Tesla says it built 34,494 cars in the first quarter of 2018 — its best quarter ever. Model 3 production was slightly less than predicted but was ramping up strongly toward the end of the quarter.
With the end of the quarter wrapping up, Tesla Model 3 production news and speculation this past week was hotter than a spoon on a Florida beach. A story about official Hyundai Kona EV specs were able to sneak into the top 5 nonetheless, with the biggest reader concern about this sizzling newcomer being that Hyundai probably won’t have the capacity (read: battery supply) to build a ton of them.
With the end of quarter 1 (Q1) 2018 nearly here — the time period by which Tesla CEO Elon Musk had most recently projected 2,500 Model 3 electric cars would be produced a week — it seems like it would be interesting to speculate a bit about the intersection of Model 3 production figures, investor and short-seller expectations, and company stock prices.
The class action lawsuit filed against Tesla by a group of shareholders in relation to the firm’s 2016 acquisition of SolarCity has been given the go-ahead to proceed by a judge in Delaware — following a push by Tesla to have the lawsuit thrown out.
The measure to approve the previously proposed performance-based compensation plan for Tesla CEO Elon Musk passed with around 80% support, with around 73% of votes cast, the company revealed in a new Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) filing.
The performance-based compensation package Tesla’s board recently proposed for Tesla CEO Elon Musk has drawn a variety of responses to date. After two of the most prominent proxy advisory firms out there came out against the proposal and urged shareholders to vote against it, Tesla’s fourth largest investor, the T. Rowe Price Group, seemingly came out in favor of the proposal.
It’s remarkable that Tesla rocketed from its IPO to surpassing Ford in value in just 7 years. Tesla’s prowess on Wall Street has left many investors miffed. After all, Ford recently announced 2017 sales of over 6.6 million cars worldwide. Meanwhile, Tesla barely cracked sales of 100,000 cars. How could an industry behemoth like Ford be overtaken by this younger, smaller Silicon Valley startup?
If Tesla was to encounter insurmountable financial problems over the coming years — just bear with me, as a thought experiment here, no arguing yet — what exactly would end up happening?
Recently famed Apple analyst Gene Munster predicted market share gains ahead for Tesla based on a survey executed by his firm Loup Ventures. It turns out there are other indicators that point to market share gains down the line for Tesla. With so much riding on the success of Model 3, Seeking Alpha’s Victor Dergunov remains convinced that a stock “breakout appears imminent … and new all-time highs [are] very likely” for Tesla.
We reported a few days ago on the news that the proxy advisory firm Glass Lewis has issued a recommendation to Tesla shareholders to vote against the new performance-based pay package being offered to CEO Elon Musk.
