With the Model 3 launch on the horizon, Tesla’s business has never been stronger. Over the weekend, Tesla released its delivery numbers for the first quarter of 2017 and, suffice it to say, investors have a lot to be excited about. During the first three months of 2017, Tesla delivered a tad more than 25,000 vehicles to customers, easily besting analyst expectations which fell somewhere in the 23,000 to 24,000 range. When the dust settled, Tesla over the last three months set a brand new quarterly record for deliveries.
Breaking down deliveries by model type, Tesla indicated that the Model S accounted for 13,450 deliveries while the Model X accounted for 11,550 deliveries. By way of contrast, Tesla during the same quarter a year-ago delivered 14,820 vehicles. In short, Tesla, year over year, managed to increase its delivery count by a whopping 69%. Tesla’s impressive quarter not only suggests that demand for the Model S and Model X remains strong, but that the company has managed to streamline its production process as well.
Incidentally, the cumulative number of orders Tesla processed for the quarter was even higher than its delivery count. To this point, the EV maker on Sunday said that 4,650 vehicles were still in transit to customers at the time their first quarter tally was tabulated. Consequently, those 4,650 vehicles will be included in Tesla’s second quarter delivery count.
Tesla’s press release reads in part:
In addition to Q1 deliveries, about 4,650 vehicles were in transit to customers at the end of the quarter. These will be counted as deliveries in Q2 2017.
Q1 production totaled 25,418 vehicles. This was also a new quarterly record for us.
Tesla’s impressive quarter also instills confidence that the company can actually meet its stated goal of delivering upwards of 500,000 vehicles during the first half of 2017. More broadly, it also suggests that Tesla’s goal of manufacturing 50,000 cars in 2018, while still incredibly ambitious, may not be as ludicrous as some industry observers initially claimed.
Not surprisingly, the market reacted positively to Tesla’s latest delivery figures. At the time of this writing, Tesla shares have skyrocketed nearly 7%, with the stock now trading at an all-time high of $297.
