Rivian to raise $1.3B from sale of bonds. Premature?

[NY_Rob]

"green bonds".. what a joke!

You are building vehicles that literally waste 2kWh per day doing absolutely nothing. multiply that across a fleet of 20,000 vehicles and you'll realize just how un-green Rivian really is.

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[DuoRivians]

"green bonds".. what a joke!

You are building vehicles then literally waste 2kWh per day doing absolutely nothing. multiply that across a fleet of 20,000 vehicles and you'll realize just how un-green Rivian really is.

That is not what it is meant by green here

 

[Tahoe Man]

"green bonds".. what a joke!

You are building vehicles then literally waste 2kWh per day doing absolutely nothing. multiply that across a fleet of 20,000 vehicles and you'll realize just how un-green Rivian really is.

I agree it's a joke, but it's all about investor perception.

They're doing this because they can capture that perception while getting slightly lower debt service cost.

 

[NY_Rob]

That is not what it is meant by green here

Hmmm.. " Rivian wants to attract institutional investors wanting to reduce their carbon footprint or wanting to support sustainable development because these notes are qualified as "green bonds".

Like I said... they want to sell "green bonds" yet the vehicles they produce are needlessly adding to the nations carbon footprint because they refse to address vampire drain in a meaningful way. Seems sort of hypocritical doesn't it?

 

[Tahoe Man]

Final lifeline!?!, long term survival!!!
This analysis makes no sense. They have enough capital to carry them into 2025, prior to that I fully expect them to raise more capitol in the same way that their initial IPO was a "lifeline" until they reach profitability sometime this Decade. They are executing the plan laid out in the S1 filing as precisely as ANY company, startup or otherwise, could be expected given the conditions. They are currently in a better position than Tesla was in during 2018.
Is Rivian impacted by market forces? of course same as other auto manufactures, I could make the case that Rivian would hold up to harsh stagflation better than legacy OEM's because their total exposure is much less in relation to their capitalization. All this dire doom and gloom rhetoric is utter nonsense.... "final lifeline"... oh please.

Tesla had much much more favorable environment in every way.

Rivian is going to have one hell of a tough time on the near future. The equity has lost 90% even in a very favorable economy. Rates topping out near 5.5%???

Next year's outlook will be a huge factor as the year moves forward including their burn rate. It will be interesting if the economy tanks even a little that prompts them to preannounce and warn.

 

[CascadianApe]

At what point do share holders and the board realize RJ and the executive team is bad for business?

 

[Tahoe Man]

Best not to argue with the Teslastans.

I'm not a hater but not a fanboy either.

I went back and read through some of the posting during the mania years and it's real eye opener. Tons of obsession and hysteria.

Let's face it and be real, most everyone was trying to catch the next Tesla exponential ride up. As long as you were a Rivian fan, all is good. As I said I have nothing against them and hope they do well but....The outlook will have to improve remarkably for the company and equity to improve. How does that happen when the Fed just stated today they'll hold rates higher and longer to get their way??

 

[CascadianApe]

Rivian needs a better investor relations team and a better way to handle news, and manage the markets. This is pretty bad amateur hour

It's even scarier if you worked there early on and have seen how things went over the last 6 months. They went from treating employees as equals and contributors to burdens. They've lost the plot internally about 6 to 8 months ago. Now the rest of the world is starting to see how bad the leadership is.

This is what happens when you lay quality people off that have decades of experience in the industry and go full DEI. They've been on a hiring based on demographic instead of merit spree. The team of people they had in 2021 was amazing. Also if you push back on leadership at all you get stuffed in a corner till they can justify either firing that person or laying them off. Watched AMAZING people get fired and laid off for speaking up and trying to make the company run better.

RJ HATES ideas that are not his! Hence moving R&D from Plymouth, MI or Irvine, CA. That was an immense loss of knowledge as most people did not relocate.


Time for a CEO who embraces innovation not stagnation.

 

[the long way downunder]

"raise money when you can, not when you must"

 

[DuoRivians]

Hmmm.. " Rivian wants to attract institutional investors wanting to reduce their carbon footprint or wanting to support sustainable development because these notes are qualified as "green bonds".

Like I said... they want to sell "green bonds" yet the vehicles they produce are needlessly adding to the nations carbon footprint because they refse to address vampire drain in a meaningful way. Seems sort of hypocritical doesn't it?

They’re called “green” because they meet ESG investment criteria, which often allow for lower yielding investments. Ie less expensive interest rates for Rivian

 

[Biturbowned]

So LCID’s mkt cap is higher than RIVN? Ok I’ll buy more RIVN.

 

[DuoRivians]

So LCID’s mkt cap is higher than RIVN? Ok I’ll buy more RIVN.

This is indeed strange. Enterprise value comparison is same too.

 

[drstancpa]

Let me get this right. During the earnings call, just 7 days ago, question was asked about the liquidity status and need to raise more cash. To which Clare and RJ said that they had sufficient funds to get them through 2024 into 2025.

So what changed in the last week that they are now disclosing the corporate debt offering?

I already see class action law suit being worked by ambulance chasing attorneys...

Raises question about their whole conference call. This and the production rate difference between the official and "internal goal", which now effectively is the exception by all the analysts.

Like I'd said in another thread, that was the worst call I'd heard in a very long time so I shouldn't be surprised at this action now....

I said the exact same thing to a friend the night after the earnings release, that the conference call was really, really bad. And yes, shareholder litigation is almost a certainty. Don't know they will win, but reputation damage is still a concern now.

I actually know a guy with a PhD in economics who went to work for a large law firm specializing in representing shareholders, especially class actions. He was paid to basically read between the lines of the 10-Ks and other disclosures of listed companies with steep market value declines and see if he could find any misleading statements or omissions by management. Ambulance chaser really is the right analogy.

 

[the long way downunder]

I said the exact same thing to a friend the night after the earnings release, that the conference call was really, really bad. And yes, shareholder litigation is almost a certainty. Don't know they will win, but reputation damage is still a concern now.

I actually know a guy with a PhD in economics who went to work for a large law firm specializing in representing shareholders, especially class actions. He was paid to basically read between the lines of the 10-Ks and other disclosures of listed companies with steep market value declines and see if he could find any misleading statements or omissions by management. Ambulance chaser really is the right analogy.

There's a whole "mega" industry of these ambulance chasers. The euphemism is "activist investor" … the expression I learned as a youngster in Silicon Valley is "fücker" … people who get into the situation not to do any good or speculate or participate, just to cry foul and demand the hand out.
I spent years in "due diligence" explaining to boardroom dwellers whether or not the tech and IP they were buying was worth the steam off hot piss in snow … they were invariably more interested in whatever the accountants had to say. What was the cost of acquiring the customer base, what was the accretive revenue, what was the projected value in the installed base as license revenue and upgrades, service and consulting. "It doesn't do anything, the world is going in another direction" I would say. "Thanks" they would say.

I don't know what RJ likes or hates, what this c-suite expects, the VCs and "major" investors ... they could well have ulterior motives off the radar. Examples would be for example, reading Bezos' mind, "faak Elon, faak him no matter what" … which I think is probable and yes, investors have a Danish accent when swearing.

I own an R1T and a service hoist. When I look under the R1T, when I watch the Munro videos, what I see is a wide and deep pool of intellectual property. Expansive. Marvelous. Valuable. What I don't see is an executive team that has yet learned to execute on task – they have a rolling technological "horn of plenty," but they've not yet reached that point of realizing what the engineers have invented. If I were an IP due-diligence worker bee on the job, good lord would I want to acquire Rivian, lock, stock and two smoking barrels.

 

[zipzag]

It's even scarier if you worked there early on and have seen how things went over the last 6 months. They went from treating employees as equals and contributors to burdens. They've lost the plot internally about 6 to 8 months ago. Now the rest of the world is starting to see how bad the leadership is.

This is what happens when you lay quality people off that have decades of experience in the industry and go full DEI. They've been on a hiring based on demographic instead of merit spree. The team of people they had in 2021 was amazing. Also if you push back on leadership at all you get stuffed in a corner till they can justify either firing that person or laying them off. Watched AMAZING people get fired and laid off for speaking up and trying to make the company run better.

RJ HATES ideas that are not his! Hence moving R&D from Plymouth, MI or Irvine, CA. That was an immense loss of knowledge as most people did not relocate.


Time for a CEO who embraces innovation not stagnation.

I've worked with engineers who attended GM Institute ( now Kettering) who had paid work experience in real companies as undergrads. I compare their back ground to RJ.

I sometimes wonder if Rivian was primarily constructed for the early investors to make their return at the IPO.

Musk wasn't qualified either of course. But a freak like Musk is probably a once in a century event. Plus Musk had a long runway to make stupid and harmful decisions and still have time to figure out how to run the company. The myth that Tesla was a great manufacturers before the last few years was truly bizarre.

On the positive side most ultimately successful public companies go through early turmoil. Of course all the failures do too.

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