Tesla Inc. (TSLA)


December 17, 2024

Is the Recent Move in Tesla’s Stock the Result of a Massive Options Gamma Squeeze, Suggesting Wall Street’s New-Found Fundamental Optimism is Unfounded (and is an end to the rally in [near] sight)?

By Gordon L. Johnson II

Tesla’s Stock has Been on a Tear; is this Indicative of Better Fundamentals, or Simply Options Market Activity/Manipulation? Since 10/23/24, or when TSLA reported slightly better-than-expected 3Q24 results, the stock has surged +116.7% higher; this…

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October 24, 2024

Tesla Q3 Review – Margins Surge on FSD/ZEV Credit Sale & What Appears to be More Capitalized Expenses (Similar to WorldCom/HealthSouth); & E. Musk Guides to Record Q4 Deliveries of >514.9K Cars

By Gordon L. Johnson II

Tesla Reports Strong Unaudited Q3 Numbers, and Guides to Record Q4 Delivery Growth vs. Tepid Delivery Data Thus Far. Yesterday, after the close, TSLA reported rev/adj.-EPS of $25.2bn/$0.72 vs. Cons. $25.4bn/$0.60 (GLJe $25.4bn/$0.49). Furthermore, TSLA…

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October 23, 2024

A Financial Reporter Asked Us About the Old Maxim “You Should Never Bet Against Elon Musk”; in the Below, we Provide our Answer

By Gordon L. Johnson II

Early This AM We Got the Age-Old Question Around Tesla From a Prominent Financial Reporter. Around 3:13am this morning, while GLJ was tending to 4.8-month old GLJ Jr. (for the 3rd time since going to…

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October 17, 2024

Tesla Q3 Preview – We See a -18.3% Adj.-EPS Miss on Deck & a Hypothetical Fair Value of ~$60/shr (Even When Giving E. Musk Credit for His Perpetually Delayed Robotaxi “Promise”)

By Gordon L. Johnson II

We See a Significant Q3 Adj.-EPS Miss on Deck, as Well as Q3 Free Cash Flow of -$18mn vs. the Current Cons. Est. of +$1.635bn. Based on the analysis herein, we believe TSLA is slated…

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September 24, 2024

We See Tesla’s Q3 Deliveries Coming in Below Consensus’ 461.5K Est. & the Buyside’s >470K “Whispher”; Our Work Points to 456.6K in Q3, Up +2.9% QoQ

By Gordon L. Johnson II

Things Would Be Even Worse Without TSLA’s 1.99% 6yr APR Financing Offer in U.S./Canada. Based on the latest China data from early this morning (discussed below), updates from the 6 countries that report daily sales…

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September 24, 2024

We See Tesla’s Q3 Deliveries Coming in Below Consensus’ 461.5K Est. & the Buyside’s >470K “Whispher”; Our Work Points to 456.6K in Q3, Up +2.9% QoQ

By Gordon L. Johnson II

Things Would Be Even Worse Without TSLA’s 1.99% 6yr APR Financing Offer in U.S./Canada. Based on the latest China data from early this morning (discussed below), updates from the 6 countries that report daily sales…

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July 23, 2024

Tesla 2Q24E Earnings Preview – Numerous Puts/Takes this Quarter (Rate Buy Downs + Restructuring Costs + Stronger Energy Profit + Less Chinese Exports + etc.) Make It Hard, But We Expect a “Modest” Earnings Miss

By Gordon L. Johnson II

Admittedly, 2Q24E is Not an Easy Quarter to Model for Tesla. In the below, we consider various moving parts in TSLA’s 2Q24E model, including: (a) 57.146K more cars sold in 2Q24E QoQ (a positive), (b)…

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July 15, 2024

How Does Our Bridge to Both Tesla’s 2Q24E EPS and Free-Cash-Flow Compare to the Current Consensus Estimates?

By Gordon L. Johnson II

What Does Our Bridge to Tesla’s 2Q24E EPS and Free-Cash-Flow Say vs. the Current Consensus Estimates? In the below, we provide our bridge to TSLA’s 2Q24E GAAP/non-GAAP EPS and free-cash-flow (“FCF”) when considering: (a) TSLA’s…

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July 1, 2024

We Expect Tesla’s 2Q24E Deliveries to Come in at 416.027K (i.e., -10.8% YoY), Marking the Worst-Ever Delivery Growth for the Company in Terms of Quarterly Annual %-Change

By Gordon L. Johnson II

As Has Become Custom, Ahead of Fundamentally Bad News, Tesla’s Stock Rallies. Despite what we expect to be a sizeable 2Q24E delivery miss when TSLA reports numbers tomorrow (i.e., 416.027K [Europe – 70.463K; U.S. –…

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April 22, 2024

When Adding up Tesla’s “Nightmare Before Christmas” Weekend Price Cuts in the USA + China + Germany + France + Norway + Netherlands + Middle East + Africa = What Does it Mean for the Share Price (i.e., what’s the math say)?

By Gordon L. Johnson II

Tesla Took a Slashing to the Price of its New Cars All Through this Past Weekend. In the analysis that follows, using estimates for the number of cars TSLA is expected to sell in each…

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April 16, 2024

Just How Bad Will Tesla’s 1Q24E Numbers Be, and with this Week’s 15-20% Global Staff Cuts… are Tesla’s Q2 Fundamentals Setting up for Yet Another “Disaster”?

By Gordon L. Johnson II

Tesla’s 1Q24E Revs/non-GAAP EPS Appear Set to Miss Wall Street’s Estimate… by a “Nautical Mile”; But What About 2Q24E? After spending the better part of this past weekend updating our bottom-up TSLA revenue driver model…

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January 25, 2024

Tesla’s Q4 Results/2024E Guidance Show it’s Nothing More than a Struggling Car Company (not a high-growth tech co.) & Elon Musk is the World’s (most successful) “Sleazy” Used-Car Salesman

By Gordon L. Johnson II

So What Happened, and Why are we Calling the World’s Richest Man a “Sleazy” Used Car Salesman? In this note, we provide what we see as the eight key takeaways from TSLA’s just-reported 4Q23 results,…

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January 23, 2024

Tesla Q4 Earnings Preview: In the Words of B.B. King… “The Thrill is Gone”… for EV Cars That Is; PT to $23.53

By Gordon L. Johnson II

So, What’s Up Next for Tesla and Electric Vehicle “Jesus” Elon Musk? With a cult-like following among retail investors (see here), exacerbated by the fact that the arguably most-followed sell-side analyst on TSLA came out…

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January 17, 2024

What do Last Night’s Tesla European Price Cuts Mean to the “Bottom Line”?

By Gordon L. Johnson II

So… are Last Night’s Tesla Car Price Cuts a Big Deal? In this note, ahead of a full update to our bottom-up TSLA earnings driver model due out later this week, we use a back-of-the-envelope…

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January 12, 2024

Midnight Valantine’s Day “China-Price-Cut” Massacre Spells Trouble for Tesla’s (Already) Sputtering Margins

By Gordon L. Johnson II

Did Tesla, with its Recent Model 3 “Highland” Refresh, which Pundits Predicted Would Reinvigorate Demand in China (link), Just Slash its China Car Prices Just 12 Days into 1Q24? In short, the answer, resoundingly, is…

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