Tesla valuation shot up to $1 trillion on news that Hertz ordered 100,000 vehicles for delivery by the end of 2022. The purchase is anticipated to favorably affect Tesla consumer sales as rental drivers are able to essentially test-drive Tesla electric cars. Over the past year Tesla stock has more than doubled, and the $1 trillion valuation puts it in an elite class of companies including Apple, Microsoft, Amazon and Alphabet whose market caps exceed $1 trillion. Facebook in June crossed the $1 billion valuation mark only to fall below during September and October selloffs.

Tesla’s trillion-plus valuation makes it worth more than the next nine biggest carmakers combined. “Wild $T1mes!” Tesla founder Elon Musk tweeted on the news, adding that as regards to the Hertz order he found it “Strange that moved valuation, as Tesla is very much a production ramp problem, not a demand problem.”

Tesla stock closed at $1024.86 per share on the Hertz news, an increase of more than 12 percent for a total market value of $1.03 trillion.

Tesla’s value has ascended unusually quickly in a short amount of time, growing from $100 billion to $1 trillion in less than two years, according to Dow Jones Market Data. By comparison, it took Amazon eight years-plus to achieve commensurate growth.

Hertz, which in 2011 began using electric vehicles in its rental fleet, said electric cars will comprise more than 20 percent its global fleet as a result of the Tesla order. The Wall Street Journal reports that Musk — who as of an SEC filing earlier this year dropped his CEO title in favor of “Technoking of Tesla” — says “cars sold to Hertz have no discount.”

Musk, who is Tesla’s largest shareholder and the world’s wealthiest person, now holds shares in the electric car company valued at roughly $297 billion, “more than the valuation of Toyota Motor Corp., the second-largest automaker by market capitalization.”

In other Tesla news, the company’s Model 3 was in September the top-selling vehicle in Europe, marking “the first time an electric car has outsold rival models with gasoline engines,” according to Bloomberg, which reported Tesla’s least expensive vehicle outsold popular favorites including Volkswagen’s Golf and Renault’s Clio.

Related:
Elon Musk Defies a Car Industry Mantra with Tesla-Hertz Deal, The Wall Street Journal, 10/26/21
Uber Aims for 50,000 Teslas on Its Platform by 2023, The Verge, 10/27/21
Hertz Links Up with Uber to Offer 50,000 Tesla Rentals, The Wall Street Journal, 10/27/21
GM Can ‘Absolutely’ Catch Tesla in EV Sales by 2025, Says CEO Mary Barra, CNBC, 10/27/21
Tesla’s Prototype Battery with 5 Times More Energy Storage Comes to Life at Panasonic, CNET, 10/25/21