NEW YORK, May 26, 2026, 07:02 EDT
Oklo shares moved higher ahead of the open Tuesday after Bank of America started coverage with a Buy and set an $80 target. The advanced nuclear company has been one of the wilder stocks in the AI power space. Oklo traded at $65.88, up 1.2%, according to Investing.com. Stocktwits tracked a 150% increase in retail message volume over the last 24 hours.
Timing is key. Investors are working out what electricity demand could stick and which nuclear names are just bets on winning licenses and pulling off construction and fuel supply. AI data centers have pushed Big Tech into signing power deals. Nuclear firms are trying to sell small modular reactors (SMRs), repeatable mini-nuclear plants, as a solution.
Oklo is a key name in that trade. The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission calls its Aurora design a liquid metal-cooled, metal-fueled fast reactor set for 75 megawatts electric maximum output. Reuters’ company profile says Oklo wants to supply 24/7 power to data centers, factories, industrial operations, local communities, and defense with power purchase deals.
Bank of America analyst Rinny Singh said Oklo’s “build-own-operate” strategy could put it ahead in the SMR market. Singh pointed to a 1.2-gigawatt binding power deal with Meta Platforms and more than 14 gigawatts lined up in non-binding agreements. “With the demonstration reactor on track and hyperscalers agreements, we see a compelling advantage,” Singh said. TipRanks
Oklo needed a clearer pitch for investors. Last week, 24/7 Wall St. put a $98.78 target on the stock, which pointed to a 76.77% gain from where it sat at $55.88, but only assigned it a 50% confidence rating. Two days before that, the publication said the nuclear and uranium trade was getting softer. Oklo dropped 5% that Tuesday. Uranium Energy lost 9% and Energy Fuels slid 6%.
Cash is the buffer for now. Oklo’s SEC filing listed $2.54 billion in cash, cash equivalents and marketable debt securities as of March 31. For the first quarter, the company reported a net loss of $33.1 million and used $17.9 million in operating cash. Oklo brought in about $1.18 billion from an at-the-market share sale, providing funds but diluting current shareholders.
Regulatory progress still matters to the bull case. Oklo said May 6 the NRC signed off on the Principal Design Criteria report for the Aurora project in Idaho, moving faster than usual. The approval lets the report serve as a reference in later filings and cuts down on repeated reviews of the same points. “Performance-based licensing, clear criteria, and efficient reviews are important,” Oklo CEO Jacob DeWitte said. Oklo
Meta is the commercial hook here. In January, Reuters said Meta’s deal with Oklo could lead to up to 1.2 gigawatts of nuclear power in Ohio by 2030. That’s just a piece of Meta’s bigger target of 6.6 gigawatts by 2035. One gigawatt is about the output of a big nuclear plant.
Banks are eyeing the sector, but most haven’t jumped in yet. “We have started to hear that banks are getting excited and interested in deal-making in the space,” Tess Carter, associate director of the energy and climate practice at Rhodium Group, told Reuters in April. For firms like Oklo, access to banks is key before their projects move past the venture stage and start to look like infrastructure. Reuters
Peer coverage is mixed. Bank of America took a less bullish stance on NuScale Power, assigning a Neutral rating and a $12 price target. The bank cited slower moves from agreements to firm orders, higher cash burn, and near-term funding concerns. This comes as investors shift away from uranium stocks like Uranium Energy and Energy Fuels. Investors now seem more selective, looking for companies in nuclear with clear cash, customers, and actual project buildout.
But demand doesn’t mean deployment. Reuters points out there aren’t any U.S. SMRs running commercially, and Oklo’s filings spell out risks on fuel supply, construction funding, rules, and the fact that no commercial SMRs are operating yet. “Commercialization and large-scale deployment still depend” on licensing, fuel supply, construction and financing, Oklo spokesperson Bonita Chester told Reuters. Reuters
Oklo isn’t moving like a typical utility stock. Right now, it’s trading more like a high-beta AI power story, where bulls are betting that artificial intelligence will push advanced nuclear into the market much faster. Next up, investors are watching for concrete results—regulatory steps, news on fuel, construction progress, and signed customer deals. If those stall, the $80 call option won’t become anything more than an option.
