Shares of Chinese electric vehicle maker Nio Inc. declined more than 4% in the regular trading session on Thursday.
What Happened:The decline in Nio’s shares comes after three straight days of gains. The shares had risen above the $50 mark on Tuesday for the first time since early March amid bullish sentiment in the electric vehicle sector.
Nio’s shares closed 4.3% lower in Thursday’s regular trading session at $50.90.
The loss of momentum in Nio stock was attributed to concerns over theresurgance of COVID-19in the Asia-Pacific region, with a focus on the Delta variant.
Do Bullish Factors Remain?Nio stock closed above the 30 days and 200 days simple moving averages on Thursday, indicating overall bullish sentiments, as per Trading View data. A relative strength index (RSI) of 65.91 is also on the higher side, indicating a potential uptrend.
Nioreported a 116.1% year-over-year surgein June deliveries on Tuesday, with the monthly increase representing a record for the company.
In addition, Citi has recently increased its price target on the Nio stock to $72 from $58.30 and maintained a buy rating on the stock.
Nio is also seeing high interest from retail investors.As of late Thursday, the company was the eleventh most-discussed stock on Reddit’s r/WallStreetBets forum, data from Quiver Quantitative showed. The WSB forum has 10.6 million members and is known for short squeezes.
Nio, seen as a rival to Tesla Inc., has pioneered the concept ofbattery-as-a-servicethat would allow users to rent a battery instead of purchasing one.
Nio has significantly accelerated the pace of building swap stations in the past two weeks. The EV maker aims to have 500 battery swap stations in operation in China by the end of this year.
In addition, Nio has recentlyexpandedinto Norway and is on track to sell its ES8 SUV in the European nation.
The ET7, Nio’sfourth mass-produced model, is scheduled for commercial launch in the first quarter of 2022.