Emerging from bankruptcy in June and recently announcing a ground-breaking
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 US$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 emphasise that no contract has been signed
yet." He emphasised 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.