What happened
Shares of Chinese electric vehicle (EV) maker Nio (NIO 5.26%) surged Thursday morning after an analyst report that included an increased price target and promising outlook. As of 10:45 a.m. EDT, Nio's American depositary receipts (ADRs) were up 4.7% after having jumped more than 6% at their highs this morning.
So what
The pop comes as a Deutsche Bank analyst boosted the automaker's price target by $10 to $70 per share. That would represent a 69% gain in the share price from Wednesday's closing price. Analyst Edison Yu focused on Nio's order book as the reason for the increase, reports EV-focused website CnEVPost.
Nio ES8 electric SUVs ready for export to Norway. Image source: Nio.
Now what
Nio's growth story took a bit of a pause when the company reported October deliveries of only 3,667 vehicles earlier this week. That was due to supply chain issues, and downtime to upgrade assembly lines for additional capacity and new vehicles. Nio plans to begin delivering the ET7, its first luxury sedan, early next year and has said it plans two more new products in 2022.
But Nio co-founder Qin Lihong said in an interview that the company has maintained an order book above 10,000 vehicles for several months in a row. That prompted Yu and his team to raise its delivery expectations for 2022 by 10,000 vehicles to 160,000 and up to 285,000 for 2023, according to the report. For perspective, it has delivered 66,395 vehicles in the first nine months of 2021.
Nio has begun exporting vehicles to Norway, and plans to expand in Europe to Germany next year. Investors today are reacting to the belief that the growth trajectory remains intact, as highlighted by the Deutsche Bank report.
