Can Tesla Make Good on Promised Full-Year Deliveries?
Tesla had delivered more than 33,157 vehicles by the end of September, and it really does seem unlikely that the company will reach its announced delivery targets for the year.
In a discreet, short press release issued late Friday, Tesla Motors Inc. (NASDAQ: TSLA) announced that it had delivered 11,580 Model S sedans and Model X crossovers in the third calendar quarter of 2015. That’s an increase of 49% compared with third quarter 2014 deliveries. Tesla delivered 11,532 cars in the second quarter of this year.
When Tesla reported second-quarter results in August, the company said it planned to ship just over 12,000 vehicles in the third quarter, including “a small number of Model X deliveries.” The full-year target for deliveries was softened somewhat, from a previously announced 55,000 units to a new range of 50,000 to 55,000 units.
For the first three quarters of 2015, Tesla has delivered 33,157 vehicles, and it really does seem unlikely that the company will reach its announced delivery targets for the year.
The Model X crossover was introduced last week and the company reportedly has delivered just six of the new cars. Production is expected to ramp during the quarter, but CEO Elon Musk has said the production ramp will begin slowly and then “shoot up” by the end of the quarter.
Tesla held a secondary stock offering shortly after reporting second-quarter results and sold 2.5 million shares at an offering price of $242 per share. Including an underwriter’s option of around 400,000 additional shares, net proceeds from the offering totaled about $738 million. Since then the stock price has traded in a relatively narrow range.
Shares closed at $247.57 on Friday and traded up fractionally at $248.00 in early Monday. The stock’s 52-week range is $181.40 to $286.65.
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Paul Ausick has been writing for 247Wallst.com for more than a decade. He has written extensively on investing in the energy, defense, and technology sectors. In a previous life, he wrote technical documentation and managed a marketing communications group in Silicon Valley.
He has a bachelor's degree in English from the University of Chicago and now lives in Montana, where he fishes for trout in the summer and stays inside during the winter.
