MULN stock makes comeback on electric-van hype

Mullen completes production of 350 Class-1 EV vans.
On Thursday, Mullen also announced a new delivery van pilot program with the New York Power Authority.
MULN stock gained 10.7% on Thursday.

After lacking ignition at the beginning of the week, Mullen Automotive (MULN) stock has made a silent comeback in the second half. The stock has been supported by positive news regarding the future of its electric delivery vans.

Mullen stock news: Production completed on 350 delivery vans

Mullen announced, On Friday, July 14, that it has completed initial production of 350 Class-1 EV delivery vans at its Mishawaka, Indiana, facility and sent them for final assembly at its Mississippi plant.

This follows on from more good news regarding a new pilot program begun with the New York Power Authority (NYPA). The NYPA, a large state-owned power generation and transmission company, will test Mullen’s CAMPUS delivery van at its headquarters in upstate New York. Following the testing period, the company will have the ability to purchase the vehicles.

“The Mullen CAMPUS is a highly efficient electric van designed for low-speed, closed campus use [and] has all the same DNA as the Mullen ONE but was purpose-built to be an ideal delivery solution for micro-environments,” Mullen said in a statement.

This pilot program is similar to another one Mullen has with a university in North Carolina, which is testing more than dozen of these vehicles. Six other pilot programs for the CAMPUS vehicle were previously reported at the end of June when Mullen booked its first official revenue ($308,000) from the sale of 22 of these vehicles to the Randy Marion commercial dealership.

MULN stock surged 200% on July 5 after the news it had obtained counsel to bring charges against alleged “naked short selling”. The company further whetted the appetite of bulls with the news on the following day that it was going to initiate a share buyback.

The stock seemed like it was going to the moon but gains were ultimately unsustainable, and price pulled back to close the open gap after it was revealed that the buyback policy did not oblige the company to use funds for buybacks but only gave them the option to do so.

Investors further noted that Mullen only possesses $235 million on its balance sheet from selling shares during the second quarter, much of which is required to fund the production of commercial vehicles at its Tunica, Mississippi assembly plant. The vaunted buyback, therfore, may not be a sure thing.

EV stocks FAQs

What are electric vehicles?

Electric vehicles or EVs are automobiles that use rechargable batteries and electric motors to accelerate rather than internal combustion engines (ICEs). They have been around for more that 100 years, but battery technology research & development was meager for much of the 20th century. Lithium-ion battery technology became advanced enough to produce EVs at scale in the late 1990s and 2000s, and sales have been steadily increasing since then Tesla’s Roadster was unveiled in 2008. EVs are viewed as a means of reducing carbon emissions since battery electric vehicles (BEVs) themselves produce zero emissions. Other vehicles called plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs) utilize both battery electric power and ICEs as a backup.

What is the market share held by EVs?

EVs are growing from a small base, but they rose from 9% of global new auto sales in 2021 to 14% of the total in 2022. This was a 65% YoY growth rate, and the industry delivered 10.2 million EVs worldwide in 2022. Projections show this number climbing above 16 million in 2023. Across the world, market shares differ greatly among nations. Nearly 88% of Norwegian new car sales in 2022 were EVs. On the other hand, the United States, where much of the modern innovation in EVs was forged, had less than 8% of new vehicle sales go to EVs in 2022. The largest EV market in the world, China, saw 30% of the market go to EVs that year.

Who is the father of the EV?

We know you’re thinking Elon Musk, but he’s probably more like the father of the mass-market, contemporary EV. All the way back in 1827, a Hungarian priest named Anyos Jedlik invented the electric motor and used it the following year to power a vehicle of sorts. French scientist Gaston Planté invented the lead-acid battery in 1859, and German engineer Andreas Flocken built the first true electric car for the public in 1888. EVs made up about 38% of all vehicles sold in the US around 1900. They began losing market share rapidly after 1910 when gasoline-powered vehicles grew much more affordable. They largely died off until new research programs in the 1990s led to gradual private sector investment in the 2000s.

Who are the biggest makers of electric vehicles?

China’s BYD is by far the largest manufacturer of EVs in the world. In 2022 it sold 1.8 million EVs and in the second half of the year made up 20% of the global market. The asterisk given to BYD is that the vast majority of these vehicles are hybrids. Tesla’s 12% market share is often treated as more significant than BYD, because it only sells BEVs and is the most famous EV brand in the world. Volkswagen, BMW and Wuling then round out the top five. As a new sector with heavy investment though, many startups have flooded the market. These include China’s Nio, Li Auto and Xpeng; a Swedish-Chinese manufacturer called Polestar; and Lucid and Rivian from the US.

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