Oklo pacing for big week, helped by risk-on appetite and Trump policy directive
Retail favorite Oklo, the “pre-revenue” designer of smaller experimental modular nuclear reactors with close ties to the Trump administration, is on track for its best week since January, even after slumping early Thursday.
Before Thursday’s slight decline, Oklo had posted big gains for four straight days, rising 33% in that time frame. Another stock in the category, NuScale, rose 27% in the same span.
Oklo shares may have benefited from a directive published Tuesday by the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy directing federal agencies to “establish cost-effective partnerships with private-sector innovators to meet near-term objectives that include safely deploying nuclear reactors in orbit as early as 2028 and on the Moon as early as 2030.”
Oklo’s close ties to the US government could put it in a position to benefit from such orders. US Secretary of Energy Chris Wright formerly served on Oklo’s board of directors.
Separately, Oklo announced new members of its board of directors Tuesday, adding David Christian, a former executive from Dominion Energy, and David Park, CEO of Standard Lithium, among others.
Whether these announcements ultimately translate into a financial gain for Oklo remains to be seen. But it likely won’t be seen for a while.
The company doesn’t expect to generate any meaningful revenue until it brings its Aurora line of modular reactors, none of which have been built yet, to market. (The company has announced approvals of some design plans related to a prototype it’s building at the Idaho National Laboratory.)
On the other hand, Oklo does have some money to burn, reporting cash and marketable securities worth some ~$1.4 billion at the end of 2025. And with the share price spiking this week, Oklo executives might also be tempted to offer more stock as a source of funding.
Oklo’s upswing comes amid a rebound in retail trading this week that’s sending stocks and crypto beloved by individual traders — such as IonQ, D-Wave Quantum, Hims & Hers, and SoundHound AI — sharply higher, as worries about Iran ease and traders rush to buy whatever remaining “dip” there is.
