Missing expectations: Tesla's earnings disappoint investors

Thursday, January 28, 2021

Missed expectations
Tesla's profit disappoints investors

Tesla is consistently in the black in 2020 and ends the year with a big plus. Nevertheless, shareholders react cautiously to the quarterly report. They would have hoped for more.

The US electric car manufacturer Tesla has managed its sixth quarter in a row in the black and for the first time closed a full calendar year with a profit. Despite the corona crisis, tech billionaire Elon Musk's company achieved a surplus of 721 million dollars (595 million euros) in 2020, as it announced after the US market closed. In the previous year, Tesla had to suffer a loss of $ 862 million. Revenues climbed 28 percent to $ 31.5 billion.

Despite the first annual profit since the company was founded in 2003, the numbers were not well received by investors. After the trading hours, the share initially reacted with price drops of around four percent. Because Tesla missed expectations in the final quarter. Although Musks group made another profit, this was less than assumed on the market at $ 270 million. Meanwhile, revenues grew year-on-year by a strong 46 percent to $ 10.7 billion, slightly exceeding analysts' forecasts.

Among other things, the fact that Tesla only issued a vague delivery target for the current year caused disillusionment among stockbrokers. The company, which in the past often struggled with the ambitious specifications of CEO Musk, this time refrained from a specific target. Instead, it was simply said that the aim was to exceed the growth rate of 50 percent from last year. That would mean that Tesla is aiming to deliver around 750,000 cars worldwide in 2021. In 2020 there were almost 500,000, with which Tesla achieved its previous record.

Tesla's profit margin, which is highly regarded on the financial market, has recently deteriorated significantly again, which dampens hopes for lasting profitability. The group makes a significant part of its income by trading emission certificates that other car manufacturers need to offset their emissions balance and thus meet legal requirements in California or Europe, for example. Without this income, which was $ 1.6 billion last year and $ 401 million in the final quarter, Tesla would not have made any money.

Despite the rather disappointing last quarter from the shareholders' point of view, 2020 was extremely successful for Tesla overall. On the stock exchange, Musk's company was one of the biggest winners with a price increase of around 700 percent; despite its relatively modest production figures and profits, Tesla is by far the car manufacturer with the world's highest stock market valuation. With its longest profit streak to date and the rise in the renowned US stock index S&P 500, the group, which was still considered a possible bankruptcy candidate around two years ago, reached important milestones.