Rubbish Check
Forbes Business · 28 July 2026
source“Lucid Motors Shares Skyrocket 20% After Billionaire Saudi Prince Discloses $150 Million Stake”
R3/ 10
Lightly altered
Rubbish Rating — 1 = base fact, 10 = pure rubbish
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In short
Rubbish Talk rates Forbes' claim that Lucid shares "skyrocketed 20%" on a Saudi prince's stake disclosure a 3/10 because the numbers check out against the SEC filing and multiple outlets, though the headline omits that the filing is a passive Schedule 13G, not an activist buy signal.
The Verdict
Lightly altered. The core numbers, the 20%+ surge, the roughly $150 million valuation, the 5% stake, all match the SEC filing and independent corroboration. The one omission is that this was a passive Schedule 13G disclosure, not a fresh vote-of-confidence purchase in the sense readers might infer, and Forbes' own body copy properly includes the deflating context (99.6% collapse from all-time high, stock still down 71% year-over-year) that the headline alone wouldn't convey.
What actually happened
Prince Alwaleed bin Talal disclosed a 5% stake in Lucid Motors via an SEC filing, sending shares up sharply in a single trading session. The disclosure came weeks after Lucid publicly denied bankruptcy rumors that had hammered the stock to record lows.
Key facts
- Filing shows Prince Alwaleed holds approximately 19.51 million Class A shares in Lucid, a 13G filing calculated against 390,256,808 Class A shares outstanding as of April 29, 2026.
- Lucid shares jumped as much as 25% on Tuesday after the filing surfaced, even though the disclosure itself is passive and mostly a technical formality, per Electrek's read of the same filing.
- Alwaleed certified that the shares were "not acquired and are not held for the purpose of or with the effect of changing or influencing the control of the issuer", meaning no board fight or activist intent, a nuance Forbes' headline doesn't surface.
- Forbes itself reports the stock surged 20.5% on Tuesday to around $7.80 after earlier peaking as high as $8.48, though the stock is still down 71% over the last 12 months and nearly 28% this year so far.
- The purchase timing: the investment was made on July 23, with the prince now holding sole voting and dispositive power over the shares, a little over a week after the bankruptcy-rumor selloff.
What to watch for
Watch whether Saudi PIF, Lucid's majority owner, makes any further moves, since Electrek's take flags speculation that this could presage a take-private effort. Also watch whether coverage keeps citing this as a "confidence" signal without noting it's a passive 13G, not an activist stake.
About this scoreThe R-Score is Rubbish Talk's editorial opinion on how far a headline's framing sits from what the underlying facts support. It is a judgement about presentation and emphasis, not an allegation that any outlet has acted dishonestly. Every figure we rely on is linked under Receipts so you can check it yourself.
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