Nikola -- Electric Truck Fraud ?

 An electric semi truck that was sleek, silent and sinister looking was filmed speeding through an American desert in 2018. Not just a pickup truck -- a big tractor and trailer!  “Behold,”, bragged electric vehicle (EV) company Nikola: “The 1,000 HP, zero-emission Nikola One semi-truck in motion.”  The truck WAS moving ... after being towed up a hill and then filmed rolling down the hill. A non-functioning power train, assuming there was a power train under the hood.




Now we are told by a company spokesman. “Nikola never stated its truck was driving under its own propulsion in the video. ... As Nikola pivoted to the next generation of trucks, it ultimately decided not to invest additional resources into completing the process to make the Nikola One drive on its own propulsion.”

Nikola’s chairman and founder Trevor Milton resigned, and shares in the company plunged. The news was from a report by short-selling investment firm Hindenburg Research, whose conclusions Nikola dismissed as “false and misleading”. That report came just  days after General Motors agreed to invest $2 billion into Nikola.

There are many other electric vehicle (EV) in Silicon Valley, California, with many looking forward to a initial stock public offering.  There's Rivian, Nio, Fisker, Workhorse, Lordstown Motors, and XPeng.

Tesla has had a huge breathtaking stock rally this year. Tesla makes a tiny fraction of the cars in the U.S. and loses money, but has a market capitalization that is four-times larger than the big three automakers combined.

Tesla's first, and expensive, electric car was the best car Consumer Reports ever tested, at fist, until reliability problems removed their recommendation. I have in my hands the 2020 Consumer Reports buying guide -- if you trust that guide, and I do -- owning two Toyota Camrys made in Kentucky from their recommendation, then you would not be buying any Tesla. Due to below average performance, well below average reliability, and they are expensive too.  

“It looks awful,” says Reilly Brennan of the San Francisco venture capitalist firm Trucks VC, referring to Nikola’s ordeal. “This is the warning shot of how eventually things are going to roll out over the coming decades. And it could very well be that some of these companies are overvalued.”  Tesla, in my opinion, is the most overvalued large cap stock on US stock markets.