Rivian is now the 2nd most valuable US carmaker after its IPO surge - and its founder R.J. Scaringe is worth $2.2 billion

• Rivian is now the second-most valuable US carmaker after Tesla, and is ahead of Ford and General Motors.
• Its stock has surged since its IPO on Wednesday, making its founder R.J. Scaringe worth at least $2.2 billion.

Electric-vehicle startup Rivian is now the second most valuable carmaker in the US after its post-IPO surge, despite having delivered only about 150 cars.

Its stock has surged since it priced its IPO at $78 a share on Wednesday, when it made one of the biggest market debuts in history, raising $11.9 billion.

The electric-car maker is now worth a whopping $107.4 billion after finishing at $122.99 a share on Thursday, according to Bloomberg data. On a fully diluted basis, which includes options, Rivian is worth $120.5 billion.

It means Rivian founder and chief executive R.J. Scaringe's stake in the company is now worth $2.2 billion. Scaringe, who's 38, owns 17.6 million shares, and he could become much richer through stock awards if the Amazon-backed startup does well.

In the US automaker stakes, Rivian ranks behind only Tesla, which is worth $1.07 trillion. It comes above General Motors, which has a market cap of $89.8 billion, and Ford, with a market value of $78.1 billion.

But the differences between the companies are striking. Rivian was founded in 2009, but has only delivered 156 cars, according to its IPO prospectus. It suffered a loss of $994 million in the first half of the year as it spent heavily to ramp up production.

By contrast, Tesla has delivered more than 600,000 vehicles in 2021, and had more than $20 billion of revenue in the first half. General Motors and Ford sell millions of cars per year. General Motors made more than $65 billion in revenue in the first half, and Ford notched more than $62 billion.

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So far, Rivian has 55,400 preorders for its R1T truck and R1S SUV, which it expects to fulfil by 2023.

However, investors are betting that Rivian can be the new Tesla and will thrive as countries focus on climate change and electric vehicles.

Rivian is a "a legitimate option for institutional investors who have previously only had Tesla to play the electric vehicle space," said DataTrek co-founder Nicholas Colas, adding that its products are "truly compelling."

Scaringe is one of the biggest winners from Rivian's IPO, and he retains 9.5% voting control in the company through class B shares.

The board have also given the MIT PhD grad a time-based equity award of 6.8 million shares and a performance-based option to buy up to 20.4 million shares, meaning he could dramatically increase his wealth.

Although Ford has been overtaken in the carmaker ranks, it was also a big winner from the IPO, having owned 14.4% of the company's shares before it went public.