Rocket Lab Sees Insider Selling, But My Plan Is to Buy
Rocket Lab, a successful position for the portfolio, is getting knocked around by the space trade and insider sales.
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The good news is that the portfolio made a sale at $137 on the way up for Rocket Lab (RKLB). The bad news would be that the portfolio tried to make a sale at $152 and that order wound up being “nothing done.”
Rocket Lab has been both one of the most successful positions in the old “Stocks Under $10” portfolio and the newer “$10K Portfolio.” The stock, which we originally got into in the single digits, apexed at $151 on May 27. The shares have lost almost 26% since. Of course, all space-related stocks enjoyed a glorious month of May, thanks to the hype around the coming initial pubic offering of Elon Musk’s SpaceX. Then it went south.
Readers are likely asking why Rocket Lab sold off so hard after peaking on May 27. We now have the answer. On May 28, four Rocket Lab insiders (not CEO Peter Beck) took advantage of the surging stock price and made significant sales. The market for this stock then tipped in the wrong direction.
On May 28:
– General Counsel Arjun Kampan sold 23,804 shares of RKLB for about $3.5 million.
– VP Brad Clevenger sold 3,500 shares for about $513,300.
– COO Frank Klein sold 36,860 shares for about $5.4 million.
– Director Alex Slusky sold 60,000 shares for almost $9 million. Slusky is also the head of Vector Capital, which is the firm that was behind the shell company that took RKLB public back in 2021.
Recent Portfolio News
Amazon Announcements: On Thursday morning, Amazon (AMZN) announced a series of investments designed to support employee upskilling, speed up deliveries while modernizing and expanding the firm’s European operations. The announcements, made at Amazon’s “Delivering the Future” event in London, include a more than $10 billion euro commitment to expand and upgrade fulfillment centers across Europe with next-generation robotics, and an expansion of ultra-fast delivery capabilities. Amazon plans to grow its European fulfillment center workforce by 25,000 positions over coming years. In addition, Amazon is committing $1 billion to Career Choice by 2030. The expanded investment means more people will have access to fully funded training for careers in cybersecurity, software development, logistics, renewable energy, and mechatronics.
Evolv Technologies Stays With Phillies: Evolv Technologies (EVLV) has renewed its partnership with Major League Baseball’s Philadelphia Phillies, extending the use of Evolv Express for fan entry screening at Citizens Bank Park. Express has been in use for all Phillies’ home games since the start of the 2023 season and have screened almost 12 millon guests to date.
Palantir Deal With GNP Seguros, Google: On Thursday morning, GNP Seguros and Palantir Technologies (PLTR) announced a multi-year, multi-million-dollar enterprise expansion agreement. GNP Seguros stands today as the largest insurance company in Mexico. As part of Grupo BAL-one of Mexico’s most important business consortia-GNP now becomes Palantir’s first publicly announced commercial customer in Mexico. GNP has already been operating Palantir’s Artificial Intelligence Platform in targeted deployments across its different lines of businesses. This enterprise agreement now expands that deployment across the firm’s full portfolio of insurance products.
On Thursday morning, Palantir also announced a multi-tiered partnership with Alphabet’s (GOOGL) Google Cloud, enabling integrations across Google Cloud platforms and making Palantir available on Google Cloud Marketplace. As part of this partnership, Palantir will address several foundational integrations for existing and new customers. This will include two-way data federation between BigQuery and Foundry. Additionally, deeper connectivity between Gemini and Palantir AIP will enable customers to connect models to their critical AI workflows and operations.
Lastly, also on Thursday morning, McCarthy Building Companies and Palantir Technologies announced a multi-year, multi-million-dollar strategic partnership to enhance data-driven decision-making across McCarthy’s operations. McCarthy will leverage Palantir’s AIP to create a connected AI operating system that brings McCarthy’s more than 160 years of construction expertise directly into the workflows of its teams, from early design to field execution.
Rocket Lab Price Target: On Wednesday, analyst Gregory Pendy of Clear Street reiterated a “buy” rating on RKLB while increasing his target price from $98 to $129. Pendy is rated at five stars out of five by TipRanks. Over the past two years, Pendy has a 68% success rate with a 43.6% average return.
Upcoming Portfolio Earnings
– Planet Labs (PL)…. after the closing bell this evening.
Wednesday’s Intention vs Wednesday’s Actual Trade
– Purchase 25 shares of ONDS at $12 or better.
– Bought 25 shares of ONDS at $11.20.
Thursday’s Intention
– Purchase 2 shares of RKLB at $114 or better.
Current Positions
Long 100 shares of (ALTO) at $5.79. Target Price: $9. Last sale: $5.49.
Long 2 shares of AMZN at $263.71. Target Price: $324. Last sale: $253.05.
Long 60 shares of (EVLV) at $5.9895. Target Price: $8.50. Last sale: $6.31.
Long 200 shares of (OCUL) at $8.271. Target Price: $11. Last sale: $8.40.
Short one OCUL $11 Sept. 18 call at $1.65, Last sale: $0.90.
Short one OCUL $9 July 17 call at $0.90. Last sale: $2.20.
Long 150 shares of ONDS at $9.7624. Target Price: $14. Last sale: $11.36.
Long 7 shares of PL at $37.18. Target Price $55. Last sale: $43.52.
Long 10 shares of PLTR at $137.906. Target Price: $194. Last sale: $145.57.
Long 5 shares of RKLB at $59.206. Target Price: $185. Last sale: $112.88.
Long 150 shares of (SIDU) at $3.0909. Target Price: $6. Last sale: $4.46.
Long 200 shares of (SNAP) at $5.7642. Target Price: $7.50. Last sale: $5.72.
Short two SNAP Oct. 16 $6 calls at $0.87. Last sale: $0.89.
Long 150 shares of (SOFI) at $15.9035. Target Price: $24. Last sale: $16.67.
Short one SOFI Aug. 21 $20 call at $1.02. Last sale: $1.06.
Long 35 shares of VELO at $12.3231. Target Price: $30. Last sale: $18.97.
Cash: $541.46.
Portfolio Value: $12,179.93, +21.8% from inception on March 24
At the time of publication, the $10K Portfolio was long ALTO, AMZN, EVLV, OCUL, ONS, PL, PLTR, RKLB, SIDU, SNAP, SOFI, VELO; Short SOFI, SNAP, OCUL.
