News
Tesla Model S P100D still king, but Elon Musk dubs Model 3 Performance as ‘higher value for money’
Tesla continues to actively promote the Model 3 to customers, with CEO Elon Musk recently stating that the Model 3 Performance is “higher value for money” compared to the company’s top-tier vehicle — the Model S P100D.
Musk’s latest push for the Model 3 Performance came as a response to a Model S P85D owner, who inquired if it is worth trading in his larger vehicle to the smaller but seemingly more nimble Model 3 Performance. For the first time since the Model 3’s launch, Musk compared the car favorably against the Model S P100D, at least when it comes to value for money.
Model S P100D is def still the top end, but Model 3 Performance is higher value for money
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) August 5, 2018
In a lot of ways, Elon Musk’s statement does ring true. After all, the difference between a fully loaded Model S P100D and a fully-optioned Model 3 Performance is substantial. In Tesla’s design page, the Model S P100D is listed with an estimated cost of $135,200 with all options included. The Model 3 Performance, on the other hand, costs $80,000 fully-loaded. That’s a difference of roughly $55,000 — just slightly above the cost of a non-performance Tesla Model 3 Dual Motor AWD before any options.
This is not to say that Tesla is dissuading customers from purchasing the Model S P100D, of course. As mentioned by Musk in his tweet, the P100D is still the top end of Tesla’s offerings. With its gut-wrenching 0-60 mph time of 2.28 seconds with Ludicrous Mode, it is far quicker than the Model 3 Performance, which has a 0-60 mph time of 3.5 seconds. Nevertheless, the Model S P100D is known for severely throttling its performance when driven hard around the track — an issue that is not present in the Model 3 Performance, thanks to a clever battery and electric motor cooling system. The Model 3’s electric motors and battery use cooling circuits that are independent but linked. In the event that one component heats up, the system shifts cooling capacity where it’s needed. The system can also use the battery as a heat sink to shed excess thermal load from the motors.
Elon Musk’s latest tweet about the Model 3 Performance says a lot about the company’s strategy in the coming quarters. In the recently-held Q2 2018 earnings call, Musk and Tesla’s executives stood firm on their target of making the company profitable in the third quarter. Musk mentioned this in the call, when he linked the company’s profitability target to the Model 3 ramp.
“At a production rate of 7,000 cars a week, we believe we can be sustainably profitable from Q3 onwards. We’re going to try to raise that rate of the Model 3 production steadily in the coming quarters and try to get to the 10,000 cars a week number as soon as we can. I feel comfortable achieving a GAAP income positive and cash flow positive quarter every quarter from here on out,” Musk said.
So why the Model 3 Performance? Tesla likely makes a good amount of profit from the Model S P100D, but the full-sized sedan’s production has pretty much plateaued over the years. The Model 3 ramp, on the other hand, is still ongoing, and is expected to rise significantly in the coming quarters. Tesla is aiming to hit a gross margin of 25% for the Model 3, and with the vehicle’s production estimated to hit 10,000/week sometime next year, Tesla appears to have a solid shot at making its sustained profitability goals a reality.
Tesla stock (NASDAQ: TSLA) endured one of its sharpest single-day declines in years on July 23, tumbling approximately 14.5 percent and closing near $320 after opening the session around $374. The drop erased more than $140 billion in market value amid heavy trading volume and left the shares at multi-week lows.
The sell-off followed the company’s second-quarter 2026 results, released the previous evening. Tesla reported record revenue of $28.2 billion, up 26 percent year over year, driven by a Q2-record 480,126 vehicle deliveries. Energy storage deployments also rose strongly.
Tesla (TSLA) Q2 2026 earnings results: miss on EPS, beat on revenue
Yet profitability disappointed sharply. Operating income fell 57 percent to $398 million, compressing the operating margin to just 1.4 percent. Non-GAAP earnings per share came in at $0.33, well below the roughly $0.53 analysts had expected. Free cash flow turned negative by $1.1 billion as capital expenditures surged 142 percent to $5.8 billion, largely tied to accelerated spending on artificial intelligence, robotics, and autonomous systems.
The losses on capex were expected, as Tesla said it would be spending heavily in 2026.
Investors also reacted to lingering uncertainty surrounding key product timelines. During the Earnings Call, management reiterated ambitions for Robotaxi deployment and the Optimus humanoid robot, but offered limited new concrete milestones, renewing questions about execution pace that have long accompanied Tesla’s ambitious roadmap.
The magnitude of the decline places it among Tesla’s more severe one-day percentage losses since its 2010 initial public offering. Historically, the two largest single-day drops (split-adjusted) remain September 8, 2020, when shares fell 21.1 percent amid broader market volatility and valuation concerns, and January 13, 2012, with a 19.3 percent plunge during the company’s early growth struggles.
Other notable declines include an 18.6 percent drop on March 16, 2020, at the onset of pandemic-related market turmoil. Thursday’s move ranks roughly ninth on the all-time list but stands out as the steepest in more than a year.
Despite the short-term pain, Tesla’s long-term trajectory has repeatedly recovered from such volatility. The latest results underscore both the strength of its core automotive and energy businesses and the near-term costs of heavy investment in next-generation technologies.
Elon Musk clapped back at France’s decision to withhold the approval for Tesla’s Full Self-Driving (FSD) Supervised system, projecting a clear and blunt message to French Transport Minister Phillippe Tabarot, after he publicly rejected the technology in its current form.
Tabarot outlines several concerns with Tesla Full Self-Driving in a detailed video statement, where he said, “The safety trade-offs are not yet sufficient to authorize it as it currently stands,” he said. He emphasized that FSD is not a true self-driving system and that the driver remains fully responsible.
Key issues Tabarot also brought up included allowing speeding when surrounding traffic exceeds limits and what he believes are insufficient guarantees of driver attention during complex urban maneuvers such as lane changes, intersections, and roundabouts.
Delaying the approval of FSD in France will cost lives
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 22, 2026
While acknowledging technological progress and France’s support for autonomous innovation, Tabarot stressed that deployment must prioritize road safety. He noted ongoing technical discussions with Tesla, the Netherlands, and other European partners, with further ecosystem meetings planned for the fall.
Musk’s rebuke highlights the human cost of regulatory caution. Tesla’s latest safety reports provide compelling data supporting accelerated adoption. In the most recent 12-month period, vehicles using FSD (Supervised) recorded one major collision per approximately 5.1 million miles driven, dramatically better than the U.S. national average of one crash per 698,000 miles.
Even Tesla vehicles driven manually with active safety features outperform the average by a wide margin. These figures come from billions of real-world miles of telemetry, showing FSD vehicles involved in far fewer incidents than both manual Teslas and the broader U.S. fleet.
Critics argue Tesla’s comparisons require careful scrutiny regarding reporting thresholds and fleet demographics, yet the data consistently positions FSD as a potential lifesaver. With road fatalities remaining a leading cause of death worldwide, Musk contends that proven safer technology should not face prolonged bureaucratic hurdles.
France’s measured approach reflects the broader European regulatory caution, which many, especially Musk, have been critical of in the past. However, as autonomous systems from Tesla and competitors like Waymo demonstrate superior safety in independent studies, pressure is mounting for harmonized approvals.
Musk’s warning carries the belief that every month of delay may equate to avoidable tragedies on European roads.
In a striking revelation that underscores the lucrative crossover between Big Tech and space exploration, Alphabet Inc., Google’s parent company, disclosed a massive $94.1 billion equity stake in SpaceX following the rocket company’s blockbuster initial public offering earlier this year.
The disclosure came in Alphabet’s quarterly filing, marking the first time the long-held private investment has been publicly valued at market prices. Google was an early backer, investing alongside Fidelity in 2015 with roughly $500-900 million at a time when SpaceX was valued around $12 billion.
That bet has delivered extraordinary returns, roughly a hundredfold, transforming a strategic play on satellite internet and launch capabilities into one of Alphabet’s largest assets.
Google, $GOOGL, has said they hold $94 billion in SpaceX, $SPCX, shares after IPO.
— unusual_whales (@unusual_whales) July 23, 2026
Of the total holding, approximately $80 billion remains subject to short-term post-IPO lockup restrictions, preventing near-term sales. An additional $14.1 billion faces longer-term restrictions, extending into the third quarter of 2027. This structure limits immediate liquidity but protects against market volatility as SpaceX transitions into public trading.
The SpaceX position contributed significantly to gains in Alphabet’s broader investment portfolio, which also includes a major stake in AI leader Anthropic. Combined, these holdings helped drive nearly $100 billion in investment gains during the second quarter, providing a substantial boost to net income amid ongoing AI spending pressures.
Analysts view the disclosure as validation of Alphabet’s venture strategy beyond its core search and cloud businesses. The investment aligns with deeper ties, including reported multi-billion-dollar deals for AI computing capacity on SpaceX infrastructure. As SpaceX advances Starship flights, Starlink expansion, and ambitious Mars goals under Elon Musk, Google’s stake positions it to benefit from the commercialization of space.
For Alphabet, the windfall highlights how patient, forward-looking bets in transformative sectors can yield outsized rewards. While lockups temper short-term impact, the holding cements SpaceX as a cornerstone of Alphabet’s diversified portfolio in an era where aerospace, AI, and connectivity increasingly intersect. Investors will watch closely as restrictions lift and SpaceX’s public performance unfolds.
Tesla stock tumbles after earnings, one of its sharpest single-day declines
Elon Musk is not happy about this Tesla Full Self-Driving approval delay
