Why Did Rivian Stock Fall On Thursday?
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Rivian Automotive (RIVN) stock fell 5.5% on Thursday, November 12, 2026, while the S&P 500 slipped 0.3%. If you own it, your first question is what the company did, and there was no announcement or earnings report from the company around the move. Lucid Group, one of its peers, fell even harder, dropping 11.3% the same session. So what was going on around Rivian that Thursday?
What Was Weighing On Stocks And Car Buyers?
Nvidia shares tumbled over a leadership crisis, and AI stocks around the world sank with them. The Nasdaq Composite ended the session down 0.4%. Car buyers faced financial strain as well: Cox Automotive said the monthly payment on a new vehicle reached roughly $776 in September, its highest since December 2023, as rising prices stretch new buyers thin.
Rivian sells to those same buyers, and its newest model now leads its sales. The R2 became its best-selling vehicle by volume in the third quarter, management said on the October 29 call. On that same call, management said commodity prices, memory in particular, came in a lot higher than it expected. The company is working to offset those costs so it can still deliver its trims at the prices it had set, with the base trim starting at $45,000.
Did Rivian Fall With Other Car Makers?
Mostly, yes, and it fell further than all of them but Lucid. Three of its four peers fell the same session, among them General Motors, which dropped 3.0%, while Tesla rose 1.7%. Rivian’s sub-industry, automobile manufacturers, holds only three other companies worth $2 billion or more, and none of them fell 5% or more. Those three are Tesla, General Motors and Ford; Lucid is not one of them.
The broader consumer sector barely moved, with the Consumer Discretionary sector fund, XLY, slipping 0.4%. While Rivian moved with the car makers rather than the wider market, its decline was close to twice the 2.9% median drop of its sub-industry.
Where Rivian Stock Stands After The Fall
A decline of this size is not rare for Rivian. The stock posted 15 falls at least this large in the prior 365 days, with the latest arriving only a week earlier, on November 5. Over the past twelve months, the stock lost 29.0%, while the S&P 500 returned 12.2%.
The stock now trades much nearer its lowest close of the past twelve months, $11.43 on October 26, 2026, than its highest, $22.45 on December 19, 2025. It ended Thursday at $12.80. Much of the slide is recent: over the three months to November 12 the stock fell 16.7%, against a 2.2% drop for the S&P 500. At 2.9 times its sales over the past twelve months, Rivian is priced a little below the S&P 500, at 3.2 times. Rivian lost money in that period, while the index trades at 21.9 times earnings.
Management said on the October 29 call that it expects the R2 to help its car business run at a positive gross margin as it exits the year. That automotive gross margin is the measure to watch when Rivian reports its fourth-quarter results, expected in February 2027. Management also said on the call not to expect a positive margin for the full quarter, only as it exits the quarter.
Does This Mean You Should Act On RIVN?
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