Midday Meme Stock Report for 1/11: ContextLogic, DiDi, Lucid, Upstart

Investing

Published: January 11, 2022 1:32 pm

The Tuesday morning highs dwindled in the noon hour, but all three major U.S. stock indexes continued trading in the green, if only slightly (the Dow Jones industrials were up less than 0.1%). The Nasdaq held on to a gain of around 1%, primarily on the strength of energy (sector is up by 2.5%), tech and communications (both up 0.8%). Independent oil and gas producers were leading the way.

Crude oil broke through the $81 level, and Bitcoin added more than 2% to trade at around $42,600, after falling below $40,000 on Monday. The yield on 10-year Treasuries was unchanged from Monday’s close at 1.77%, while the two-year yield pulled back from a high of nearly 0.95%. Trading volume was lower than average, and new 52-week lows were more common than new highs, especially on the Nasdaq where the lows have an advantage of around 12 to one.

Among the meme stocks on our watch list, winners outnumbered losers by around 10 to one. China’s ride-hailing giant DiDi Global Inc. (NYSE: DIDI) said the company’s chief technology has left his post of chairperson of Didi Payment. The company had no comment. Why this would send the stock to a double-digit gain is anyone’s guess. More likely is that the recent success of the Shanghai listing of China Mobile and its delisting in New York has given investors some hope for a reasonably smooth and financially painless transition for DiDi as well.

ContextLogic Inc. (NASDAQ: WISH) also traded higher by a double-digit margin in the noon hour Tuesday. The company had no specific news. The stock has lost about 73% of its value since early August, and the ups and downs of the share price on its way down have mostly occurred for no apparent reason.

Lucid Group Inc. (NASDAQ: LCID) had posted the biggest gain so far on the day among electric vehicle makers. Except for Tesla, this group mostly got beaten up on Monday. The tables turned Tuesday, however, with Tesla posting the smallest gain. Rivian had a shred of positive news when it announced that it built 1,015 vehicles in the December quarter and shipped 920 of them. The news may have awarded a halo to all the carmakers nipping at Tesla’s heels.

AI lending platform Upstart Holdings Inc. (NASDAQ: UPST) traded up more than 5% in the noon hour Tuesday. The company had no specific news, and shares traded down by about 65% from its October high of more than $400. Is this a buying opportunity or a head fake?

As the noon hour ended Tuesday, DiDi traded more than 9% to $4.90, in a 52-week range of $4.18 to $18.01. The average daily trading volume was 21.7 million shares, and more than 19 had been traded on the day.

Shares of ContextLogic also traded up more than 9%, at $2.83 in a 52-week range of $2.51 to $32.85. The average daily trading volume is nearly 29 million shares, and almost 17 million had traded thus far on Tuesday.

Lucid stock traded up about 6.6%, at $44.49 in a 52-week range of $13.00 to $64.86. The average daily trading volume is about 75 million shares, and more than 42 million had already traded.

Shares of Upstart traded up about 6.3%, at $121.67 in a 52-week range of $42.51 to $401.49. The average daily trading volume is 5.2 million shares, and more than 4.2 had traded.