Tesla faces a difficult period as Chinese demand remains weak, which will impact first-quarter deliveries, Wedbush analyst Dan Ives said. Market monitoring.
Tesla typically releases the number of cars delivered shortly after a quarter ends — which serves as a proxy for that quarter's sales numbers.
According to the FatcSet consensus, Tesla is expected to deliver 457,000 vehicles in the first quarter, compared to 423,000 vehicles in the same quarter last year. In that case, it would be lower than expectations in late January, which were then 494,000 cars.
Ives believes the automaker had a “nightmare quarter” in a perfect storm of demand problems that helped consensus forecasts fall sharply.
In addition to Ives, Deutsche Bank analyst Emanuel Rosner is unlikely to lower his forecast for the first quarter.
Tesla is believed to have delivered 414,000 vehicles in the quarter – a decline from the previous forecast of 427,000 vehicles. Much of the reduction relates to weaker-than-expected sales in China, as well as production cuts in the country.
Meanwhile, Rosner lowered its 2024 forecast from 2.06 million to 1.9 million vehicles.
“Although Tesla announced it will raise prices in the US and China starting in April, we view it as more of an attempt to increase sales in March than a sign of strong demand,” Rosner says.
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