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Lucid Group (NASDAQ:LCID) shares are experiencing bullish momentum today on the back of the recent spate of stock price target upgrades from Wall Street analysts. As an illustration, the stock is currently up over 7 percent and is trading at the $15 price handle.
Earlier today, Cantor Fitzgerald analyst, Andres Sheppard, initiated coverage on Lucid Group shares with an overweight rating, pegging a $23 price target on the stock. This equates to an upside potential of around 52 percent relative to the current share price of $15.06. However, readers should note that Sheppard's track record of success is currently an abysmal 13 percent, based on the tabulation by Benzinga.
Of course, today's upgrade follows a much more potent one a few days back when Citi analyst Itay Michaeli reinstated his buy rating on the stock with a target of $28, thereby corresponding to an upside potential of over 85 percent relative to the current price level. Critically, Michaeli boasts of a much more respectable 52 percent success track record on his ratings.
As to the rationale behind this upgrade, Micheli cited Lucid Group's prominent position among electric vehicle manufacturers on the back of the company's "demonstrated leading EV tech credentials with a best-in-class blend of range, performance, charging dynamics, and price."
Bear in mind that Lucid Group's AMP-1 facility in Casa Grande, Arizona, currently has a production capacity of 34,000 units per annum. The company is adding a second assembly line at the facility to handle the production of the Lucid Gravity SUV that is expected to launch in 2024. Once the upgrade is complete, the facility's annual production capacity will increase to 90,000 vehicles per year. Separately, Saudi Arabia recently awarded Lucid Group around $3 billion in incentives to establish a 155,000-units-per-year production facility in the Kingdom. The Saudis have also signed an agreement to purchase up to 100,000 electric vehicles from the company over the next ten years.
We had noted in our previous post on this topic that Lucid Group's production cadence has reportedly now increased to between 40 and 50 cars per day from an earlier run rate of just 5 to 15 cars daily. Assuming 20 working days in a month, Lucid Group can now feasibly produce around 1,000 EVs per month.
