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Tesla stock climbs on grim news

The Wall Street Journal tells us about Tesla's first quarter results:

The Texas-based car company reported net income of $1.1 billion for the January-to-March period, down 55% from the year prior. Revenue fell 9% to $21.3 billion, reflecting a decline in both vehicle prices and deliveries.

Tesla’s operating margin narrowed significantly, dropping to 5.5% in the first three months of the year, from 11.4% a year earlier. Adjusted earnings per share of 45 cents missed Wall Street’s expectations.

....Tesla sells five passenger models—fewer than many other automakers—and earlier this month reported an 8.5% decline in first-quarter deliveries.

....Tesla’s free cash flow turned negative in the first quarter, bleeding about $2.5 billion as the company invested in artificial-intelligence infrastructure, and unsold-vehicle inventory climbed to 28 days of supply, from 15 days the year prior.

....Tesla reiterated Tuesday that growth in 2024 might be “notably lower” than it was the previous year.

Naturally Tesla stock was up 10% in after-hours trading.

41 thoughts on “Tesla stock climbs on grim news

    1. DianaBryan

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  1. lower-case

    certainly not the only reason for tesla's problems, but maybe attacking the politics and morals of your customers isn't such a great business model

    1. tigersharktoo

      Elmo says "F you!"

      In addition to which they now have competition in the EV marketplace from multiple automakers. For a few years they were almost the only player.

    2. Citizen Lehew

      Yeah, I think it's been WAY understated just how much total brand destruction is affecting Tesla's business.

      Did Elon imagine that rabid right wingers would start believing in global warming and pick up the slack for the droves of lefty customers who wouldn't be caught dead in a Tesla now?

      1. Five Parrots in a Shoe

        For example, I've already decided that my next car will be an EV. But definitely not a Tesla, no way, no how, not a chance in hell.

        1. Citizen Lehew

          Same here. I was absolutely sure my next car would be a Tesla. Now I'm absolutely sure it'll be any EV but a Tesla.

          1. KinersKorner

            Same with me. My wife forbids it. I did tell her soon he will be selling them that at a loss, could we get one then? Honestly, I wouldn’t buy one.

  2. J. Frank Parnell

    Elon runs Tesla as a vanity company, not a business. He is continually getting distracted by shining things like self presenting door handles (only took four generations of design to make them reliable), hawk wing doors, Cybertruck, etc.These suck up cash and engineering effort that could better be spent on more mundane things like improved quality and cheaper EV’s for the masses. Buying Tesla stock is investing in Elon’s next science fair project.

    1. Crissa

      I guess you don't know that Ford selected self-presenting doors for their new models? It turns out that's cheaper than cutting holes and making structure for a handle.

      Trucks are the biggest sellers in North America. So of course they go for them.

      Their margins on EVs are so much higher they made $90 billion profit last year while Toyota made $60 billion.

      Their only limit is how many can they build and how deeply do they want to discount them.

      1. J. Frank Parnell

        Ah, Crissa the Elon fan boy speaks.

        The difference is Ford understood what it was getting into. The environment inside a door is the essentially the same as outside, in terms of temperature and humidity, so you have to design accordingly. It took Tesla four tries to get it right, meanwhile Tesla customers get to participate in their product development and testing.

        I think you have it wrong when you call the cybertruck a truck, it’s actually more of an up market personal transportation vehicle. I don’t think you will ever see you landscaping crew or your contractor driving up in one. In any case Tesla spent so much on developing a product with a limited market that they will likely never make a profit on it.

  3. Wichitawstraw

    Stock is up because they are going to lay off 2,700 people who will be out of work so that Elon can own the libs.

  4. Chondrite23

    Apparently Elon said they were canceling the $25,000 model (not out yet) to be replaced by an unspecified low cost model coming out “real soon now”. Based on this the stock is up about 12% after hours. I can’t believe the people buying this are so gullible.

    1. Crissa

      Only Reuters is saying that - Elon has said he didn't say that, and other executives saying it's being misconstrued.

      ????‍♀️

      1. TheMelancholyDonkey

        Yeah, I'd trust a company run by someone who says things that are misconstrued as often as Musk does.

      2. jdubs

        Elons statements about Tesla are literally never true. But some people are bound up so tightly in his cult that they still put weight into what he says.

  5. golack

    No worries, I'm sure he'll get the shareholders to vote for his, what, $56 billion, pay package (not salary, just stock options?)...

  6. kennethalmquist

    The earnings per share “missed expectations” by coming in at $0.45 per share when expectations were $0.46 per share. To me, it looks like the expectations were pretty much on the mark, so there is no reason for the reported financial numbers to move the price of the stock. Prior to the announcement, the stock was down 26% from it's July 2023 high.

    Of course there's also no reason for the reported financial numbers to move the stock higher. Probably what moved the stock higher was the discussion of future plans.

    1. Lounsbury

      And also potentially - besides bets on bottom-out - some positions readjustments.

      As indeed informed market actors have already over just the past quarter engage in significant selling on expectations.

    1. Crissa

      As much as he's a wreck, Tesla isn't. All automakers are hitting a wall when it comes to sales, either dropped growth or retraction this year. Especially more expensive models.

      We'll see how their production rates for the new batteries and trucks will be. They're on track now - if they stopped the ramp today - to deliver more trucks this year than Ford has delivered Lightning EVs since their launch.

      ????‍♀️

      1. jdubs

        Just to be clear, Ford sold roughly 4x more vehicles than Tesla did in 2023. Ford sales were up 3% from 2022 while Tesla sales were down 9%.

        But this is all GOOD NEWS! lol

    1. Lounsbury

      For Drum and most of his Lefty commentariat, afraid yes (although discernable reasons better said as "multiple factors other than that publication of report, some of which being entirely exogenous"

    2. TheMelancholyDonkey

      Stocks go up when there are more buyers than sellers. They go down when there are more sellers than buyers.

  7. Dana Decker

    The new, more affordable Tesla model (using an existing platform) will be a Model 3 without a radio or power windows. You can save more if you bring your own seat, ac and steering wheel. Or get the smaller battery version with a range of 30 miles.

  8. Brett

    It happened the last time the stock dipped close to $100/share. All the Phony Stark cult investor crowd started piling in to buy it, pushing it back up again.

    I'm curious if that will persist. Musk doesn't have something brand-new to promise Big Returns with anymore, unlike before Cyber-Truck really went out for sale. Big promises about Self-Driving Taxis this year, but I suspect they won't even be able to reasonably imitate Waymo's driving record by then.

  9. D_Ohrk_E1

    bleeding about $2.5 billion as the company invested in artificial-intelligence infrastructure

    The training (computing) costs for each generation of LLM rises exponentially. OpenAI appears to be only a generation or two away from the cost being over $1B to train a new generation. At the point where we're talking multi-billion dollar training costs, don't you think LLMs hit a growth ceiling? Will that be a barrier for LLMs to reach singularity?

  10. jambo

    The company will eventually be done in by toxic Muskulinity.

    Ok, I didn’t really have much of a comment to make, but I just came up with that term and wanted to get it out there before anyone else thought of it.

  11. Lounsbury

    Price move like this needs to be understood in context of the price moves in the preceding days / week where it is typ

    Writing "Naturally Tesla stock was up 10% in after-hours trading." is naively misplaced sarcasm that only reflects an ignorance of public trading - the adage sell on rumour, buy on facts while a bit silly and simplistic hints - savvy market operators were selling in anticipation, the price trend on Tesla over the past was structurally downwards from 180 to 140s (and that down from end 2023 240-260s trading range).

    A small rebound on the confirmation of the bad is typically unwinding of certain more negative bets and buying in on some parties estimation of potential upside from a known negative (in any case a multitude of factors on savvy market actors that were already selling, it is the naive retail traders that are doing the buy and sell on daily)

  12. Jim Carey

    Imagine a 5-year-old in a busy grocery store lying on his back in the middle of the main aisle yelling and screaming at the top of his lungs with arms and legs flailing in the air because he wanted a chocolate bar and his mom said no.

    Taking money out of your wallet and putting it in Elon's wallet is the moral equivalent of throwing the kid a chocolate bar saying, "Here you go kid. Don't let anyone tell you you're wrong about anything ... ever."

    1. Yikes

      Everyone should know that between "Elon Fan Boy" and the fossil fuel industry, virtually every single legacy automaker, the PR firms hired by the last two, and those who hate what Musk shitposts on a daily basis there is a large, large area on a chart which Kevin could surely come up with.

      In response to one of my last posts on this someone said that a company who makes windmills is doing more for the cause of global warming than Tesla as a company. I don't agree.

      We have to get all these damn ICE cars off the road. There are only two ways to do it, legislate it, which is going to be not only slow, but fought every step of the way by the usual suspects, or show people that EVs are in every way superior to ICE cars and you can do your bit for the environment without figuring out how to use a bicycle to get around.

      I submit that anyone who thinks this can be done without Tesla succeeding is naive. My definition of naive in this sentence boils down to OK, name the non Chinese company with any actual intent, plan, or ability to make more than a million EVs a year.

      I further submit that anyone not buying a Tesla because of its asshole major shareholder is naive in another way. For purposes of this sentence naive means only allowing critical, absolutely critical, progress to be made on addressing climate change by a person if that person meets suitable liberal standards across the board. This would not apply to those who can show their import papers for their new BYD Seal.

      There are plenty of issues where naivete, even my own, can come to the fore. I don't believe climate change is one of them. If that means I have to defend a company owned by Musk, that's just what has to be done. It would be nice if there were multiple alternatives. There aren't.

      1. MrPug

        "It" (not entirely clear what "it", is, but whatever) most definitely can be done without Tesla. And "it" most most definitely can be done without Musk running Tesla. In fact, I think Tesla's best chance for long term viability would be to shitcan Musk with all due speed.

      2. ScentOfViolets

        I don't hear much about not buying a Tesla because that's money in Elon's pocket, but I do hear a lot about Tesla's reputation for poor build quality as well as being notoriously unreliable. Let's not even talk about Tesla's ergonomically insane design choices, the yoke instead of a wheel, no stalks on the steering column, etc.

        All of which to say is that if you want to go EV there are multiple -- and better -- alternatives to the hot mess on wheels that is the Tesla.

      3. jdubs

        Arguing that there are no other alternatives might have made sense a few years ago, but its obviously wrong at this point.
        Teslas market share in both the US and worldwide is eroding very quickly.

  13. pjcamp1905

    Tesla's future is as a battery and charger company. They can't get product out the door and Musk's ideas on what they should be doing are borderline insane. His mythical taxi fleet won't happen because the Technoking insists on only cameras, no lidar or other sensors, for self driving. That just layers one knotty problem on top of another.

    What is going on with the "affordable" Tesla is murky at best. Musk doesn't want to talk about it and Reuters has said it is dead. Tesla is grossly overvalued, but especially if it is to be a luxury car maker.

    Today, Musk said Tesla is an AI company, not a car company. As near as I can tell, it isn't either one.

    The Cybertruck consumed a vast quantity of resources and is unlikely to sell significant quantities. That gives you a sense of Musk's warped priorities.

    He'll keep his job for a lot longer because the board is stuffed with relatives and cronies. He'll probably get his $56 billion payday, which will accomplish nothing beyond pimping his ego and driving the company further down.

    Musk just isn't really interested in running the company anymore. He seems to prefer sitting on eXTwitter, whining and airing grievances.

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