There's A Secret Bidding War To Buy Fisker

Start-up electric automakers are not only very desirable investments, such as Rivian, which just received another $2.5 billion in financing from both private capital sources and Amazon but also potential initial public offerings. Best example: Tesla. One of Tesla's main rivals, Nikola, issued an IPO just last month and its shares are now up by more than 60 percent. And now another Tesla rival is quietly in talks to also go public. Reuters reports Fisker Inc. is holding discussions to issue an IPO through a sale to "a so-called blank-check acquisition company."

This is the same model Nikola used and Fisker has clearly take note. At the moment, Fisker refuses to comment on the report, as does Spartan Energy Acquisition Corp, the investment group currently leading the quiet bidding war.

No other parties were named, but it's possible a deal worth close to $2 billion could be finalized sometime this week. Late last week, Fisker announced a $50 million investment from a private investment fund. The amount will be good enough to provide the necessary cash flow to launch the Fisker Ocean all-electric crossover in 2022. It will serve as a direct rival to the Tesla Model Y and also the upcoming Audi Q4 Sportback e-tron.

Founded by Henrik Fisker in 2016, the Los Angeles-based Fisker has pledged to sell its first model with a starting price tag of just $37,500, and that's before the federal tax incentive. Henrik Fisker's previous venture, Fisker Automotive, filed for bankruptcy back in 2013. It only managed to build less than 2,000 examples of the Fisker Karma.

Chinese auto parts supplier Wanxiang Group purchased the company's assets the following year and renamed it Karma Automotive. Unlike Fisker Inc., Karma Automotive is reportedly facing a serious financial crisis right now. Fortunately, Spartan is in good financial shape to make a deal with Fisker.

In 2018, it raised $552 million with its own IPO and it plans to use those funds along with some borrowed money to seal the Fisker deal. Expect to hear more about this emerging news in the coming days.