A Newly Public Cloud Developer Surged 2,000% in Its First Week

(Bloomberg) -- Traders should have some fun with this small-cap stock whose quadruple-digit gain has managed to go under the radar.

Phunware Inc., a cloud software provider that manages the app development lifecycle, is off to a dramatic start in 2019, with shares having climbed more than 2,000 percent from last year’s low. The rally started after the company consummated its merger with Stellar Acquisition Inc. in late December, thrusting it into the public market.

Chief Technology Officer Luan Dang, who was an angel investor in Vonage Holdings Corp., became the second-largest holder with a 683,534-share stake. Malaysia-based investment fund Khazanah Nasional Bhd is the biggest investor with 2.2 million shares.

Shares ended 2018 at $14.26 and closed at a record $220 on Wednesday. After initially extending its meteoric rise on Thursday -- surging as high as $550 -- the stock subsequently turned sharply lower, ending down 29 percent on the day at $157. It was halted multiple times for volatility reasons. Volume amounted to 29,170 shares for a total traded value of $2.2 million.

At current levels, Phunware has a market capitalization of about $4.4 billion, up from $56.5 million at the end of last year.

Austin, Texas-based Phunware on Thursday also issued a press release announcing that it had been granted a patent related to monitoring the location of mobile devices both indoors and outdoors.

The company didn’t immediately return a request for comment.

To contact the reporters on this story: Kamaron Leach in New York at kleach6@bloomberg.net;Ryan Vlastelica in New York at rvlastelica1@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Catherine Larkin at clarkin4@bloomberg.net, Richard Richtmyer, Chris Nagi

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