Investor's Corner
Tesla’s Q4 2018 delivery and production report: 63k Model 3 delivered, 86.5k total cars produced
Tesla has released its production and delivery figures for the fourth quarter of 2018, capping off what could only be described as a historic year for the electric car maker. In Q4 2018, Tesla produced a total of 86,555 vehicles, which is 8% more than its prior all-time-high in the third quarter. Deliveries also grew to 90,700 vehicles, a number that’s also 8% more than Q3 2018’s all-time-high.
Tesla’s Q4 production numbers are comprised of 61,394 Model 3 vehicles, in line with the company’s guidance and 15% more than its already notable figures in the third quarter. Tesla also produced a total of 25,161 Model S and X, which is consistent with its long-term run rate of around 100,000 units per year. The more than 90,000 deliveries that Tesla was able to accomplish in Q4 translates to about 1,000 vehicles per day — a notable feat for such a young carmaker. This number is comprised of 63,150 Model 3 (signifying a 13% growth over Q3), 13,500 Model S, and 14,050 Model X vehicles.
Over the course of 2018, Tesla delivered a total of 245,240 vehicles, comprised of 145,846 Model 3, as well as 99,394 Model S and Model X. The company notes in its report that its deliveries in 2018 are almost equal to its total deliveries in all prior years combined. This is despite the electric car maker only producing mid and high-priced variants for the Model 3, and deliveries only being exclusive to North America. Seemingly as a way to highlight the demand for the vehicle, the company pointed out that more than 75% of Model 3 orders in Q4 came from new customers, not reservation holders.
By the end of the quarter, Tesla had 1,010 Model 3 and 1,897 Model S and X that was in transit to customers, which are expected to be delivered in early 2019. The company also notes that its inventory levels remain the smallest in the auto industry, and that its figures for vehicles in transit saw a reduction in Q4 due to improvements in its logistics systems in the North American region.
Apart from reporting record deliveries and production, Tesla also noted that it is rolling out a price adjustment of $2,000 for its vehicle lineup to absorb the reduction of the federal tax credit being granted to electric car buyers. With the adjustments in place, the reduction of the $7,500 federal tax credit to just $3,750 would likely not weigh down customers as much.
While Tesla reported yet another historic quarter that saw the company delivering an average of 1,000 vehicles per day, Wall Street has not taken kindly to the electric car maker’s Q4 2018 results. Tesla stock (NASDAQ:TSLA) has fallen more than 7% on Thursday’s trading, partly due to the company’s 63,150 Model 3 deliveries falling slightly short of FactSet estimates of 64,900. Craig Irwin, an analyst with Roth Capital Partners, noted that Tesla’s price adjustments on its vehicles are not helping TSLA stock either.
“The price cut is what’s driving the stock lower, as it openly acknowledges the sunset of subsidy dollars is a material headwind,” he said.
Nevertheless, Baird analyst Ben Kallo noted in a recent report that demand for the Model 3 would likely be strong, particularly as deliveries to other countries are expected to begin this 2019. With regions such as Europe and China expected to start receiving the electric sedan in the next few months, Tesla’s numbers would likely remain healthy in the year to come.
“Importantly, we believe the inventory build is natural as the company ramped production ahead of orders to meet the tax credit step down deadline. We continue to believe Model 3 demand remains strong, particularly as the company has not begun international shipments or introduced leasing options, and are buyers on any weakness,” Kallo wrote.
A link to Tesla’s Q4 2018 full report can be found here.
As of writing, Tesla stock is trading down 7.45% at $308.00 per share.
Disclosure: I have no ownership in shares of TSLA and have no plans to initiate any positions within 72 hours.
Tesla has its answer to grow its automotive sales over the next few years, TD Cowen analyst Itay Michaeli says, but it just has to bring it to the U.S.
On Thursday, Michaeli reiterated his $490 price target and the ‘Buy’ rating he already held on Tesla stock (NASDAQ: TSLA). However, its automotive division has struggled to show sequential growth over the past few years, mostly due to its focus on AI and Full Self-Driving. Tesla already axed two of its lower-volume vehicles with the Model S and Model X earlier this year.
However, Tesla does not need to engineer an entire new vehicle to trigger an upward tick in sales; it just has to bring it from China to the U.S., Michaeli said.
He is talking about the Model Y L, a slightly larger version of the all-electric crossover that is already available in China. U.S. customers have been pleading with CEO Elon Musk to bring it to the country since its launch in Asia last year, but he’s not convinced of it because of the advent of self-driving and its importance in this particular market.
The problem is that Tesla owners have been requesting something larger that could fit a typical American family. The Model Y L is slightly larger than the standard Model Y, but some are concerned that it could still be too small to fit what most people might need.
Instead, they have asked for a full-size SUV from Tesla.
Tesla gives big hint that it will build Cyber SUV, smaller Cybertruck
Nevertheless, the Model Y L still presents a great opportunity for Tesla in the U.S., and Michaeli says that there is an additional sales opportunity of about 100,000 units, with demand potential falling somewhere between 60,000 and 135,000 units.
TD Cowen’s note to investors also analyzed that Tesla’s growth could come from a stock perspective as well, positively impacting the stock price, as it has been widely reliant on vehicle sales, even though Tesla has truly phased itself away from that being an important metric.
Tesla stands to gain greatly from the introduction of the Model Y L in the U.S., but only if Elon Musk sees it as a viable fit for the market. Families may need to see Tesla bring something larger to the U.S., or they might be forced to buy from another automaker that offers something that fits is needs for more interior space to haul around the kids.
Elon Musk
SpaceXAI just launched into your kitchen with their new app
SpaceXAI just powered its first consumer app and it predicts what you want to buy.
SpaceXAI just made its first move into consumer AI, and it involves your grocery cart. On June 3, 2026, Gopuff and SpaceXAI announced the launch of Go, a Grok-powered shopping assistant built directly into the Gopuff app that predicts what you need before you even start searching for it.
Gopuff is an instant delivery platform that operates more than 400 micro-fulfillment centers across the U.S., delivering everyday essentials, snacks, drinks, and household items in as little as 15 minutes. It is not a restaurant delivery app or a marketplace. It owns its inventory, controls its warehouses, and handles its own logistics, which means it has built one of the most detailed consumer behavior datasets in retail over its 13-year history.
Go combines SpaceXAI’s advanced reasoning, voice, and image generation models with Gopuff’s dataset of hundreds of millions of orders and real-time cultural signals from X to prepare a suggested cart the moment a customer opens the app. It learns each shopper’s habits and automatically builds a personalized cart based on time of day, location, order history, and real-time indicators. Returning customers can check out with a single tap.
Rather than searching for specific items, users can describe a situation like a game-day party or the desire for a healthy breakfast and Go will assemble a cart automatically. It can also predict when shoppers are running low on items like coffee or paper towels and have them packed and delivered in under 15 minutes. Grok voice integration lets users talk to the app in plain conversational language and check out completely hands-free.
Gopuff co-founder and co-CEO Yakir Gola said: “Today, we believe the greatest friction left in commerce is not delivery or instantaneous access to the essentials customers need. It’s the moment before: the thinking, the deciding, the remembering. We’re combining Gopuff’s demand intelligence with xAI’s frontier reasoning to create an everyday shopping experience that feels like a true extension of you.”
Why SpaceX just made a $60 billion bet on AI coding ahead of historic IPO
The timing carries context beyond the product launch. SpaceXAI was formed after SpaceX completed an all-stock merger with Elon Musk’s xAI earlier this year, folding one of the most advanced AI labs in the world into the same corporate structure as the company preparing what could be the largest IPO in history. SpaceXAI is dipping into consumer-focused AI just as it prepares for its public debut, and while Musk has openly discussed building an everything app, this launch uses Grok to power another company’s product rather than launching a standalone consumer platform. Every consumer-facing deployment of Grok ahead of the IPO roadshow adds tangible evidence that SpaceXAI is not just an infrastructure play but a direct competitor in the AI application layer where OpenAI and Google are already fighting for dominance.
Elon Musk
SpaceX’s amended S-1 is sparking a major Tesla merger conversation
A single line in SpaceX’s amended S-1 just sent Tesla stock down 5% in one day.
A single line buried in SpaceX’s amended S-1 filing is doing more to move Tesla’s stock price than anything Tesla itself has announced in months. The clause, disclosed as SpaceX prepares for what could be the largest IPO in Wall Street history, states that the company “may issue a significant amount of equity in connection with future transactions.” While this may be seen as boilerplate language in S-1 filings, the historical ties between SpaceX and Tesla, and with Elon Musk reportedly discussing a possible merger with close colleagues, investors are interpreting it as something closer to a signal.
The concern among institutional investors like Gary Black, managing director of The Future Fund, pointed directly to the amended filing on X, saying it “strongly suggests more SPCX equity will be issued,” which could potentially be used to acquire Tesla. He estimated such a deal could be 28% dilutive to Tesla shareholders since SpaceX would likely command a significantly higher valuation multiple. Black added that institutional investors he knows hate the idea of a combination because they prefer pure plays over conglomerates, which he said “nearly always gravitate to the lowest common multiple.”
The Tesla and SpaceX merger everyone is talking about is quietly building
The bull case runs the math differently. Tesla influencer and retail shareholder advocate AleXandra Merz pushed back on what she called a widespread misunderstanding of how merger-of-equals deals actually work. Rather than simply splitting the difference between two market caps, a merger exchange ratio is negotiated based on relative fair market values, meaning the lower valued company typically sees its stock reprice upward toward the deal value.
Under her model, SpaceX enters at a $2.5 trillion valuation and Tesla at $1.6 trillion, producing a combined entity worth $4.1 trillion split evenly between both shareholder groups. That implies Tesla’s side of the deal would be valued at $2.05 trillion, a gain of roughly $450 billion from its current market cap. She cited Dow-DuPont and CBS-Viacom as historical examples of how markets reprice both companies toward the announced exchange ratio after a deal is unveiled.
What does a Merger of Equals mean to Elon’s compensation packages?
Well, it changes everything.
Enjoy https://t.co/uekCldyITw pic.twitter.com/kolq1C9qTu
— AleXandra Merz 🇺🇲 (@TeslaBoomerMama) June 1, 2026
The SpaceX S-1 amendments also revealed just how much financial infrastructure already binds the two companies together. As Teslarati has reported, SpaceX purchased $697 million in Tesla Megapacks, $131 million in Cybertrucks, and the two companies have shared supply chain resources, and semiconductor fabrication plans since well before any merger conversation became public. A retail poll by Tesla influencer Sawyer Merritt is finding that 36% of respondents do not plan to buy SpaceX shares at IPO and 15.3% saying their decision depends on the valuation.
Do you plan on buying @SpaceX stock at its IPO?
— Sawyer Merritt (@SawyerMerritt) June 1, 2026
Whether the merger happens or not, the amended filing is seemingly moving markets and sharpened a debate that is no longer theoretical. SpaceX is weeks away from trading publicly, and Tesla shareholders are now watching every word of every filing for clues about what Musk plans to do next.
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