Tesla crosses $800 bn in market cap for first time

Electric-car maker Tesla's shares on Friday ended up 7.84% at $880.02, hitting a record high.

Tesla's market capitalization crossed $800 billion, fortifying its position as Wall Street's fifth most valuable company, above Facebook Inc.

Tesla CEO Elon Musk also surpassed Amazon's top boss Jeff Bezos to become the world's richest person, Bloomberg News reported on Thursday.


Evercore ISI upgraded the rating on stock to "in line" from "underperform" and raised the price target to $650 from $225.

Separately, Reuters reported that China's search engine giant Baidu plans to form a company to make smart electric vehicles (EV), with manufacturing to be carried out at plants owned by automaker Geely.

The company also launched a cheaper variant of the Model Y, its sports utility vehicle, bringing its price closer to that of Model 3 sedan, Tesla's least expensive car.

Tesla stock has surged over 700% in the past 12 months.