Ola Electric shares: After sliding 6% in early trade, stock makes a sharp rebound; scrip up 3%

Amid growing customer complaints against the EV maker and poor conditions at its service centres across the country, the Central Consumer Protection Authority (CCPA) has issued a show-cause notice to Bhavish Aggarwal-run EV company, asking it to respond to the notice within 15 days of receipt.

Besides, the stock took a heavy beating after a spat between comedian Kunal Kamra and company's CEO Bhavish Aggarwal on social media platform X did not go down well with the customers as well as stock investors. 

The stock slipped over 8% on Monday. 

On Sunday, a war of words broke out between Ola founder Bhavish Aggarwal and stand-up comedian Kunal Kamra over the after-sales and service quality.

The controversy started when Kunal Kamra responded to a post on X by Agarwal, who posted a photo of Ola's gigafactory, by putting a picture of several Ola Electric scooters parked together seemingly waiting for servicing.

In response to Kamra's tweet, Bhavish Aggarwal called him a failed stand-up comic and his tweet a "paid one, asserting that Ola Electric is rapidly expanding its service network and will clear all the backlogs "soon."

Further, many Ola Electric consumers jumped into the spat and complained about the service quality of the company, asking Aggarwal to address their issues.

Following this, many market analysts, experts, and others called out Aggarwal for his “rude, arrogant, and ignorant responses. 

One of the netizens said, “I don’t know how to cook, but that doesn’t mean I can’t say if the taste is good or not. How good a comedian is he? He has no relation whatsoever to how bad your OLA service is.”

A customer posted, “Sir, I am also an old user of OLA S1 Pro, and the service thing is true; your service centre guys don't behave well with the customer. The software is the biggest mess here, to be honest. Instead of these statements, try to resolve and optimise the software issues.”

In August this year, Ola Electric Mobility was listed at an issue price of ₹76. It quickly doubled from its issue price to make a post-listing high of ₹157.4.

Ola Electric has been losing market share to legacy auto players like Bajaj Auto and TVS Motor as they ramp up their push within the EV space.

One of the market experts on X said that Ola CEO's outburst on the social media platform will not go down well with stakeholders of the company, and it could be a big overhang on the stock, which was under pressure in any case.

The expert said that one of the biggest metrics one should track carefully is managerial risk, and a company's performance, reputation, or ability to continue as a business can be negatively impacted by its management.