Tesla stock bounces back after the company's positive Q1 2024 Earnings Call

Tesla (TSLA) CEO Elon Musk and his team executed the company’s Q1 2024 Earnings Call with a master stroke. It turned the negativity of Wall Street into a positive sentiment about the automaker’s short-term future.

The results started appearing the next morning. Tesla stock has surged more than 14% since Monday when it closed at a year-to-date historic low of $141.45. On Thursday, Tesla shares closed at $170.18.

Tesla’s vehicle deliveries dropped by 20% QoQ in Q1. This was enough precedent for the obvious negative financial results for the quarter. The majority of analysts thought it would be a difficult earnings call for Musk and the company but they all handled it well.

Along with the Q1 earnings call (listen below), Tesla also made an intelligent move by launching the new Model 3 Performance (Ludicrous). The attractive features, specs, and pricing of the refreshed Tesla Model 3 Performance also helped boost the Tesla stock price.

Above: Tesla (TSLA) Q1 2024 unaudited Financial Summary. Source: Tesla Investor Relations website (PDF).

Tesla 2024 Vehicle Delivery Guidance

Elon Musk predicted slower growth in 2024 during the Year 2023 Earnings Call earlier this year. But in the Q1 call, Musk made a different claim.

Adam Jonas of Morgan Stanley asked Elon Musk about his thoughts on volume production and whether the Q1 decline in deliveries will result in an overall lower number of deliveries in 2024 compared to 2023. “No, we will have higher sales this year than last year,” Musk replied.

According to Elon Musk, Model 3 Highland ramp-up challenges at the Fremont factory also contributed to the drop in Q1 vehicle deliveries. The existing assembly lines of the previous generation Model 3 required a significant amount of re-tooling to scale production of the updated Model 3 Highland.

Tesla is expecting fast growth in the sales of the new Model 3 this year. While interacting with a large number of Tesla Community members across different social media platforms, I found out that several customers opted to buy the new Model 3 Highland even when they could get a cheaper Model Y instead. 

Tesla’s $25K Compact Car, Autonomy, and Robotaxi

One of the most important announcements during the Q1 2024 earnings call was the disclosure of the timeline of Tesla’s next-gen cheaper and smaller electric vehicle. This new compact Tesla car will be ideally priced around $25,000 and will be Autopilot Full Self-Driving capable as well.

Elon Musk announced that Tesla’s next-gen vehicle is going to be launched early next year and production is possibly going to begin in the 2nd half of 2025. Tesla’s Q1 2024 update also contains the following information on this upcoming model:

Our company is currently between two major growth waves: the first one began with the global expansion of the Model 3/Y platform and we believe the next one will be initiated by advances in autonomy and introduction of new products, including those built on our next-generation vehicle platform.

In 2024, our vehicle volume growth rate may be notably lower than the growth rate achieved in 2023, as our teams work on the launch of the next-generation vehicle and other products. In 2024, the growth rates of energy storage deployments and revenue in our Energy Generation and Storage business should outpace the Automotive business.

Tesla, Inc. (TSLA)

Elon Musk looked very positive about Tesla reaching full autonomy for vehicles where there is no more need for human supervision (Level 5). “If someone doesn’t believe Tesla is going to solve autonomy, I think they should not be an investor in the company,” he said.

Musk and other executives explained how Tesla is not just an automotive company and why it should be labeled as an AI and Robotics company.

The recent success of Tesla FSD v12 and its subversion has given Elon Musk and the Tesla AI team the confidence to put forward such statements.

“Then you have a car that goes from 10 hours of use a week, like an hour and a half a day, to probably 50 but it costs the same” Musk painted the Tesla Robotaxi future with his power of imagination.

Just earlier this month, Elon Musk announced that Tesla will be unveiling its Robotaxi on 8th August 2024. This might also mean that the automaker will unveil a prototype of the company’s next-gen smaller vehicle. Musk might be positive that a prototype of this vehicle will be ready to show to the world by then.

Above: Diagram of the Tesla business ecosystem that shows the company is not just a company that makes electric vehicles. Credit: Courtesy of Tesla, Inc.

Ultimately, Elon Musk and his team convinced investors that Tesla has a great future ahead. The dent in the demand for its electric vehicles is just a temporary phase that the company will overcome soon.

Because Tesla is not just a car company. It has expanded into robotics, energy, self-driving software provider (to other manufacturers), has a vast charging network, and is also a battery cell manufacturer.

Tesla is going to be a ride-hailing company in the near future that will be better than Uber and Lyft with its Robotaxi business model.

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Featured image: Courtesy of Tesla, Inc.

Note: An earlier version of this article was published at Tesla Oracle. Author: Iqtidar Ali.