher than their closest competitors. They may be acquiring and selling cars but I question if they're making any money on them. A one quarter pop is as likely or not to be followed by a decade of slumps in my opinion. 

I follow Ford pretty closely.  Bought a bunch at $17 before the downturn, now it's at 15 (I'm an idiot).  Then I bought more at $12 (I'm a genius!). 

Seriously, I like their prospects and their EV strategy and the EVs (Mustang, F150) have been sold out for a while.  Their fundamentals are good (Price/earnings of 5.3 etc.) and they're making money.  Time will tell if I'm guessing right.