Tesla (TSLA) Stock Soars 7% in Premarket After Smashing 4Q Delivery Estimates, Numbers Seen as 'Jaw Dropping'
Shares of Tesla (NASDAQ: TSLA) are up nearly 7% in pre-open Monday after the company delivered better-than-expected Q4 deliveries.
Tesla said it delivered 308,600 EV units in the fourth quarter of 2021, which marks a new record-setting quarterly performance. This compares to the Street consensus of 267,000, according to FactSet.
The highest-ranked estimate was 292,000.
Tesla previously delivered more than 305,000 cars in a single quarter. In Q3, Tesla delivered 241,300 cars.
For the full year, Elon Musk’s company delivered 936,172 vehicles, nearly double of 499,647 it delivered for 2020.
A few days ago, Deutsche Bank analyst Emmanuel Rosner reiterated a Buy rating and raised the price target to $1,200.00 per share (up from $1,000.00) on Tesla as he expected the company to top analyst estimates.
Rosner raised his 4Q deliveries to 282,000 units from the prior 268,000. Credit Suisse’s Dan Levy was expecting 290,000 EV units, while RBC’s Joseph Spak was calling for 285,000 cars.
Wedbush analyst Daniel Ives described the 4Q delivery numbers as “jaw dropping” as they “beat even the bull case whisper number on the Street.”
“This was a “trophy case” quarter for Musk & Co. with massive momentum moving into 2022… Taking a step back, with the chip shortage a major overhang on the auto space and logistical issues globally these delivery numbers were "jaw dropping” and speaks to an EV demand trajectory that looks robust for Tesla heading into 2022. For 2021 this gives Tesla 936k deliveries for the year, well above the 900k best case number in the eyes of the Street,” the analyst said in a client note.
Ives highlighted robust demand from China, which will remain a focus for bulls going forward.
“While there are many competitors in the EV space, Tesla continues to dominate market share as evidenced again this quarter while battling through the chip shortage and now is seeing China demand step up big time after facing headwinds earlier in 2021,” the analyst concluded.
Ives rates Tesla as Outperform with a $1,400.00 per share price target.
JPMorgan analyst Ryan Brinkman raised the price target to $295.00 per share from the prior $250.00 on the Underweight-rated Tesla stock following 'better-than-expected' deliveries.
"While our higher price target continues to imply large downside, we continue to believe it is not ungenerous, including that it values Tesla as the world’s most valuable automaker, edging out Toyota’s current ~$300 bn market capitalization despite Toyota being the world’s largest automaker by 2021 unit volume (9.0 mn); Tesla’s 0.9 mn of 2021 unit volume (1/10th of Toyota’s), by contrast, ranks it as only the world’s 20th largest automaker by 2021 unit volume (just ahead of #21 ranked Chery and just behind #19 ranked Tata), indicating it still has a long way to go to grow into its elevated valuation," Brinkman said in his report.