{"id":81955,"date":"2025-04-22T05:00:00","date_gmt":"2025-04-22T09:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/?p=81955"},"modified":"2025-04-22T05:00:00","modified_gmt":"2025-04-22T09:00:00","slug":"tesla-q1-2025-earnings-preview-messy-one","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/?p=81955","title":{"rendered":"Tesla Q1 2025 earnings preview: it’s going to be a messy one"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n\t\"Tesla<\/figure>\n

Tesla (TSLA) will release its Q1 2025 financial results today, Tuesday, April. 22, after the markets close. As usual, a conference call and Q&A with Tesla\u2019s management are scheduled after the results.<\/p>\n

Here, we\u2019ll look at what the street and retail investors expect for the quarterly results.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Tesla Q1 2025 deliveries and energy deployment<\/h2>\n

CEO Elon Musk and his loyal shareholders often claim that Tesla is now an AI\/Robotics company, but the truth is that the company\u2019s automotive business still drives the vast majority of its financial performance.<\/p>\n

Tesla\u2019s revenue remains tied mainly to the number of vehicles it delivers.<\/p>\n

\tAdvertisement – scroll for more content<\/span><\/p>\n

Earlier this month, Tesla disclosed its Q1 2025 vehicle production and deliveries:<\/p>\n

\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\u00a0<\/td>\nProduction<\/strong><\/td>\nDeliveries<\/strong><\/td>\nSubject to operating lease accounting<\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Model 3\/Y<\/td>\n345,454<\/td>\n323,800<\/td>\n4%<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Other Models<\/td>\n17,161<\/td>\n12,881<\/td>\n7%<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Total<\/strong><\/td>\n362,615<\/strong><\/td>\n336,681<\/strong><\/td>\n4%<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/figure>\n

It was significantly below expectations and approximately 50,000 units short of what Tesla delivered in Q1 2024. <\/p>\n

Analysts have been adjusting their revenue and earnings expectations accordingly since the disclosure a few weeks ago.<\/p>\n

Now, Tesla\u2019s energy storage business is also starting to make a meaningful contribution to its financial performance. The company disclosed having deployed 10.4 GWh of energy storage products during Q1 2025.<\/p>\n

Tesla no longer discloses solar deployment information.<\/p>\n

Tesla Q1 2025 revenue<\/h2>\n

For revenue, analysts generally have a pretty good idea of what to expect, thanks to the delivery numbers and now the energy storage deployment data.<\/p>\n

However, many were taken by surprise by how low Tesla\u2019s deliveries were this quarter and the automaker offered a lot of discounts, which will affect the average sale price that analysts are now trying to figure out.<\/p>\n

The Wall Street consensus for this quarter is $21.345 billion, and\u00a0Estimize<\/a>, the financial estimate crowdsourcing website, predicts a slightly lower revenue of $21.254 billion.<\/p>\n

Here are the predictions for Tesla\u2019s revenue over the past two years, with Estimize predictions in blue, Wall Street consensus in gray, and actual results are in green:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n

This would be about a $1 billion lower than the same period last year \u2013 meaning that analysts don\u2019t expect Tesla\u2019s increased energy storage deployment to compensate for the lower vehicle deliveries.<\/p>\n

Tesla Q1 2025 earnings<\/h2>\n

Tesla claims to consistently strive for marginal profitability every quarter, as it invests the majority of its funds in growth, but its growth has disappeared from its automotive business over the last year, and its gross margin is going in the same direction.<\/p>\n

Analysts are trying to estimate Tesla\u2019s gross margin with the lower deliveries to figure out its actual earnings per share.<\/p>\n

For Q1 2025, the Wall Street consensus is a gain of $0.41 per share and Estimize\u2019s crowdsourced prediction is a little lower at $0.40.<\/p>\n

Here are the earnings per share over the last two years, where Estimize predictions are in blue, Wall Street consensus is in gray, and actual results are in green:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n

If the estimates are accurate, Tesla\u2019s earnings per share would be down from $0.45 during the same period last year.<\/p>\n

There are several things that Tesla could do here that could surprise investors with a significant earnings beat. Tesla could have recognized revenue from the launch of FSD in China, even though the launch was brief and 95% of the value of the FSD package is unsupervised self-driving, which Tesla has yet to deliver.<\/p>\n

Tesla could have also sold more emission credits. As of the end of last quarter, Tesla was still sitting on a good amount, and while it claims to sell them when the price makes the most sense, it is quite an opaque market and Tesla could at any time decide to sell them just to save itself from a bad quarter.<\/p>\n

Other expectations for the TSLA shareholder\u2019s letter, analyst call, and special \u2018company update\u2019<\/h2>\n

As we reported yesterday, this is likely going to be a messy earnings report. Musk has been on a propaganda spree lately after Tesla suffered immense brand damage and declining stock price due to his involvement in politics.<\/p>\n

Now, he has called for a \u201clive company update\u201d at the same time as the release of Tesla\u2019s financial results, which appears to be a desperate move at damage control amid a tough quarter for the company.<\/p>\n

I expect that he will try to paint a rosy picture of Tesla\u2019s self-driving and robot efforts to come save the company amid declining EV sales.<\/p>\n

As I previously reported, I wouldn\u2019t be surprised if he also pushes for Tesla to invest in his xAI startup or proposes a merger between the companies<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Tesla will also take questions from retail shareholders based on the most popular ones on Say. Here are the top 5 questions and my thoughts on them:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Is Tesla still on track for releasing \u201cmore affordable models\u201d this year? Or will you be focusing on simplified versions to enhance affordability, similar to the RWD Cybertruck?<\/strong>\n