In its second quarter results, Tesla reported a 16% year-over-year decline in automotive revenue, driven largely by softer deliveries in Europe and price adjustments in key markets. European registrations slid by double-digit percentages in Germany, the U.K., France and Denmark, where Tesla delivered fewer than 1,000 vehicles in July for the first time in over a year. While Tesla’s North American volumes held relatively steady, the overall slowdown reflects intensifying competition from Chinese manufacturers and legacy brands expanding their EV lineups. Management has attributed part of the revenue shortfall to strategic price cuts intended to preserve volume, even as manufacturing costs remain elevated. Tesla’s share performance has been under pressure, with year-to-date losses approaching 24%, partly linked to reputational challenges stemming from high-profile political controversies. Nevertheless, bulls argue that Tesla’s long-term upside lies in its self-driving roadmap, energy storage deployments and emerging robotaxi network, which began limited operations in Austin earlier this year. The board’s recent decision to grant CEO Elon Musk a fresh equity award—totaling 96 million shares—aims to align leadership incentives with execution on autonomy and global manufacturing targets. Investor focus now turns to upcoming battery cell capacity expansions, new factory ramp-ups, and the public debut of the next-generation FSD suite. On August 6, CEO Elon Musk announced that Tesla is training an upgraded Full Self-Driving (FSD) model with roughly ten times more parameters and significantly improved video compression loss. If on-road testing proceeds without major issues, Tesla aims to release the enhanced FSD package to customers by the end of next month. The new model leverages expanded neural network capacity and richer training data to bolster perception and decision-making in complex driving scenarios. This strategic upgrade underscores Tesla’s commitment to autonomy as a cornerstone of future growth and positions the company to compete more effectively with emerging self-driving offerings from legacy automakers and technology startups.
In its second quarter results, Tesla reported a 16% year-over-year decline in automotive revenue, driven largely by softer deliveries in Europe and price adjustments in key markets. European registrations slid by double-digit percentages in Germany, the U.K., France and Denmark, where Tesla delivered fewer than 1,000 vehicles in July for the first time in over a year. While Tesla’s North American volumes held relatively steady, the overall slowdown reflects intensifying competition from Chinese manufacturers and legacy brands expanding their EV lineups. Management has attributed part of the revenue shortfall to strategic price cuts intended to preserve volume, even as manufacturing costs remain elevated. Tesla’s share performance has been under pressure, with year-to-date losses approaching 24%, partly linked to reputational challenges stemming from high-profile political controversies. Nevertheless, bulls argue that Tesla’s long-term upside lies in its self-driving roadmap, energy storage deployments and emerging robotaxi network, which began limited operations in Austin earlier this year. The board’s recent decision to grant CEO Elon Musk a fresh equity award—totaling 96 million shares—aims to align leadership incentives with execution on autonomy and global manufacturing targets. Investor focus now turns to upcoming battery cell capacity expansions, new factory ramp-ups, and the public debut of the next-generation FSD suite. On August 6, CEO Elon Musk announced that Tesla is training an upgraded Full Self-Driving (FSD) model with roughly ten times more parameters and significantly improved video compression loss. If on-road testing proceeds without major issues, Tesla aims to release the enhanced FSD package to customers by the end of next month. The new model leverages expanded neural network capacity and richer training data to bolster perception and decision-making in complex driving scenarios. This strategic upgrade underscores Tesla’s commitment to autonomy as a cornerstone of future growth and positions the company to compete more effectively with emerging self-driving offerings from legacy automakers and technology startups.