Al Root
Investors didn't like Tesla's first-quarter delivery numbers. Neither did Wall Street.
The electric vehicle maker sold 358,023 cars in the first quarter, up from 337,000 a year ago. First-quarter 2025 results were impacted by a Model Y changeover, as Tesla updated its most popular vehicle, prompting some buyers to wait for the newer version.
Wall Street was looking for deliveries of about 366,000 vehicles, so it was a miss. Tesla also made about 50,000 more cars than it sold. Increasing inventories can lead to discounting and lower production down the road.
"Pricing headwinds loom," wrote Wells Fargo analyst Colin Langan. He called the delivery results a "whiff," but kept his price target at $125 a share. Langan has one of the lowest target prices on the Street and rates shares Sell.
It was an "underwhelming" start to the year, wrote Wedbush analyst Dan Ives. He rates shares Buy, and kept his $600 price target for Tesla stock.
Investors were underwhelmed. Tesla stock dropped 5.4% to $360.59, sending shares down for a seventh consecutive week. The S&P 500 eked out a 0.1% gain on Thursday.
Wall Street appears underwhelmed, too, with several price target cuts following the report.
Baird analyst Ben Kallo cut his target to $538 from $548, while maintaining his Buy rating. "Deliveries -- and fundamentals broadly -- have been de-emphasized in our recent conversations with investors," wrote Kallo. "However, energy deployments have been a larger focus and were a negative surprise in the print."
Tesla also deployed just 8.8 gigawatt-hours of battery storage in the first quarter, down from 14.2 gigawatt-hours in the fourth quarter.
Goldman Sachs analyst Mark Delaney cut his target to $375 from $405, while keeping his Hold rating on shares, noting that EV sales have been weak following the September expiration of the $7,500 federal purchase tax credit.
Truist analyst William Stein cut his price target to $400 from $438. He kept his Hold rating on shares, noting that Tesla's update lacked any update on AI initiatives, including robo-taxis and robots.
Tesla launched a robo-taxi service in Austin, Texas, in June and plans to expand service to nine cities in the first half of 2025. Tesla also plans to unveil the third generation of its humanoid robot in the coming weeks.
Those are key areas investors are focused on. They will have a chance to hear more when Tesla reports its first-quarter results on April 22.
Over the past few days, the average analyst price target for Tesla stock has ticked down about $9 to $408, according to FactSet.
Write to Al Root at allen.root@dowjones.com
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(END) Dow Jones Newswires
April 03, 2026 11:07 ET (15:07 GMT)
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