Tesla’s Share Price Has Been Suspect Since Like Forever
Tesla’s share price has been having a hard time of it lately. The stock has lost about half its value since its all-time high back in December, and, since Musk took office alongside Donald Trump in January, dropped for 7 consecutive weeks, rebounding only ever-so-slightly last week, after Musk got the president of the United States to turn the White House lawn into a cheesy Tesla (sorry, Tesler) dealership. Tesla stock dropped another 5 percent today, on a day when the overall market was slightly up. I bookmarked this Bryce Elder column at the Financial Times back on January 31, and now seems like a good time to link to it: The usual explanation for when Tesla trading resembles a Pump.fun shitcoin is: “because Elon talks a lot”. Here’s JPMorgan analyst Ryan Brinkman to expand on the theme: It’s not clear to us why Tesla shares traded as much as +5% higher in the aftermarket Wednesday, although we have some leading theories. Perhaps it was management’s statement that it had identified an achievable path to becoming worth more than the world’s five most valuable companies taken together (i.e., more than the $14.8 trillion combined market capitalizations of Apple, Microsoft, NVIDIA, Amazon, & Alphabet). Or maybe it was management’s belief that just one of its products has by itself the potential to generate “north of $10 trillion in revenue”. It may have even related to management guidance for 2026 (no financial targets were provided, but it was said to be “epic”) and for 2027 and 2028 (“ridiculously good”). Brinkman, who has a long-standing “underweight” rating on Tesla, is beginning to sound a bit exasperated: [T]he company’s financial performance and Bloomberg consensus for revenue, margin, earnings, and cash flow all keep coming down, but analyst price targets and the company’s share price keep going up. For instance, Tesla has missed Bloomberg consensus EBIT in 9 of the past 10 quarters by an average of -16.3%. Consistently missing estimates is one thing. What Tesla has been doing is consistently missing lowered estimates. [...] Tesla’s biggest asset is hyperbole. The more extreme the hyperbole, the more valuable it gets. Maybe after-hours market participants understand the dynamics better than Tesla bears, so are primed to park fundamentals and trade on vibes. Or maybe something else entirely is going on. Sounds a lot like the other guy at the White House Auto Mall. ★
Tesla’s share price has been having a hard time of it lately. The stock has lost about half its value since its all-time high back in December, and, since Musk took office alongside Donald Trump in January, dropped for 7 consecutive weeks, rebounding only ever-so-slightly last week, after Musk got the president of the United States to turn the White House lawn into a cheesy Tesla (sorry, Tesler) dealership. Tesla stock dropped another 5 percent today, on a day when the overall market was slightly up.
I bookmarked this Bryce Elder column at the Financial Times back on January 31, and now seems like a good time to link to it:
The usual explanation for when Tesla trading resembles a Pump.fun shitcoin is: “because Elon talks a lot”. Here’s JPMorgan analyst Ryan Brinkman to expand on the theme:
It’s not clear to us why Tesla shares traded as much as +5% higher in the aftermarket Wednesday, although we have some leading theories. Perhaps it was management’s statement that it had identified an achievable path to becoming worth more than the world’s five most valuable companies taken together (i.e., more than the $14.8 trillion combined market capitalizations of Apple, Microsoft, NVIDIA, Amazon, & Alphabet). Or maybe it was management’s belief that just one of its products has by itself the potential to generate “north of $10 trillion in revenue”. It may have even related to management guidance for 2026 (no financial targets were provided, but it was said to be “epic”) and for 2027 and 2028 (“ridiculously good”).
Brinkman, who has a long-standing “underweight” rating on Tesla, is beginning to sound a bit exasperated:
[T]he company’s financial performance and Bloomberg consensus for revenue, margin, earnings, and cash flow all keep coming down, but analyst price targets and the company’s share price keep going up. For instance, Tesla has missed Bloomberg consensus EBIT in 9 of the past 10 quarters by an average of -16.3%.
Consistently missing estimates is one thing. What Tesla has been doing is consistently missing lowered estimates. [...]
Tesla’s biggest asset is hyperbole. The more extreme the hyperbole, the more valuable it gets. Maybe after-hours market participants understand the dynamics better than Tesla bears, so are primed to park fundamentals and trade on vibes. Or maybe something else entirely is going on.
Sounds a lot like the other guy at the White House Auto Mall.
