Tesla Is Still Bleeding Money, Misses Its Q2 Sales Target

Elon Musk has ambitious future product plans, right now though Tesla is

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by Brad Anderson

August 4, 2016 at 22:26

Elon Musk has ambitious future product plans, right now though Tesla is hurt by ever-increasing losses and lower than expected sales.

In the electric automaker’s second quarter earnings call, it was announced that losses increased by almost 60 per cent over Q2 2015, up to $293 million. This was partly caused by deliveries of 14,402 units, short of Elon Musk’s goal. Additionally, over 5,000 vehicles produced late in Q2 are still in transit and won’t be delivered until early in the third quarter.

By the end of 2016, Tesla wants to have sold almost 80,000 vehicles, well up on the 50,500 which were shipped to customers during 2015.

The company is currently producing 2,000 cars a week, but that should ramp up to 2,400 units before the new year. By 2018, Musk expects Tesla to be building 500,000 vehicles annually, rather than by 2020 as initially forecast.

Due to higher sales throughout 2016 compared to last year, revenues have risen to $1.27 billion, helped in part by the range-topping Model X, which Musk says that, on average, costs 15 per cent more than the Model S.