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Nikola stock plunges 26% after fraud claims complicate hydrogen plans:
Shares of hydrogen truck startup Nikola plunged 26 percent on Wednesday after The Wall Street Journal reported that the company was struggling to find partners to build a planned network of hydrogen fueling stations. Nikola's stock closed at $21.15 on Wednesday, a decline of 57 percent from the $50 peak reached on September 8
[...] Nikola now concedes that the truck never worked and that a promotional video of the truck was made by rolling it down a hill.
Nikola argued that this was old news because Nikola is no longer marketing the Nikola One and has a working prototype of the Nikola Two. But the revelations threw the company into chaos and forced Milton to resign on Sunday.
Previously:
New Report Claims Widespread Deception by Nikola Motor and Founder Trevor Milton
Nikola Motors Opening Reservations for Badger Electric Pickup Truck on June 27
Nikola Semi Startup Shines on Wall Street With $34BN Valuation
(Score: 1) by fustakrakich on Friday September 25 2020, @09:08PM (2 children)
Requires to much processing and high maintenance infrastructure. Just stick with fermented algae
La politica e i criminali sono la stessa cosa..
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday September 26 2020, @07:12AM (1 child)
Not to mention that Hindenberg fiasco a few years back....
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Grishnakh on Saturday September 26 2020, @08:03PM
The Hindenburg disaster isn't a good reason to avoid hydrogen. Hindenburg was caused by multiple factors including poor design (I seem to remember something about the interior of the dirigible containing an explosive compound). Just look at what we fuel cars with today: a highly flammable substance.
There are many good reasons to avoid hydrogen: it has absolutely *horrible* energy density. To get a decent amount of range for a hydrogen-fueled vehicle, you have to compress hydrogen gas a ridiculous amount, meaning you have to have a big, heavy tank able to contain that pressure. If this tank ruptures in a crash, it'll be disaster, meaning you need to make the tank even stronger (and heavier). There's been research into materials to use in tanks to make them crash-proof (by absorbing the H2 gas and releasing it more slowly as it's used), but this of course reduces the usable volume. H2 molecules are also really tiny compared to other molecules (such as hydrocarbons like gasoline), and it's really hard to reliably contain them because they leak right through the material that their storage tanks are made of (which again means you need thicker, heavier tanks, which is bad for a vehicle where weight is a concern). Containing the gas in service stations isn't trivial either, nor is refueling a vehicle by an amateur without having leaks. The whole thing is just a bad, bad idea.
There's a reason that gasoline (or diesel or kerosene) has lasted so long as a vehicle fuel. There's a big inefficiency to it because most of the energy is lost to heat, due to the way heat-cycle engines work, but even so it's relatively easy to work and relatively safe. Battery-electric vehicles are finally threatening their dominance, thanks to major advances in energy density (the energy density of lithium-ion batteries is quite amazing compared to the batteries we had 30 years ago), but it's taken a long time to reach this point. Hydrogen offers few advantages, and a ton of major disadvantages. The main "advantage" it has is that it absolutely requires you to visit a fueling station to refuel your vehicle, so certain interests are protected, whereas with BEVs, you don't need Sunoco or Texaco or BP any more, you only need your local electric utility.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 25 2020, @09:18PM (1 child)
Find ten differences.
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Friday September 25 2020, @10:56PM
Nikola's just a scam riding off Tesla's coat tails, and Tesla's cool tech (it is cool tech, there's no denying) and has whipped the market (stock, not car) up into a bit of a frenzy (even when Musk asserts the stock's overpriced).
There isn't much else that falls into the "solar panels for everything!!" eco camp. Well, except there is, but I'm betting most people haven't heard of it yet. For example, from only a couple of days ago (after the Nikola feikness scandal:
https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/SPI/?_guc_consent_skip=1600884282 = SPI Energy Co., Ltd. (SPI) NasdaqGS - NasdaqGS Real Time Price.
Its daily stock price gainz peaked at +2,999.90% because of this headline:
"SPI Energy Launches New Electric Vehicle Company Subsidiary"
"...today announced the launch of EdisonFuture, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of SPI Energy, to design and develop electric vehicles ("EV") and EV charging solutions."
or:
https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/next-nikola-ev-maker-lordstown-claims-40000-pre-orders-new-electric-truck
"Lordstown Motors Corp., claims it has secured tens of thousands of preorders for its electric vehicle ahead of a potential Nasdaq listing in October.
[...] So Lordstown's announcement is timely because the EV company recently entered into a business agreement with shell company, DiamondPeak Holdings Corp., which is set to close in October. If all goes well, Lordstown will be listed on the Nasdaq under the ticker "RIDE" in the near term.
As of Wednesday, DiamondPeak ended the session around $24.4 per share. The stock is up nearly 200% since the start of August, from $11 to $31 in 35 sessions."
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 2) by corey on Saturday September 26 2020, @03:11AM (2 children)
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday September 26 2020, @05:42AM
I think they did it to ride the coat tails of name recognition. They don't want to be seen as stark competition, but rather complimentary contemporaries in a wave of new green car technology companies.
A less charitable look at it would be capitalizing on brand name confusion.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday September 26 2020, @11:03AM
To drive up the stock price. It worked.