Musk’s darling, Tesla, has faced headwinds in recent months. On Tuesday, the electric car maker’s first-quarter delivery figures showed a significant decline – well below Wall Street’s lowest estimates. Tesla’s first-quarter deliveries fell 20% from the previous quarter and more than 8% from the same period a year earlier, marking the first year-over-year sales decline since 2020.
In a press release, Tesla blamed falling deliveries on its production ramp on its refreshed Model 3, as well as an arson at its Berlin factory and supply chain problems caused by the sea dispute. Red.
Tesla’s stock was down more than 5% on Tuesday and nearly 30% over the past year.
Tesla announced layoffs. Justin Sullivan
Wedbush technology analyst Dan Ives said in a note Tuesday that the automaker’s first quarter was a “total disaster” and a “nightmare” for Tesla, as the automaker faces increasing competition in the Chinese market for electric vehicles, notably from BYD, which competes with Tesla. with Tesla for the title of best seller of electric vehicles. Ives, a longtime Tesla buyer, warned in his note that the company could face “darker days” if Musk fails to turn things around and regain investor confidence.
In the United States, Musk’s company is also facing slowing demand from customers who appear increasingly tired of Musk’s antics. A recent report from market information company Caliber found that the number of respondents who would consider buying a Tesla fell to 31% in February, down from 70% in November 2021.
“The issue around Twitter and Elon’s personal views on politics and other things in the world have really turned off a lot of potential buyers,” said Colin Rusch, a stock analyst at Oppenheimer. said CNBC Tuesday. “People who were buying electric vehicles specifically for the climate are giving up on buying Tesla.”
For his part, Musk said Tesla was “between two major waves of growth.” But we do not yet know when the car manufacturer will emerge from the crisis. Tesla’s CEO has warned that “we’ve dug our own grave” with ramping up production of its first truck, the Cybertruck, and he’s already drawing up plans for what appears to be a second-generation Tesla Roadster. more ambitious.
More bad news
Tesla isn’t the only bad news for Musk. The billionaire has faced headwinds on several fronts. Since the start of the year, Elon Musk’s fortune, which is largely based on his holdings in Tesla, has fallen by $40.5 billion, or 17.7%, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.
So far, Musk’s purchase of Twitter doesn’t appear to be going as planned. In February, Fidelity again lowered the value of its stake in Musk’s social media company – the drop equates to a roughly 73% drop in the site’s value since Musk bought Twitter in 2022 for $44 billion. dollars.
X is shedding advertisers and facing lawsuits worth tens of millions of dollars from the former employees Musk fired when he cut the company’s workforce in half.
Musk sued OpenAI and Sam Altman in February. Kent Nishimura
Meanwhile, legal experts say Musk’s own lawsuit against Sam Altman and OpenAI will likely be a losing battle and may not even go to trial.
A judge recently dismissed a lawsuit filed by Musk’s X had argued that the nonprofit Center to Combat Digital Hate violated spend on the platform.
Some bright spots
While it’s certainly been a tough year for Musk, there have been some bright spots.
Most notably, SpaceX successfully launched the Starship into space last month on its third test launch. The test marked an occasion that had been years in the making, beset by multiple explosives test flights and regulatory hurdles.
Musk’s brain-computer interface startup Neuralink also hit a major milestone earlier this year. After years of Musk promising that Neuralink would begin human trials soon, the company implanted its first device in a human and revealed its first patient in 2024. Neuralink showed how its device could allow the patient to publish on social media, from scrolling on a computer. , and play hours of video games using only his mind.
businessinsider
