Tesla Q4 delivery figures hit another record high, but still fall short of Wall Street expectations

Today Tesla released its fourth quarter 2022 operating data. Against a backdrop of high inflation assaulting consumer willingness, frantic Fed rate hikes and epidemic attacks, Tesla's production and delivery figures for the fourth quarter last year still hit the 400,000 mark for the first time in history.

According to Tesla, the company delivered 405,278 vehicles in the final quarter of 2022, with production figures reaching 439,701. Combined for the full year, Tesla delivered a total of 1.31 million vehicles in 2022, with production figures reaching 1.369 million, the first time in the company's history that the company has "broken 100".

Data source: Tesla

From the capital market's point of view, although the company's operating figures are still in the "high growth" category, they do not meet the harsh expectations of Wall Street. According to FactSet, analysts' consensus estimate is for 427,000 new vehicles to be delivered in the fourth quarter, with a range of 409,000 to 433,000. Meanwhile, the year-over-year increase in delivery and production figures for 2022 is 40% and 47%, respectively, which also falls short of the company's own "50% annual growth" target.

In the fourth quarter of last year alone, Tesla's stock price plunged 53 percent. In addition to market headwinds, a series of turmoil over Musk's acquisition of Twitter and a move to dump Tesla stock have also shaken the confidence of the capital markets.

Tesla stock trend in 2022

Since the U.S. stock market is closed on Monday for the New Year's holiday, investors will need to wait until Tuesday to see how the capital markets react to the latest delivery data. According to Tesla's "oversupply" status, 34,000 vehicles were still in pre-delivery flow at the end of the fourth quarter. The company also highlighted this in a press release, saying that the increase was triggered by a "more even regional vehicle production mix.

Martin Viecha, Tesla's head of investor relations, also expressed pride in the company's team after the release and emphasized that a smoother delivery pattern would generate more vehicles in transit, which is why production is outpacing deliveries.

~440k cars made and ~405k delivered in Q4. Delivery growth of 40% and production growth of 47% in 2022. All things considered...I’m super proud of the team for this result. A smoother delivery pattern will require more vehicles in transit, which is why production > deliveries.

— Martin Viecha (@MartinViecha) January 2, 2023

In terms of specific delivery figures, the company produced a total of 20,613 Model S/X and 419,088 Model 3/Y in the fourth quarter and delivered 17,147 Model S/X and 388,131 Model 3/Y. Tesla also took its first delivery of the Semi electric truck last December, but did not make a dent in the delivery figures. reflected.

In 2022, Tesla's global production lines, in addition to the Fremont, California and Shanghai plants, will begin mass production and deliveries of the Model Y in Austin, Texas and Berlin. For 2023, the market is also now highly anticipating that Tesla will announce the site of a new factory early in the year and launch production of the Cybertruck pickup truck during the year.

Before the data was released, Wedbush analyst Dan Ives predicted that Tesla's delivery figures for 2023 would be roughly around 1.8 million, implying an increase of nearly 500,000 units from 2022.

Facing economic headwinds, Tesla is also offering U.S. customers a $7,500 discount and up to 10,000 miles of free supercharging in the final days of 2022, and while some of this subsidy is directly related to the Biden administration's Inflation Deflation Act, Tesla has also lowered selling prices in other regions to varying degrees in the fourth quarter.

Tesla also confirmed in a press release that the company will release its fourth-quarter results after the close of trading on Jan. 25 (local time.) Martin Viecha also announced that the company will hold an investor day on March 1, where it will invite select institutional and retail investors to tour the Texas plant and meet with management.