Cantor Fitzgerald said on Monday that five key areas will be in focus when US electric vehicle maker Lucid Motors reports second-quarter earnings on Tuesday after the market close.
The analyst Andres Sheppard said the firm will be focusing on gross margin figures, an update on Gravity SUV sales, progress on the third EV model, details of the recently announced robotaxi deal, and a potential revision to its annual production guidance.
In a new research note, Cantor reiterated a Neutral rating and $3.00 price target on Lucid, implying a 24% upside based on Friday’s closing price.
Sheppard said both production and delivery volumes for the second quarter missed the firm’s forecasts as well as consensus estimates compiled by Visible Alpha.
Lucid delivered 3,309 vehicles in the three months ended June 30, compared with Cantor’s estimate of 3,791 and Visible Alpha consensus of 3,611.
Production stood at 3,863 units, also below the firm’s forecast of 4,000 and consensus of 4,305. For the full year 2024, Lucid had delivered 10,241 vehicles and produced 9,029.
“A key item of focus will be gross margins as Lucid continues to work towards improving its persistently high negative GMs,” Sheppard wrote. Sell-side consensus expects Lucid to report negative gross margins of approximately 95%, according to the analyst.
Cantor expects management to provide “quantification on the initial sales” of the Gravity SUV, which began deliveries earlier this year, and an update on whether Lucid remains on track for the launch of its high-volume midsize SUV.
The company has previously targeted a start of production for the third model in late 2026 with the interim CEO Marc Winterhoff mentioning that the second model under the mid-size platform would launch “close together” with the first one.
Commenting on the company’s full-year 2025 production guidance of approximately 20,000 vehicles, Sheppard noted that “there is a possible scenario where LCID could revise down its guidance.”
The EV maker produced 6,075 vehicles in the first half of the year. To meet its target, Lucid needs to more than double the pace and manufacture nearly 14,000 units between July and December.
In 2022, the first full year of production, the company manufactured 7,180 vehicles. In the following years, the EV maker produced 8,428 and 9,029 units.
In May 2021, Lucid projected it would deliver 20,000 vehicles in 2022, rising to 49,000 in 2023, 90,000 in 2024, and 135,000 in 2025.
Actual results have fallen well short of those targets. The company delivered just 4,369 vehicles in 2022, 6,001 in 2023, and 10,241 in 2024.
In early 2022, Lucid reported more than 25,000 customer reservations, representing potential revenue of over $2.4bn based on average selling prices at the time.
However, from January 2022 through December 2024, the company delivered only 20,611 vehicles — indicating that a substantial number of those early reservations were ultimately cancelled or not converted into sales.
Lucid in July said it will supply 20,000 Gravity SUVs to Uber over six years as part of a robotaxi partnership involving autonomous vehicle technology from Nuro.
“We expect color on the company’s newly announced robotaxi partnership with Uber and Nuro,” Sheppard added, along with any revisions to production plans.
Uber is investing $300 million in Lucid, but the company has yet to disclose details on expected revenue or margins. Uber, not Lucid, will operate the fleet.
As in prior quarters, Lucid is collecting shareholder questions via Say Technologies, with the top-voted ones to be addressed by interim CEO Marc Winterhoff and CFO Taoufiq Boussaid during the earnings call.
Among the most voted questions, shareholders are seeking updates on the Gravity SUV, the start of production of the third model, and the reverse stock split.
Lucid shares hit a new all time low at $1.93 in November and touched $1.98 on the first day of July.
However, the stock rebounded and soared in mid-July after the partnership announcement with Uber and autonomous driving startup Nuro. Over the last few weeks, Lucid shares have paired most of those gains.
