Shares of Tesla Motors (TSLA) are off to the races today after CEO Elon Musk said that North American sales jumped in September and global deliveries hit a record.
Associated Press The Wall Street Journal has the details, which came in response to an earlier story in the Journal citing the possibility of falling sales:
Tesla Motors Inc. likely delivered about 3,274 Model S sedans in North America in September, boosting its domestic third quarter deliveries to about 4,900 vehicles, according to equity analyst Brian Johnson of Barclays.
He derived that figure after Chief Executive Officer Elon Musk said September sales rose 65% in North America and that global deliveries were a record. Mr. Musk made the comments in a tweet in response to a Wall Street Journal article that cited data from WardsAuto showing U.S. sales falling 26% this year through September.
Mr. Musk called the Journal story inaccurate, although he didn't actually address the figures in the story, only saying that September sales had risen.
And yes, the same reporter wrote both stories.
Baird’s Ben Kallo and Tyler Frank call the recent demand fears “overblown:”
Recent demand worries are overblown, in our opinion. Several recent articles (including sales estimates provided by Wards Auto) indicate slowing U.S. Model S sales. We, however, believe demand for the Model S remains strong given Tesla's current U.S. delivery wait time of ~2 months.
That doesn’t stop Kallo and Tyler from being “cautious” on outperform-rated Tesla’s third quarter earnings. They explain why:
Q3 production could be slightly lower than expected, but we expect a strong ending weekly run-rate which should set up a solid Q4. We believe production was ~900 vehicles per week when we toured the factory in August, and believe production is now ahead of schedule with gains from Tesla's new finishing line.
Deliveries likely in line with guidance as Tesla continues to improve logistics to international markets. We believe deliveries will be in line with guidance of ~7,800 vehicles as Tesla continues to improve logistics for international deliveries.
We are lowering our Q3 estimates to reflect lower gross margin related to Tesla's extended warranty program. We are lowering our overall/auto gross margin estimates to 27.2%/25.0% from 28.1%/26.0% to account for higher warranty accruals. We estimate Q3 sales of $786.3M and non-GAAP net income of ($7.2M) vs. consensus of $896.0M and $2.5M, respectively. Additionally, we estimate Q3 non-GAAP EPS of ($0.05) vs. consensus of $0.00.
Shares of Tesla Motors have jumped 9.5% to $242.62 at 3:21 p.m.
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