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Projecting Tesla’s Growth for the Next 6-10 Years

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When Tesla announced its Gigafactory, it provided us with a fairly detailed picture of its growth going forward. And now that the Gigafactory deal is done with Nevada, that growth seems to be a low risk assumption. Tesla has also provided us with some color about 2015 and using all this information and filling in the blanks, I’ve come up with this chart for Tesla’s automotive growth going forward:

Tesla's Growth

Tesla’s Gigafactory is expected to produce 50GWh of battery packs in 2020. If we assume that 85kWh is the average pack size – I expect the Model 3 pack to be smaller and Model X pack to be larger – Tesla will need 42.5GWh for automotive use. That leaves an excess of 7.5GWh for energy storage. By early next year, Tesla will be using as much or more than the rest of the global cylindrical cell output combined based on their stated Model S run rate goal of 50,000/year. So at 500,000 cars per year, Tesla would be using 10 times the current global output of cylindrical cells and more than the current total global output of batteries.

However, the Gigafactory should be maxed out by then and my personal prediction is that we will either see a major expansion of the Gigafactory go online shortly after 2020 or we will see more such factories go online in the coming years. Considering that the current Gigafactory that expects to start production in 2017 broke ground in 2014, factory 2 should break ground in 2018, just after the first one goes online. My expectation is also that during that time frame at the latest, Tesla will start considering auto factories on other continents.

Tesla has also stated that they are building superchargers at a rate greater than one per day. At that rate, by 2020, Tesla will have 2000 superchargers globally, enough to give them a major leg up over any other manufacturer. In fact, by 2017, which is the earliest that any long range EVs are expected, Tesla should already have 1000 supercharger stations in place. That would already put the Model 3 ahead of any potential competition in the space.

As far as storage batteries go, Tesla currently sells some storage batteries through SolarCity both for residential and commercial customers. Currently this is a very small limited availability offering. However, the Gigafactory will change all that making batteries more affordable and giving SolarCity the ability for bigger and more widespread deployments. As someone with solar panels, this excites me as much or more than automotive growth for Tesla. As solar system prices are dropping, over the next decade storage along with panels might become the norm. The market for this is potentially limitless.

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So if you think that you have missed out on Tesla’s growth, you are wrong. Major growth is still to come. If there is one company I see becoming bigger than Apple, it is Tesla. Here is what Tesla’s revenue growth would look like with Model S average price of 100,000$, Model X at 110,000$ and Model 3 at 60,000$ from cars alone.

Tesla's Growth (Revenue)

At 500,000 cars, Tesla will have 0.5% of the global auto market still leaving significant growth potential ahead. Even though there has been a recent up tick in rumors of 200 mile EVs, I expect none of them to be competitive with Tesla until at least 2020 and that too only if the rest of the industry bothers with a charging network to enable long distance travel in an EV.

My personal estimate is that Tesla will produce 2 million cars by 2024. At that time, I estimate Tesla auto revenues of $160 billion – about equaling current GM revenues. However, none of this takes into account Tesla’s storage revenues. If by 2024, Tesla can sell 100GWh of storage batteries at 150$/kWh, that would bring in another $15 billion in revenue but at a higher margin than the auto business. At $175B in revenue and growing, with margins of 15% and a P/E of 20, Tesla would be worth more than $500 billion then. Tesla will still be a growth company with 4-6 available models and more coming soon.

Disclosure: I am long TSLA, SCTY.

Visit my personal finance blog or visit me at Seeking Alpha.

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Elon Musk

Tesla analysts believe Musk and Trump feud will pass

Tesla CEO Elon Musk and U.S. President Donald Trump’s feud shall pass, several bulls say.

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The White House, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
President Donald J. Trump purchases a Tesla on the South Lawn, Tuesday, March 11, 2025. (Official White House Photo by Molly Riley)

Tesla analysts are breaking down the current feud between CEO Elon Musk and U.S. President Donald Trump, as the two continue to disagree on the “Big Beautiful Bill” and its impact on the country’s national debt.

Musk, who headed the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) under the Trump Administration, left his post in May. Soon thereafter, he and President Trump entered a very public and verbal disagreement, where things turned sour. They reconciled to an extent, and things seemed to be in the past.

However, the second disagreement between the two started on Monday, as Musk continued to push back on the “Big Beautiful Bill” that the Trump administration is attempting to sign into law. It would, by Musk’s estimation, increase spending and reverse the work DOGE did to trim the deficit.

President Trump has hinted that DOGE could be “the monster” that “eats Elon,” threatening to end the subsidies that SpaceX and Tesla receive. Musk has not been opposed to ending government subsidies for companies, including his own, as long as they are all abolished.

How Tesla could benefit from the ‘Big Beautiful Bill’ that axes EV subsidies

Despite this contentious back-and-forth between the two, analysts are sharing their opinions now, and a few of the more bullish Tesla observers are convinced that this feud will pass, Trump and Musk will resolve their differences as they have before, and things will return to normal.

ARK Invest’s Cathie Wood said this morning that the feud between Musk and Trump is another example of “this too shall pass:”

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Additionally, Wedbush’s Dan Ives, in a note to investors this morning, said that the situation “will settle:”

“We believe this situation will settle and at the end of the day Musk needs Trump and Trump needs Musk given the AI Arms Race going on between the US and China. The jabs between Musk and Trump will continue as the Budget rolls through Congress but Tesla investors want Musk to focus on driving Tesla and stop this political angle…which has turned into a life of its own in a roller coaster ride since the November elections.”

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Tesla shares are down about 5 percent at 3:10 p.m. on the East Coast.

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Elon Musk

Tesla investors will be shocked by Jim Cramer’s latest assessment

Jim Cramer is now speaking positively about Tesla, especially in terms of its Robotaxi performance and its perception as a company.

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Credit: CNBC Television/YouTube

Tesla investors will be shocked by analyst Jim Cramer’s latest assessment of the company.

When it comes to Tesla analysts, many of them are consistent. The bulls usually stay the bulls, and the bears usually stay the bears. The notable analysts on each side are Dan Ives and Adam Jonas for the bulls, and Gordon Johnson for the bears.

Jim Cramer is one analyst who does not necessarily fit this mold. Cramer, who hosts CNBC’s Mad Money, has switched his opinion on Tesla stock (NASDAQ: TSLA) many times.

He has been bullish, like he was when he said the stock was a “sleeping giant” two years ago, and he has been bearish, like he was when he said there was “nothing magnificent” about the company just a few months ago.

Now, he is back to being a bull.

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Cramer’s comments were related to two key points: how NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang describes Tesla after working closely with the Company through their transactions, and how it is not a car company, as well as the recent launch of the Robotaxi fleet.

Jensen Huang’s Tesla Narrative

Cramer says that the narrative on quarterly and annual deliveries is overblown, and those who continue to worry about Tesla’s performance on that metric are misled.

“It’s not a car company,” he said.

He went on to say that people like Huang speak highly of Tesla, and that should be enough to deter any true skepticism:

“I believe what Musk says cause Musk is working with Jensen and Jensen’s telling me what’s happening on the other side is pretty amazing.”

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Tesla self-driving development gets huge compliment from NVIDIA CEO

Robotaxi Launch

Many media outlets are being extremely negative regarding the early rollout of Tesla’s Robotaxi platform in Austin, Texas.

There have been a handful of small issues, but nothing significant. Cramer says that humans make mistakes in vehicles too, yet, when Tesla’s test phase of the Robotaxi does it, it’s front page news and needs to be magnified.

He said:

“Look, I mean, drivers make mistakes all the time. Why should we hold Tesla to a standard where there can be no mistakes?”

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It’s refreshing to hear Cramer speak logically about the Robotaxi fleet, as Tesla has taken every measure to ensure there are no mishaps. There are safety monitors in the passenger seat, and the area of travel is limited, confined to a small number of people.

Tesla is still improving and hopes to remove teleoperators and safety monitors slowly, as CEO Elon Musk said more freedom could be granted within one or two months.

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Investor's Corner

Tesla gets $475 price target from Benchmark amid initial Robotaxi rollout

Tesla’s limited rollout of its Robotaxi service in Austin is already catching the eye of Wall Street.

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Credit: Tesla

Venture capital firm Benchmark recently reiterated its “Buy” rating and raised its price target on Tesla stock (NASDAQ: TSLA) from $350 to $475 per share, citing the company’s initial Robotaxi service deployment as a sign of future growth potential.

Benchmark analyst Mickey Legg praised the Robotaxi service pilot’s “controlled and safety-first approach,” adding that it could help Tesla earn the trust of regulators and the general public.

Confidence in camera-based autonomy

Legg reiterated Benchmark’s belief in Tesla’s vision-only approach to autonomous driving. “We are a believer in Tesla’s camera-focused approach that is not only cost effective but also scalable,” he noted. 

The analyst contrasted Tesla’s simple setup with the more expensive hardware stacks used by competitors like Waymo, which use various sophisticated sensors that hike up costs, as noted in an Investing.com report. Compared to Tesla’s Model Y Robotaxis, Waymo’s self-driving cars are significantly more expensive.

He also pointed to upcoming Texas regulations set to take effect in September, suggesting they could help create a regulatory framework favorable to autonomous services in other cities.

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“New regulations for autonomous vehicles are set to go into place on Sept. 1 in TX that we believe will further help win trust and pave the way for expansion to additional cities,” the analyst wrote.

https://twitter.com/herbertong/status/1938287117441855616?s=10

Tesla as a robotics powerhouse

Beyond robotaxis, Legg sees Tesla evolving beyond its roots as an electric vehicle maker. He noted that Tesla’s humanoid robot, Optimus, could be a long-term growth driver alongside new vehicle programs and other future initiatives.

“In our view, the company is undergoing an evolution from a trailblazing vehicle OEM to a high-tech automation and robotics company with unmatched domestic manufacturing scale,” he wrote.

Benchmark noted that Tesla stock had rebounded over 50% from its April lows, driven in part by easing tariff concerns and growing momentum around autonomy. With its initial Robotaxi rollout now underway, the firm has returned to its previous $475 per share target and reaffirmed TSLA as a Benchmark Top Pick for 2025.

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