Emerging from bankruptcy in June and recently announcing a groundbreaking
deal with Tesla to put 100,000 EVs into the car rental market, Hertz uplisted
to the Nasdaq on Tuesday. Not a traditional initial public offering, but rather
in what's known as a "re-IPO," company investors put up more than 44.5
million of their own shares. Hertz spent $300 million to buy back more than 10
million of those. Hertz began trading on the Nasdaq on Tuesday under HTZ. The
company formerly traded over the counter as HTZZ.
Following the Tesla deal announcement last week, which purports
to get 100,000 EVs on the road by the end of 2022, questions arose from none
other than Tesla CEO Elon Musk about whether the deal was "final" or
could deliver that vehicle quantity to the market. Commenting on his company's
stock rise, Musk tweeted: "If any of this is based
on Hertz, I’d like to emphasize that no contract has been signed yet." He
emphasized that demand for Tesla vehicles was such that no special pricing
would be extended to Hertz for the deal.
Speaking to online news outlet
Cheddar on Tuesday, Hertz interim CEO Mark Fields and co-founder and managing
member of Knightshead Capital Management Tom Wagner hedged on timing of the
Tesla rollout, saying Hertz worked closely with all its vehicle manufacturing
partners and that the relationship would evolve, without naming Tesla
specifically.
"Right now, the demand is
vastly in excess of any amount of supply that we can bring in. So the key for
us, as I said, is really making sure that the delivery cadence works in the
context of our ecosystem," said Wagner.