Steven Porrello, The Motley Fool

Sat, June 13, 2026 at 5:25 AM CDT













Where we're going, we don't need roads!" said Doc Brown of Back to the Future before revving up the most famous flying car in the history of film -- the iconic, lightning-powered, Flux Capacitor-embedded DeLorean.

The phrase could just as well be the motto of Archer Aviation (NYSE: ACHR). Archer, like Doc, has a flying car -- Midnight, an electric takeoff vertical and landing (eVTOL) aircraft. It might not travel back in time, but it can travel above streets and turnpikes at a targeted speed of 150 mph, cutting an hour-long slog through traffic to 10 minutes or less.

Image source: Archer Aviation.

Archer stock has been trailing the market in 2026, as Wall Street continues to worry about FAA certification timelines and ongoing losses. And yet for those who believe eVTOLs will transform transportation, today's dip in Archer Aviation might be an opportunity, one that could grow tenfold or more over the long run. Here's how.

Archer Aviation currently trades between $5 and $6 a share, with a market cap of about $4.5 billion. A tenfold gain to Archer stock at today's price, then, would bring its market cap to $45 billion -- assuming no significant stock dilution. In reality, Archer has increased its share count substantially over the years to fund operations, and chances are more dilution is coming. For the sake of example, however, we'll use $45 billion, knowing that the actual market cap needed to support a tenfold gain could be higher.

What would need to happen for this stock to grow into a $45 billion market cap? For one, the FAA regulatory process, which Archer is currently moving through, would be a thing of the past. Two, Archer would need to be generating meaningful revenue. Assuming a price-to-sales ratio of 20 -- roughly where Tesla (NASDAQ: TSLA) traded at the end of 2020, when investor enthusiasm reached feverish levels -- Archer would need to generate about $2.3 billion in revenue.

That's not a lofty long-term target. In fact, analysts currently expect Archer's revenue to reach nearly $500 million within two years.

Data by YCharts

The leap from $93 million to $482 million in the graph above suggests analysts expect Archer to make substantial progress toward commercialization over the next several years. FAA type certification is crucial because, without it, Archer can't bring Midnight into commercial services.

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