Lucid raising $3 billion with more money from Saudi owners

Lucid Group Inc. is raising about $3 billion in a common stock offering with the majority of the money coming from the electric vehicle maker’s Saudi owners after a more than 60 percent stock slump in the last year. The shares plunged more than 7% in extended trading.

The company announced the raise along with a corresponding investment by its owners — Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund — in a statement, confirming an earlier Bloomberg News report. PIF, the kingdom’s largest sovereign wealth fund, is purchasing $1.8 billion of the stock in a private placement.The fund already owns about 60 percent of Newark, California-based Lucid, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Bank of America Corp. is acting as the sole book-running manager for the public offering.

“Lucid intends to use the net proceeds from the public offering, as well as from the private placement by its majority stockholder, for general corporate purposes,” the company said.

The shares fell 7.5 percent to $7.18 at 5:58 p.m. in extended New York trading after the report of the stock offering.

PIF first invested in Lucid in 2018, and steadily accumulated more shares until it held a majority ownership when the startup went public in 2021 through a combination with a special purpose acquisition company. The EV maker’s market value temporarily catapulted above established rivals Ford Motor Co. and General Motors Co. that year, and the shares jumped in January this year amid expectation of a buyout by PIF.