ChargePoint stock falls on revenue warning, C-suite shakeup
Shares of ChargePoint Holdings (CHPT) fell sharply on Friday after releasing preliminary third-quarter results and announcing its CEO and CFO were leaving the company. ChargePoint says its third-quarter revenue will fall in a range of $108 to $113 million, well short of the $150 to $165 million that was previously expected. The EV charging company says COO Rick Wilmer will be its new CEO and President, with former CEO Pasquale Romano staying on as an advisor. The company is searching for a permanent CFO.
Roth MKM downgraded ChargePoint shares to "Neutral" from "Buy" and slashed its price target to $2, while Needham cut its price target on the stock to $4 from $8.
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Video Transcript
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BRAD SMITH: News out of the EV space is not so supercharged this morning as ChargePoint shares plummet over its preliminary third quarter results and some leadership shakeups. Roth MKM also downgraded the stock to neutral from buy and slashed its price target to $2 saying that there's material deterioration and it wasn't the only one. Needham also came out with a call this morning slashing its price target to $4 from $8.
They still interestingly maintained their buy rating on this. But as we continue to really dive into what's taking place over at ChargePoint, it comes at the same time that you've got a host of companies and auto manufacturers that have decided to make their own move over to the NACS, the North American Charging Standard. Lucid, Fisker, Ford, GM, BMW, Hyundai, all of those that have announced those ambitions and that certainly, kind of, shakes up the network model that ChargePoint was really looking to build out as well.
SEANA SMITH: Certainly does. We know that this is an industry that's been under pressure now for quite some time. ChargePoint, which is largely viewed as one of the leaders within this industry now showing even more signs of stress here. We're seeing it reflected in the stock price. Ahead of this report, shares were down about 2/3. Now they're selling off another 30 and so percent here on the day.
When you take a look at some of these issues, you mentioned the fact, the competition from Tesla. And obviously, that has been the big driver here in this story over the last several months. Signing more and more automakers onto its charging standard really disrupting the industry and forcing some of these other players like ChargePoint to adapt.
I think also one of the reasons why we're seeing such a reaction in the stock here this morning was this executive change. It came as a bit of a surprise here to the street. TD Cowen was out with a note or out with reaction here to this saying that these big changes, they did not see them coming. When it comes to exactly what they are replacing, the CEO, the CFO, the two top jobs. So a real shift here in executives for the company, which could pretty vastly change the direction of the company here going forward.
I think a lot are questioning what exactly the future holds for ChargePoint for some of its other rivals out there. Its market cap now just around $1 billion. And it was peaking at just over $11 billion just around two years ago, so a massive slide in shares. Just around $2 a share, obviously, something that we need to keep an eye on. And we're seeing real weakness across the sector.
BRAD SMITH: Yeah, one of the SPAC stories that, of course, we had tracked early on in its life as a publicly-traded entity thanks to the de-SPAC that took place. And at the end of the day, some of the numbers as well that the company had put out there, they were looking for and the Street was looking for $150 million at the low end of the guidance range. $150 million to $165 million was that range there. Ultimately, ChargePoint came out and said that third quarter sales actually going to fall closer to between $108 million on the low end, top end $113 million. And the Street not liking that at all today.
