Nio rallies after Tesla’s largest outside investor loads up on shares

Reuters/Aly Song

• Nio shares surged Tuesday after a filing showed that Baillie Gifford & Co, Tesla’s largest investor after Elon Musk, had bought a big stake in the company.
• The filing revealed that Baillie Gifford & Co owned 85.3 million NIO shares, representing an 11% stake in the Chinese carmaker.
• Nio went public in the US last month and soared 75% on its second trading day.
• Watch Nio trade in real time here.

Shares of Nio, the electric-car maker touted as the Tesla of China, rallied more than 20% in late trading Tuesday on news that Baillie Gifford & Co, Tesla’s largest investor after Elon Musk, had beefed up its position. 

The stock was up by about 7% after the closing bell.

A Tuesday regulatory document revealed that Baillie Gifford & Co owned 85.3 million NIO shares, or an 11% stake in the Chinese car maker, which was worth about $515 million as of the close of trading Monday.

Nio went public in the US last month. Shares priced at $6.26 apiece on September 12, the low end of its range, causing the electric-car maker to fall short of raising the $1.8 billion it had sought. But on the following day, after touching its record low of $5.35, the stock soared 75%, sending its market capitalization above $12 billion. 

The four-year old Tencent-backed startup delivered its first volume-manufactured vehicle — the ES8 — to users on June 28, and started to generate revenue this year, according to its IPO filing. 

Nio said it made $6.95 million in revenue in the first half of 2018 and that it had 6,201 unfilled ES8 reservations at the end of August, for which non-refundable deposits had been made.

Shares of Nio are up 18% since the September 12 IPO.

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