Except for a bump and dump when Nvidia's Jensen Huang pitched autonomous vehicles at CES in January* and the larger jump in February the stock has been pretty much range-bound this year:
From FreightWaves, March 7:
Morgan Stanley initiates coverage of Aurora Innovation ahead of commercial driverless operations launch
Autonomous trucking is gaining the attention of Wall Street with Morgan Stanley initiating coverage of autonomous truck technology company Aurora Innovation on Monday. Ravi Shanker, equity analyst at Morgan Stanley, writes that despite taking years longer than expected, “Trucking finally appears to be on the cusp of an autonomous future.”
Morgan Stanley believes that Aurora is the most sophisticated on-highway, Class 8 autonomous solution among peers, with the April rollout of its commercial driverless operating being a key milestone for both Aurora and the industry. However, equity analysts are more bullish than industry executives, believing that the development of autonomous trucking “has achieved enough escape velocity to be considered a real and credible commercial option for many commercial fleets.”
Shanker writes that if all goes according to plan, the next 12 months will see the industry logging thousands of miles of driverless operations from trucking fleets, placing autonomous trucking in the same “real” category as passenger robotaxi fleets.
Compared to the approximately half-dozen other autonomous trucking companies about to launch driverless commercial operations, Shanker notes that Aurora’s plans for its April driverless commercial launch give it a head start. Morgan Stanley also sees on-highway operations as the most complex task for autonomous trucking compared to peers like Kodiak and Gatik, which are revenue-generating today with adjacent applications like off-highway or last-mile....
"Autonomous vehicle company Aurora sells $820M worth of stock"
Ships, trucks and mining machines are where the autonomous action is. Mr. Musk may be on to a $10 trillion opportunity in passenger vehicles but that is still some ways away....
It's been a while in coming....While Musk was ahead of the curve, others are following Tesla’s and Nvidia’s lead. Huang’s CES speech helped lift shares of Aurora Innovation , an autonomous-truck technology company, by almost 30% on Tuesday.
Aurora is working with Nvidia and the auto parts supplier Continental to bring updated self-driving semi trucks to roads by 2027. Nvidia brings its AI hardware and software expertise, Aurora has self-driving software, and Continental integrates both into automotive-grade products for truck makers.
“The lustrous sheen of Jensen’s crocodile (?) leather attire was only to be outshined by his positive commentary on the autonomous vehicle (AV) market [Monday] and the robotics market broadly,” wrote Canaccord analyst George Gianarikas in a Tuesday evening report.
Following the remarks, he raised his target for Aurora’s stock price to $10 from $7. Gianarikas rates the stock Buy.
Aurora stock gave back some of Tuesday’s big gains, closing down 4% at $8.06 on Wednesday while the S&P 500 and Dow Jones Industrial Average gained about 0.2% and 0.3%, respectively....