Gary Zhou 
Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA) as a company is no stranger to doing things that were widely thought of as impossible. It made the stigmatized segment of electric vehicles exciting with cars like the original Roadster and the Model S. It also proved that battery production is the next great frontier with projects such as Gigafactory Nevada.
And with Tesla stock’s recent rampage in the market, the EV maker has done what could very well have seemed impossible just a few years ago — it made the biggest 12-day gain in the history of capital markets by adding almost $400 billion to its market cap. The feat, which was recently highlighted in a Fortune article, was something that not even Tesla’s peers in the trillion-dollar club have accomplished in the recent past.
Tesla shares were on a wild surge as of late, with the company going on a tear following its impressive Q3 2021 earnings results on October 20. Just two days after that date, Tesla touched the $1 trillion valuation mark for the first time. News of car rental giant Hertz’s decision to purchase 100,000 Teslas in a $4.2 billion deal then pushed TSLA shares to a one-day gain of 13%, ending the day at $1,025 a share.
Despite Elon Musk later clarifying that the Hertz deal has “zero effect” on Tesla’s economics since the car rental giant would be buying the vehicles at full price, momentum from the contract effectively boosted TSLA stock to an all-time record close of $1,209 per share on November 1. Tesla’s massive surge ultimately saw the company’s market cap growing from $818 billion to $1.2 trillion, an increase of about $392 billion, in just 12 days.
Tesla is a newcomer in the trillion-dollar club, and each of the four companies that stand above the EV maker has experienced its own surges in the past. Apple, for example, saw a 17% bull run from June 7 to July 19 of this year, which allowed the company’s market cap to swell to $2.4 trillion. This run, however, took nearly three times as long as Tesla’s recent rampage, and it was about $50 billion short compared to the EV maker’s 12-day run.
Microsoft’s closest runs came over 20 days from September 27 to October 25, when the tech giant surged by 11.4% and added $225 billion to its market cap. A 15% increase over the 15 days from January 11 to February 8 also resulted in the company adding $240 billion to its market cap. Amazon, for its part, saw a 9.4% surge over nine days from June 21 to July 5 that resulted in a valuation rise of $165 billion. Lastly, Alphabet got its quickest boost over 25 days from March 22 to April 26, when its shares surged 18%, adding $240 billion to the company’s valuation.
What is interesting is that even with Elon Musk’s comments about the Hertz deal not being finalized — and TSLA stock dropping 3.1% in the process — the event only erased about 12 billion from the company’s $392 billion, 12-day advance. If one were to consider this selloff, Tesla would still be particularly impressive, with the company ranking first for a 14-day surge. Overall, Tesla seems poised to set records in the segments it touches, and its stock, which now seems to sit comfortably within the trillion-dollar club, might very well do the same.
