Oklo stock lost nearly half its value on its first trading day.
Since then, the stock has tripled, despite Oklo trading below its 52-week peak.
The stock still has plenty of upside, but also plenty of risks.
Some stocks need years to ripen into their best form. Others explode out of the gate and never look back. Somehow, Oklo (NYSE: OKLO) has been both.
Oklo went public via a special purpose acquisition company merger (SPAC) in May 2024. It debuted on the market with a share price of about $15.50. If you had invested $10,000 in Oklo, then (at $15.50 a share), you would have lost half your investment by the end of its first day on the market. Share prices collapsed to about $8.45. So much for Sam Altman's nuclear moonshot.
Missed Nvidia in 2009? This Rare Signal Is Flashing Again. In 2009, a "Double Down" signal flashed for a little-known chipmaker called Nvidia. For the first time in years, that same "Total Conviction" signal is flashing for a company 1/100th the size of Nvidia. Continue »
Image source: The Motley Fool.
From there, however, Oklo has staged an impressive climb. And while today's share price (about $44) is certainly not the highest it's ever peaked, it has roughly tripled from where it started on that bruising first day.
In other words, a $10,000 investment in Oklo at its starting price of $15.50 would be worth about $28,600 today, assuming shares were held consistently throughout.
At Oklo's peak of roughly $193 per share (in October 2025), that original $10,000 investment would have been worth more than $124,000 (briefly).
Oklo, to say the least, is not a normal nuclear energy stock. It has significant upside, but the risks are just as enormous. The company has, I think, matured significantly since hitting that peak of $193, but the road from today's early-stage reactor developer to a profitable business is long and enveloped in mist. The company still has to prove its harder parts -- license Aurora for commercial deployment, then actually deploy Aurora for profit -- but for those who can wait patiently, the stock has the potential to return to those high levels.
Steven Porrello has positions in Oklo. The Motley Fool has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.