Investor's Corner
Tesla registers monster batch of 28k Model 3 VINs in 3 days, 20k for int’l markets
Tesla recently exhibited what could very well be the most encouraging sign of the Model 3 ramp to date. From Friday to Sunday, Tesla registered a mammoth batch of more than 28,000 Model 3 VIN registrations, over 20,000 of which were designated for international markets. With these latest batches of filings, Tesla’s total Model 3 registrations now number 236,512.
The new registrations were reported by Model 3 VIN tracking group @Model3VINs, which tracks Tesla’s filings for the electric sedan. This latest batch also complements the more than 14,800 Model 3 VINs that were registered in the week of January 6. That’s more than 42,000 Model 3 VINs filed during the first two weeks of the first quarter alone. For perspective, the filings of the past three days alone are roughly equal to the registrations that Tesla submitted for the vehicle until early April 2018, more than eight months after the electric sedan entered production.
#Tesla registered 21,308 new #Model3 VINs. ~100% estimated to be dual motor. ~73% estimated to be International. Highest VIN is 229766. https://t.co/3YURcBa7CB
— Model 3 VINs (@Model3VINs) January 11, 2019
#Tesla registered 4,967 new #Model3 VINs. ~88% estimated to be dual motor. ~68% estimated to be International. Highest VIN is 234733. https://t.co/5dE326nC5M
— Model 3 VINs (@Model3VINs) January 12, 2019
#Tesla registered 1,779 new #Model3 VINs. ~97% estimated to be dual motor. ~94% estimated to be International. Highest VIN is 236512. https://t.co/nROixpNgdG
— Model 3 VINs (@Model3VINs) January 13, 2019
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The recent batch of Model 3 VIN registrations come amidst Tesla’s ongoing push to deliver the electric car to international markets such as China and Europe, both of which represent a potentially lucrative market for the vehicle. Tesla, for one, has noted that the “mid-sized premium sedan market in Europe is more than twice as big as the same segment in the US” on its Q3 2018 Update Letter. China, on the other hand, expects its electric car market to expand this year, with the country putting a sales target of 2 million new-energy vehicles in 2020, as noted by the Nikkei Asian Review.
Overall, these monster batches of VIN registrations bode well for Tesla’s planned ramp for the Model 3. With the vehicle already saturating North America, and with the majority of remaining North American reservation holders likely holding out for the highly-anticipated, $35,000 Standard Range Model 3, delivering the electric car to other countries is pivotal for Tesla’s performance this first quarter.
This is not to say that everything will be easy for Tesla for the next few months, though. If any, the electric car maker still needs to overcome some challenges as it starts bringing the Model 3 to foreign territories. As of early January, reports indicate that Tesla is still looking to receive homologation approval to sell the Model 3 in Europe. In a statement to the Los Angeles Times, the company stated that it was working closely with regulators and that it expects to gain approval for the Model 3 after the holidays. That said, Tesla is yet to confirm if the electric sedan has received the approval of European regulators as of date.
In China, Tesla is set to start its Model 3 assault by bringing the vehicle’s top-tier variants — the Long Range AWD and Performance variant — to the country. These two vehicles are expected to start saturating the Chinese EV market as the company prepares to manufacture more affordable variants of the electric car in Gigafactory 3, which is currently undergoing construction. During Gigafactory 3’s groundbreaking event, Elon Musk stated that he expects the first locally produced Model 3 to roll out of the Shanghai facility towards the end of the year.
For now, sightings of Model 3 batches seemingly intended for the international markets have been reported by the Tesla community. Earlier this month, Tesla enthusiasts from the United States have shared images of trucks loaded with what appeared to be European-spec Model 3 heading towards a pier. Even more recently, Tesla community and r/TeslaMotors member u/Nicoriquo shared images of a Model 3 fleet that reportedly arrived in Europe.
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In a new note to investors on Tuesday, Morgan Stanley analyst Andrew Percoco said that Tesla has one big financial question to answer for investors regarding its Robotaxi rollout, Full Self-Driving software, and Optimus.
Percoco said in the note that, for the most part, investors are still very positive about the direction the company is headed. However, there are some things the firm would like to see, and they have to do with financials.
Tesla (TSLA) Q2 2026 earnings results: miss on EPS, beat on revenue
Tesla bulls are more than convinced that the company’s Full Self-Driving software is proof it can develop physical AI. Financially, however, there are still some questions, especially on elevated spending, which CEO Elon Musk said would occur as the company works to roll out Robotaxi faster and continue developing its Optimus robot.
The latter two are where Tesla will have to prove progress to investors, as Percoco writes that both projects “will require clearer evidence that Robotaxi is scaling and more tangible Optimus proof points to support the ROI on elevated capex.”
Percoco said the second quarter earnings call did not change his long-term thesis of where Tesla is positioned in the AI race, which is out in front. However, there are concerns that weaker gross margins and higher R&D spend will stress financials, and that has “sharpened our (and investors’) focus on measurable progress across Robotaxi and Optimus.”
Additionally, Robotaxi still needs to be proven with more operation in existing cities while maintaining safety but improving how many rides it gives in any given time, he said. For Optimus, Percoco wrote that he is “still looking for evidence beyond commentary around SOP.”
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Morgan Stanley put Percoco in charge of covering Tesla after long-time analyst Adam Jonas transitioned to the automotive side.
Currently, Morgan Stanley has a $415 price target on Tesla and a ‘Hold’ rating on the stock. It is trading at around $330 at the time of publication, which was 2:30 P.M. on the East Coast.
SpaceX’s massive investment in AI will make it a big winner, Argus Research said after the company’s successful earnings call last week.
The firm also upgraded shares to a Buy from Hold and set a $160 price target.
SpaceX (NASDAQ: SPCX) is currently recovering from its heavy AI infrastructure investments, as it spent nearly $16 billion in Q2 alone. The company did this primarily by monetizing high-demand GPU compute capacity at a much faster pace than traditional data center economics would suggest.
Company CFO Bret Johnsen said that SpaceX would be able to pay back anything on new deployments within a year.
There are plenty of ways the company can do this:
Leasing excess compute capacity through contracts
SpaceX has already built Colossus and Colossus II, largely for its own model training. However, much of that capacity is already rented out to third parties. It already has major deals with Anthropic, Google, and Reflection AI. These partnerships are adding billions per month to SpaceX’s spreadsheet.
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High utilization driven by industry-wide scarcity
The demand for advanced AI training and inference capacity continues to exceed what is available for use. SpaceX can fill new racks quickly after they come online, so the capital deployed converts into revenue with minimal idle time.
Additionally, management and outside observers have described the new compute capital as behaving more like a cost-of-goods-sold than traditional multi-year capex, especially because of this rapid monetization pattern.
Capacity has already scaled from ~0.4 GW a year to 1.4 GW annually by the end of Q2. There are targets of more than 2 GW by year-end.
High incremental margins on the rental business once capacity is online
GPU cloud providers often operate at strong gross margins. SpaceX can monetize capacity that was already partially built or can be added efficiently. This means that incremental EBITDA margins on the rental revenue are usually high. This accelerates cash recovery relative to the gross capital outlay.
Parallel monetization of its own AI software and applications
Beyond pure infrastructure rental, SpaceX also generates revenue from Grok through subscriptions and usage, from X through ads, data, and other related services, enterprise APIs, and the planned integration of the Cursor coding tools acquisition.
These application layers ride on the same compute infrastructure and provide additional high-margin streams that could offset build-out costs. AI-segment revenue overall rose sharply to about $2.6 billion in Q2, according to Motley Fool. This was driven primarily by the infrastructure contracts, but the software side is also partially responsible.
Efficient, large-scale deployment and vertical integration advantages
SpaceX has emphasized the rapid construction of power and cooling infrastructure and favorable cost-per-megawatt economics relative to industry benchmarks in some disclosures.
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Combined with its ability to scale capacity aggressively and the fact that many contracts start generating revenue within months of capacity coming online, the effective payback compresses dramatically compared with more conventional multi-year data-center projects.
SpaceX’s dominant near-term recovery path will turn the AI clusters into a hyperscale-style compute rental business for other leading AI companies while still using a portion for internal models.
Elon Musk
Another Tesla SpaceX merger prediction by ARK Invest has Elon Musk talking
Elon Musk again denies a Tesla China split as new SpaceX merger speculation resurfaces quickly.
Elon Musk restated that Tesla has no plans to separate its China business from the rest of the company, responding to a new round of merger speculation from ARK Invest.
On the firm’s “Brainstorm” podcast, Cathie Wood’s team, including chief futurist Brett Winton and research director Nick Grous, argued a Tesla and SpaceX combination remains likely, with an announcement possible before the end of the year even if the deal itself would not close that quickly. Winton called Tesla’s Shanghai operations a “small ish wrinkle” for a merger rather than a real obstacle, since SpaceX’s national security work with the U.S. government sits uneasily next to Tesla’s manufacturing base in China.
Musk pushed back on the framing directly. “China is awesome. I strongly encourage people to visit,” he wrote on X. He also repeated language he first used in late July, when the Wall Street Journal reported that Tesla executives had been told to prepare for a possible spinoff, sale, or closure of the China business ahead of a SpaceX tie up. Musk called that report “absurdly fake news” at the time, adding that a separation had “never even come up in a discussion ever,” a line he echoed again this week.
The repeated denial has not settled the underlying question, because Shanghai’s role in Tesla’s business is exactly what makes a merger complicated. Gigafactory Shanghai still ships more than half of Tesla’s global deliveries and functions as the company’s main export hub for Europe and Asia. Teslarati previously reported on Musk’s initial denial, and the merger conversation itself has been building since SpaceX’s IPO gave it public shares to use as acquisition currency.
Wedbush’s Dan Ives has pegged the odds of a Tesla SpaceX merger at 80 to 90 percent by early 2027, and ARK’s prediction of a year end announcement adds another data point to that timeline, even as Musk keeps rejecting the specific mechanics reporters have described. Neither position rules out the other. Musk can deny a China spinoff was ever discussed while analysts still expect some form of combination to move forward, since ARK and Ives are both describing convergence at the corporate level, not necessarily the internal restructuring the Journal described in July.
For now, Tesla’s China business remains intact, and Musk’s comments this week make clear he has no interest in publicly walking that position back, no matter how often the merger question resurfaces.
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Tesla has one big financial question to answer for investors: Morgan Stanley
SpaceX AI investment gamble will make it a big winner, firm says
