Back in September 2024, I wrote a post titled “Sunnova Energy (NOVA): Mission Accomplished – 15 Free Shares to Keep Forever” with a kind of smug optimism you only get from a good trade. At the time, Sunnova looked battered but promising, and I’d managed to walk away with 15 shares—paid for entirely by gains on earlier trades. The plan? Keep them forever. A little solar keepsake. A badge of patience.

Well, “forever” ended in June 2025, when Sunnova filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy and got booted from the NYSE. The ticker NOVA died quietly, replaced by NOVAQ on the over-the-counter markets, where distressed stocks go to haunt one another.

What happened?

Sunnova had been struggling for a while, burdened by debt and operating in a high-interest-rate environment that crushed the solar leasing model. When their financing dried up, so did investor faith. The stock collapsed, and by mid-2025, shares were trading for less than half a cent. A sad sun indeed.

NOVA (NYSE)

This was its primary listing until it was delisted following financial distress and the Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing in June 2025. After delisting from the NYSE, Sunnova began trading over-the-counter under the new ticker:

NOVAQ (OTC Markets)

So in summary:

Period	Exchange	Ticker
Before June 2025	NYSE	NOVA
After delisting	OTCMKTS	NOVAQ (not worth a cent)

Did I lose money?

Here’s the surprising part: no.

Thanks to what I call the “free stock by double up” strategy, I was holding those 15 shares at zero cost basis. I’d doubled down when the stock dropped, sold half when it bounced, and kept the rest as profit-paid relics. It’s a rinse-and-repeat method I use for long-shot plays:

1. Buy when blood runs.
2. Sell when hope returns.
3. Keep what’s left—free and clear.

It doesn’t always work, but when it does, it protects your downside beautifully. Sunnova’s bankruptcy meant my 15 shares are now essentially worthless. But since I didn’t pay anything for them in the first place, I lost nothing.

The moral of the story?

Nothing is forever—not even your “forever” stocks. But if you build a margin of safety into your positions, even the worst-case scenarios turn into amusing footnotes rather than painful lessons.

So here’s to Sunnova. A dream that ran on sunlight, debt, and optimism—until it didn’t.

And to the “free stock” strategy: a small idea that outlived the company it was built on.