Despite cost cuts, Rivian surpasses Wall Street's second-quarter expectations.

• For the second quarter, Rivian Automotive surpassed Wall Street's expectations for both revenue and earnings per share.
• Despite continuing to lose thousands of dollars for each vehicle produced, the electric vehicle manufacturer has been concentrating on cutting expenses.

The electric vehicle maker is expected to outperform Wall Street's top- and bottom-line expectations for the second quarter by reducing costs from its business.

Analysts polled by LSEG estimated how the company would perform, but their predictions did not match the actual results.

• The adjusted loss per share was $1.13, lower than the expected loss of $1.21.
• Automotive revenue: $1.16 billion vs. $1.14 billion expected

During the second quarter, the company's net losses increased to $1.46 billion, resulting in a loss of $1.46 per share, compared to a loss of $1.2 billion and $1.27 per share in the previous year.

The company's EBITDA remained relatively stable from the previous year, resulting in a loss of $860 million.

On Tuesday, Rivian confirmed its 2024 production target of 57,000 units, with an expected loss of $2.7 billion in adjusted EBITDA and $1.2 billion in capital expenditures.

In the first six months of the year, Rivian manufactured approximately 23,600 vehicles, with only 9,162 produced in the second quarter due to plant downtime for retooling and cost reduction.

Rivian's second-quarter results were released more than a month after the company held an investor day that emphasized cost-cutting efforts, efficiency gains, and in-house technologies and software. This event occurred just days after Rivian announced that Volkswagen planned to invest up to $5 billion in the EV startup, with an initial investment of $1 billion.

Despite Rivian's significant cash burn and slower-than-expected demand for EVs, the stock closed Tuesday at $14.80, up 1.3%.

Rivian, despite still losing money on every vehicle it produces, has been concentrating on cost reduction. RJ Scaringe, CEO of Rivian, stated in June that earlier this year, the company achieved efficiencies in products and manufacturing, resulting in a 20% reduction in material costs for its current vehicles. Furthermore, the company aims to achieve a 45% reduction in material costs for its upcoming "R2" vehicles, which are projected to begin production in early 2026.

Through the first half of the year, Rivian spent a total of $537 million, with $283 million being spent during the second quarter.

Rivian had a total liquidity of $9.18 billion at the end of the second quarter, with $7.87 billion of it being cash, cash equivalents, and short-term investments.