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Bailey Gifford is still the largest holder of Tesla stock outside of Elon Musk and passively managed ETFs.
Tobias Schwartz POOL / AFP via Getty Images
Long
Tesla
shareholder removes money from the table.
Bailey Giffordasset manager based in UKhas participated in Tesla promotions for many years, accumulating over 69 million shares at a time. Gifford’s growth peaked in the fourth quarter of 2019, with around 7% of issued Tesla shares (ticker: TSLA).
The fund manager sold around 10 million shares during the first half of the year, taking profit, while Tesla shares soared nearly 160% from late December to late June.
Gifford recently sold an additional 19 million shares, making it less than 40 million shares. Over the past few months, Gifford has sold over 40% of its recent stake in electric vehicle manufacturer…
The move could shake the confidence of some Tesla bulls. However, Gifford holds over 4% of the outstanding shares, making it the largest holder of Tesla shares outside of Elon Musk and passively managed index funds. And he said that this is, in fact, a step towards rebalancing.
“The significant increase in Tesla’s share price meant that we needed to cut our stake to reflect concentration guidelines that limit the weight of a single stock in customer portfolios. However, we intend to remain major shareholders for many years to come. “
The rebalancing of rapidly rising stock prices is the so-called “high-end problem” on Wall Street. This is true of Gifford, who has made billions from Tesla stock. Some of the fund’s early purchases were worth around $ 7 a share.
Tesla shares fell 5.8% on Wednesday to $ 447.37. However, to date, the company’s shares are up about 435%. And Tesla success supported the entire electric vehicle sector.
Electric vehicle promotions Barron’s tracks traded since the beginning of 2020 have grown by more than 350% on average since then. Electric vehicles are also attracting billions of new capital. China
Lee Auto
(LI) and
Xpeng
(XPEV) e.g. recently completed initial public offers… And another Chinese competitor,
NIO
(NIO), sold more shares for secondary placement.
NIO shares are up about 400% since the beginning of the year. Li and Xpeng shares rose more than 50% since their respective IPOs. Gifford, by the way, owns over 9% of the outstanding shares of NIO.
EV returns comparable numbers for
S&P 500
and
Dow Jones Industrial Average,
as well as for traditional car companies. Promotions
General Motors
(GM) and
Ford motor
(F), for example, are down about 15% and 25% YTD, respectively.
Write to Al Root, allen.root@dowjones.com
