(Bloomberg) -- ElectraMeccanica Vehicles Corp. climbed as much as 39 percent Wednesday after receiving its first analyst rating, a signal that the Canadian small-cap is finally attracting attention on Wall Street as it looks to take on Tesla Inc.
Benchmark analyst Bill Sutherland assigned a “speculative buy” recommendation on the electric vehicle maker. SOLO, the company's one-person, three-wheel, fully enclosed battery electric vehicle “has a large potential” total addressable market, since 83 percent of all cars on the highway only have one occupant, Sutherland wrote in a note.
“This company is producing the car that Elon Musk wishes he were building,” ElectraMeccanica Chief Executive Officer Jerry Kroll said in an interview with Bloomberg Television earlier this year. “It is great to produce a $45,000, a $100,000 car or a $250,000 car. But for the masses? A $15,000 car that can get them to stop using gas. That's creative.”
See more: Canada's Answer to Tesla Is a $15,500 Electric Three-Wheeler
Meanwhile, in a report issued Wednesday by Barclay's Sustainable & Thematic Investing team, the authors projected that micromobility, which is described as an electric vehicle weighing less than 500kg (1,100 pounds), could be an “iPhone moment in urban personal and commercial transportation,” with a potential $800 billion global revenue opportunity for micromobility operators by the mid-2020s.
As of Jan. 30, the Vancouver-based company had non-binding letters of interest for 64,158 corporate orders: 22,242 for SOLOs and 40,997 for Tofinos, a two-seat roadster that is in development. The company had also received deposits for 864 SOLOs and 55 Tofinos for personal use.
Filling pre-orders alone for SOLO and Tofinos implies an initial opportunity of approximately $2 billion, according to Sutherland, who estimates the company's revenue will be $7.5 million for 2019, growing to $157.2 million in 2021.
Sutherland set a price target on ElectraMeccanica of $6 per share, which implies 75 percent upside from Tuesday's close of $3.42. Benchmark was one of the lead managers on the company's Nasdaq debut in August.
To contact the reporter on this story: Janet Freund in New York at jfreund11@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Catherine Larkin at clarkin4@bloomberg.net, Steven Fromm
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