Investor's Corner
Faraday Future defies the odds, will start vehicle production in March
Faraday Future has announced that it has acquired the necessary funding to begin vehicle production and will do so next month.
Investors and Faraday Future reservation holders have become pessimistic over the past two years. Not only has the company been stalled in its efforts to begin production of the FF 91 SUV, but its stock has plummeted as customers have lost hope in receiving the vehicle they originally ordered. Yet it seems Faraday has achieved the impossible, pulling out of its financial tailspin and heading to production next month.
Faraday said it acquired a total of $135 million in funding, allowing for its vehicle production after five long years of waiting. The FF 91 SUV will begin production in March and will begin deliveries to customers in April. Faraday did not specify how many vehicles would be produced or which customers would be receiving vehicles first.
Such a dramatic shift in Faraday’s trajectory stems from its last effort funding round and new corporate leadership that seems dead set on recovering what many assumed to be a sinking ship. Faraday Future CEO Xuefeng Chen (XF, as he is titled in the press release) follows previous CEO Carsten Breitfeld who resigned after a board review of his leadership since IPO. Along with the most recently secured funding, the CEO will also be looking to expand outstanding shares to drive more investment into the business; a vote will be held on the matter in a meeting with investors at the end of this month.
Faraday Future’s FF 91 is the $180,000 SUV that the company hopes will redefine the luxury EV segment. “Competing with Ferrari, Maybach, Rolls Royce, and Bentley, as the only next-gen Ultimate Intelligent TechLuxury EV product, the FF 91 Futurist puts forward a unique and intelligent EV experience with extreme technology, an ultimate user experience,” says the press release, but looking to the vehicle’s actual specs, it certainly has the chance to shake things up.
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- Credit: Faraday Future
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- Credit: Faraday Future
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- Credit: Faraday Future
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- Credit: Faraday Future
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- Credit: Faraday Future
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- Credit: Faraday Future
The FF 91 is a long-wheelbase luxury vehicle that performs with incredible performance specifications. Its tr-motor system produces a combined 1050 horsepower, shooting the SUV to 60mph in just 2.39 seconds. However, with a refined interior experience, fitted with rear captain’s chairs and fine leather upholstery, the vehicle’s target market is more Oceans Eleven, less Miami Vice.
Through the Faraday Future “Dynamic Vehicle Control” system, drivers benefit from semi-active dampers that will smooth the vehicle’s ride, four-wheel-steering that makes the sizable vehicle nimble and maneuverable, and thanks to its dual motor system in the back, rear torque-vectoring ensures power makes it to the ground. But thanks to the vehicle’s impressive aerodynamic shape, these features don’t come at the detriment of range, with the FF 91 still capable of 381 miles on a single charge thanks to its sizable 130 kWh battery.
Faraday has not specified how fast the vehicle charges but notes on its website that the FF 91 will gain 200 miles of range in just 30 minutes of charging.
With such a remarkable turnaround from just late last year and an astonishingly quick start of production, optimism is finally returning to the Faraday Future brand. Yet many still have good reason to be cautious about the fledgling brand. Hopefully, by ultimately delivering on its initially promised vehicles, Faraday can start to repair its cultural cache and begin to work on ramping production for what could be a fantastic vehicle.
Disclosure: William Johnson does not own Faraday Future stock.
What do you think of the article? Do you have any comments, questions, or concerns? Shoot me an email at william@teslarati.com. You can also reach me on Twitter @WilliamWritin. If you have news tips, email us at tips@teslarati.com!
Tesla stock (NASDAQ: TSLA) just got a price target boost from its biggest bear, Gordon Johnson of GLJ Research, who raised his expected trading level to one that is 95 percent lower than its current trading level.
Johnson pushed his Tesla price target from $19.05 to $25.28 on Wednesday, while maintaining the ‘Sell’ rating that has been present on the stock for a long time. GLJ has largely been recognized as the biggest skeptic of Elon Musk’s company, being particularly critical of the automotive side of things.
Tesla has routinely been called out by Johnson for negative delivery growth, what he calls “weakening demand,” and price cuts that have occurred in past years, all pointing to them as desperate measures to sell its cars.
Johnson has also said that Tesla is extremely overvalued and is too reliant on regulatory credits for profitability. Other analysts on the bullish side recognize Tesla as a company that is bigger than just its automotive side.
Many believe it is a leader in autonomous driving, like Dan Ives of Wedbush, who believes Tesla will have a widely successful 2026, especially if it can come through on its targets and schedules for Robotaxi and Cybercab.
Justifying the price target this week, Johnson said that the revised valuation is based on “reality rather than narrative.” Tesla has been noted by other analysts and financial experts as a stock that trades on narrative, something Johnson obviously disagrees with.
Dan Nathan, a notorious skeptic of the stock, turned bullish late last year, recognizing the company’s shares trade on “technicals and sentiment.” He said, “From a trading perspective, it looks very interesting.”
Tesla bear turns bullish for two reasons as stock continues boost
Johnson has remained very consistent with this sentiment regarding Tesla and his beliefs regarding its true valuation, and has never shied away from putting his true thoughts out there.
Tesla shares closed at $431.40 today, about 95 percent above where Johnson’s new price target lies.
Tesla (NASDAQ: TSLA) stock received a price target update from Pierre Ferragu of Wall Street firm New Street Research, citing the company’s growing lead in self-driving and autonomy.
On Tuesday, Ferragu bumped his price target from $520 to $600, stating that the consensus from the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas was that Tesla’s lead in autonomy has been sustained, is growing, and sits at a multiple-year lead over its competitors.
CES 2026 validates Tesla’s FSD strategy, but there’s a big lag for rivals: analyst
“The signal from Vegas is loud and clear,” the analyst writes. “The industry isn’t catching up to Tesla; it is actively validating Tesla’s strategy…just with a 12-year lag.”
The note shows that the company’s prowess in vehicle autonomy is being solidified by lagging competitors that claim to have the best method. The only problem is that Tesla’s Vision-based approach, which it adopted back in 2022 with the Model 3 and Model Y initially, has been proven to be more effective than competitors’ approach, which utilizes other technology, such as LiDAR and sensors.
Currently, Tesla shares are sitting at around $433, as the company’s stock price closed at $432.96 on Tuesday afternoon.
Ferragu’s consensus on Tesla shares echoes that of other Wall Street analysts who are bullish on the company’s stock and position within the AI, autonomy, and robotics sector.
Dan Ives of Wedbush wrote in a note in mid-December that he anticipates Tesla having a massive 2026, and could reach a $3 trillion valuation this year, especially with the “AI chapter” taking hold of the narrative at the company.
Ives also said that the big step in the right direction for Tesla will be initiating production of the Cybercab, as well as expanding on the Robotaxi program through the next 12 months:
“…as full-scale volume production begins with the autonomous and robotics roadmap…The company has started to test the all-important Cybercab in Austin over the past few weeks, which is an incremental step towards launching in 2026 with important volume production of Cybercabs starting in April/May, which remains the golden goose in unlocking TSLA’s AI valuation.”
Tesla analyst breaks down delivery report: ‘A step in the right direction’
Tesla has transitioned from an automaker to a full-fledged AI company, and its Robotaxi and Cybercab programs, fueled by the Full Self-Driving suite, are leading the charge moving forward. In 2026, there are major goals the company has outlined. The first is removing Safety Drivers from vehicles in Austin, Texas, one of the areas where it operates a ride-hailing service within the U.S.
Ultimately, Tesla will aim to launch a Level 5 autonomy suite to the public in the coming years.
Investor's Corner
Tesla Q4 delivery numbers are better than they initially look: analyst
The Deepwater Asset Management Managing Partner shared his thoughts in a post on his website.
Longtime Tesla analyst and Deepwater Asset Management Managing Partner Gene Munster has shared his insights on Tesla’s Q4 2025 deliveries. As per the analyst, Tesla’s numbers are actually better than they first appear.
Munster shared his thoughts in a post on his website.
Normalized December Deliveries
Munster noted that Tesla delivered 418k vehicles in the fourth quarter of 2025, slightly below Street expectations of 420k but above the whisper number of 415k. Tesla’s reported 16% year-over-year decline, compared to +7% in September, is largely distorted by the timing of the tax credit expiration, which pulled forward demand.
“Taking a step back, we believe September deliveries pulled forward approximately 55k units that would have otherwise occurred in December or March. For simplicity, we assume the entire pull-forward impacted the December quarter. Under this assumption, September growth would have been down ~5% absent the 55k pull-forward, a Deepwater estimate tied to the credit’s expiration.
“For December deliveries to have declined ~5% year over year would imply total deliveries of roughly 470k. Subtracting the 55k units pulled into September results in an implied December delivery figure of approximately 415k. The reported 418k suggests that, when normalizing for the tax credit timing, quarter-over-quarter growth has been consistently down ~5%. Importantly, this ~5% decline represents an improvement from the ~13% declines seen in both the March and June 2025 quarters.“
Tesla’s United States market share
Munster also estimated that Q4 as a whole might very well show a notable improvement in Tesla’s market share in the United States.
“Over the past couple of years, based on data from Cox Automotive, Tesla has been losing U.S. EV market share, declining to just under 50%. Based on data for October and November, Cox estimates that total U.S. EV sales were down approximately 35%, compared to Tesla’s just reported down 16% for the full quarter. For the first two months of the quarter, Cox reported Tesla market share of roughly a 65% share, up from under 50% in the September quarter.
“While this data excludes December, the quarter as a whole is likely to show a material improvement in Tesla’s U.S. EV market share.“
Tesla Giga Shanghai celebrates 5 million electric drive unit milestone
Tesla price target boost from its biggest bear is 95% below its current level
