Down More Than 60% From Its High, Is Now the Time to Buy Archer Aviation Stock?

Archer Aviation remains more than 60% below its 52-week high of $14.62 and 45% lower over the past year, as investors wait for FAA Type Certification of its Midnight eVTOL aircraft. The company says it has reached a key FAA milestone and still plans to begin operations later this year, but it remains a cash-burning business with limited revenue and meaningful execution risk. The article argues Archer offers higher upside than rival Joby at a lower valuation, but approval does not eliminate the risk of ongoing losses and cash burn.

Analysis

The market is treating ACHR and JOBY less like operating businesses and more like binary regulatory-duration trades. In that setup, the cheaper name usually screens as the cleaner long, but the real edge is in recognizing that certification is not the value inflection point by itself; it is the point at which financing risk re-prices. If Archer clears the gate, the stock can rerate quickly on de-risking, but the follow-through depends on whether the market believes the company can fund the next 12-24 months without punitive dilution.

The second-order winner may be the broader eVTOL supply chain, not the air-taxi OEMs themselves. Any proof of certification cadence should tighten the cost of capital for component suppliers, battery-pack assemblers, avionics, and infrastructure partners, while simultaneously pressuring weaker private peers that need fresh equity before the category proves itself. Conversely, if Archer executes but still burns cash at a high rate, the market will learn that approval is only a commercialization milestone, not an earnings catalyst, which caps upside for the entire pre-revenue cohort.

The contrarian view is that JOBY’s premium may be partly justified if investors are paying for execution credibility rather than headline momentum. But the spread looks wide enough that a lot of good news is already capitalized into JOBY while ACHR is pricing in a more adverse path than the likely base case. Near term, the stock reaction should be dominated by certification headlines and any guidance around launch timing; medium term, the more important variable is financing terms, because dilution can overwhelm operational progress for 6-18 months.

For us, the setup favors trading the valuation gap rather than expressing a directional view on the category. If certification progress stays intact, ACHR has more convexity; if progress stalls, both names can derate, but JOBY’s higher multiple makes it more vulnerable to disappointment. The key risk is that investors confuse regulatory proximity with commercial viability and chase too early before unit economics are visible.

Key Decisions for Investors

• Initiate a tactical long ACHR / short JOBY pair trade over the next 1-3 months: express relative re-rating if Archer continues to de-risk certification, with the short leg hedging category beta and valuation compression risk.
• Buy ACHR only as a small event-driven position, sized for binary risk, and look to add on pullbacks rather than strength; the setup is best for a 6-12 month horizon, not a core hold.
• Avoid chasing JOBY into positive headline flow unless there is evidence of post-certification commercial traction; at current relative valuation, the asymmetry is less attractive and downside to a sentiment reset is meaningful.
• Use call spreads on ACHR rather than outright shares if positioning ahead of a regulatory catalyst; this limits dilution/financing risk while keeping upside to a sharp rerating.
• Monitor financing announcements and cash runway closely; if either issuer signals accelerated capital needs, expect a 15-25% stock-level drawdown even if operating milestones remain intact.