BYND rises on elevated volumes, has now doubled in the last 10 days after product revamps
Beyond Meat soared as much as 18% in overnight trading, extending a winning streak that has seen the stock nearly double since April 10, after gaining over 41% in yesterday’s session alone.
That’s a significant turnaround for the meat alternative company, which just three weeks ago was tanking after issuing weak sales guidance... with the company’s management laying blame on American society for its business struggles.
Beyond repair?
BYND has had two distinct moments in the sun: one as a bona fide startup stud promising to transform the food industry forever in 2020 and 2021, and the other as a meme stock, when the company suddenly found itself at the center of a retail trading frenzy last October after a tumultuous few years.
Sparking this latest tick higher appears to be a new product release from last Thursday, when the company revealed that Beyond Immerse, the company’s first functional beverage line, had signed a distribution agreement with Big Geyser — one of the country’s largest nonalcoholic distributors. That followed an update to its breakfast sausage range just three days earlier.
It’s a big ask for a new sausage or protein-packed drinks with fruity flavors — both highly competitive categories — to fully save a company that’s seen sales sink, losses balloon, and its share price crater through the years. But the product news, combined with Beyond appeasing Nasdaq regulators by finally filing its delayed 2025 annual report, seems to have been enough to reinvigorate investor interest, shaking off some concerns about a delisting.
Perhaps most importantly, however, is that retail traders are once again fishing in the higher-risk, higher-reward end of the stock market pond. Risk-on assets have ripped higher in the last few weeks as geopolitical risks calmed, bringing indexes to an all-time high and seeing meme-like stocks soar on speculative excitement rather than business fundamentals. Just from last week, we’ve seen Allbirds and Myseum skyrocket on surprise AI pivot news. Retail favorites like quantum name IonQ have also caught a bid.
But, where Beyond’s concerned, this ain’t 2021 yet. And it’s still nowhere near last October, either:
Per Bloomberg data, there’s still plenty of interest in betting against the company — short interest as a percent of the equity float is at 35% — but it still pales compared to the 83% level from its October high.
In simple volume terms, BYND traded only some $224 million as of yesterday — a tiny fraction of October’s busiest day, when $11 billion changed hands.
