Anjali Sharma
GG News Bureau
NEW YORK, 27th Jan. Tesla shares on Friday plunged to 11 per cent after the market opened, wiped $73 billion off the company’s market value hours after it warned of slowing growth in electric car sales and an existential threat from Chinese rivals
Tesla world’s most valuable automaker saidiIn an earnings presentation the its sales growth this year “may be notably lower” than last as it continued developing the “next-generation” vehicle, likely a lower-priced model.
It reported a sizeable 38 per cent increase in deliveries last year compared with 2022.
Tesla had targeted a 50 per cent annual growth rate averaged over several years.
Tesla’s financial results for the last quarter were also disappointing, with adjusted earnings per share down 40 per cent from a year earlier, and revenue, rose 3 per cent to top $25 billion, coming in below market forecasts.
It was the second straight quarter the company fell short of earnings forecast by analysts, after a string of better-than-expected results stretching back to the start of 2021.
The stock doubled in price during the course of 2023, but those gains came in during the first half of the year and Tesla shares were off to a weak start in 2024, falling 16 per cent before Wednesday’s earnings report. The stock is currently trading at its lowest level since April last year, news reported.
The losses were comparable to an unusually large one-day fall of 11.4 per cent in late December 2022.
The investors were worried about the outlook for Tesla’s sales and profitability, and the US economy.
