1 Stock That's Risen Over 1,000% in the Last 365 Days

Key Points

• Oklo is developing Aurora, a small modular reactor that could be an ideal energy source for hyperscale data centers.

• The company is riding on policy tailwinds, including an Idaho project to build its first modular reactor.

• Pre-revenue and pre-license, Oklo is a speculative play on the future of energy.

• 10 stocks we like better than Oklo ›

A 1,000% return. A 10-bagger. Ten dollars for every $1 you invest. It's the kind of multiple every investor hopes for and only a few get. The kind that could make you wealthy with the right initial investment.

Many growth companies surged by 1,000% or more over their lifetime. And yet investors in Oklo (NYSE: OKLO) who have held their shares for the last 365 days have realized a gain of about 1,200%. That's enough to turn $10,000 into $125,000, or enough to scale up from a used sedan to a brand new foreign sports car.

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But past performance doesn't guarantee future results, and Oklo is definitely not a safe stock. In fact, its volatility can be all over the map, from days of double-digit gains to days of double-digit losses.

With so much positive momentum already behind it -- and a price-to-book ratio in the low 20s -- does this nuclear energy stock still have room to grow, or will it fizzle out?

Image source: Getty Images.

How we got here

Oklo has spent the better part of a decade designing Aurora, a compact nuclear reactor that's expected to run for 10 years without refueling. Unlike big reactors, which require huge cooling towers and long timelines for construction, Aurora is designed to be small, modular, and fairly easy to deploy.

This compactness and modularity is partly why Oklo's design has garnered so much attention. Similar to how cellphones let people connect beyond the reach of landlines, Aurora could deliver power to remote areas, like mining sites and military camps, that traditional power grids don't reach.

This, in turn, makes Oklo's design seem like an ideal solution for power-hungry AI data centers (it's notable that Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI, was once Oklo's board chairman).

What's turning heads this year, however, isn't the technology but the deals.

In June, the company was selected by the Department of Defense and Air Force as the apparent recipient for an Alaska-based project to build and operate the Air Force's first modular reactor. And in September, it broke ground on its first Aurora project as part of a program in Idaho sponsored by the Department of Energy.

Since Oklo has not built or operated a commercial reactor, both of these opportunities give it a chance to prove that its designs can work at scale.

What's holding Oklo back

If an AI-driven future unfolds as expected, the company could be sitting on a multibillion-dollar idea. But let's not get ahead of ourselves. The hard truth is that it hasn't generated any revenue.

In part that's because, while the company has strong backing, it doesn't have a license from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) to build Aurora modular reactors commercially. And it's not expecting its first to be up and running until late 2027, which means it won't generate revenue for several years.

Another potential weakness is that Aurora depends on a fuel source that is in extremely short supply outside of Russia: high-assay low-enriched uranium (HALEU). The only commercial-scale HALEU enrichment plant under development in the U.S. is being built by Centrus Energy. Although Centrus recently delivered a sizable quantity of HALEU to the Department of Energy, it still has a long way to go before it meets the needs of a nuclear company like Oklo.

Lastly, there's the money. Its cash and equivalents were around $227 million at the end of June. That gives it a runway of a few years.

At the same time, building nuclear reactors -- even small ones -- is capital intensive. So investors should be prepared for more capital raises along the way, potentially diluting shares.

Is Oklo worth buying?

When you see an energy stock that has climbed over 1,000%, it's easy to get wide-eyed and greedy. But before you buy Oklo, just consider a few things.

First, the company's valuation is already high. At today's share price, its market cap sits between $16 billion and $17 billion. Again, this is a pre-revenue company we're talking about. Clearly, there's a lot of growth expectation already baked into the stock.

Second, Oklo isn't the only front-runner in small modular reactors (SMRs). There's also NuScale Power, which is developing a light-water SMR and is the first U.S. company to receive NRC approval for an SMR design. And though it doesn't have a working reactor yet, it aims to have one finished by the end of the decade.

Oklo has tailwinds from White House policy and the AI boom. But whether it becomes a long-term supplier of power depends on what happens between now and its first reactor coming on line.

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Steven Porrello has positions in NuScale Power and Oklo. The Motley Fool recommends NuScale Power. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.