Among the major automotive manufacturers, Tesla is the only one to realize a year-over-year growth in vehicle deliveries from March 2021 to February 2022, seeing a near doubling in sales. Other companies struggled to maintain level sales this year compared to last, with the only company seeing a less than 10 percent decline being Kia.
Tesla delivered 23,050 vehicles in March 2021, according to data from TrueCar. The electric automaker saw a 93.2 percent growth in February 2022 compared to last March, delivering 42,742 vehicles last month. Tesla was an anomaly in this category when compared to other major automakers. From BMW to Ford, to GM and Stellantis, every major automotive company suffered substantial losses in deliveries year-over-year.
The automaker to suffer the most substantial loss was Volkswagen, which saw a 44.3 percent decline in automotive sales from March 2021 to February 2022. Other considerable losses came from Nissan (-41.3%), Honda, (-30.6%), Subaru and Ford (-27.6%), and BMW (-23.9%).
Credit: TrueCar
The realized gains in Tesla’s sales figures could be attributed to a more favorable consumer sentiment regarding electric vehicles over the past year, which has been led due to the company’s nearly-unanimous recognition as the leader in EVs. Additionally, Tesla was one of the only major automakers to combat the semiconductor and chip shortage with relative ease. While the company did experience delays in production last year due to parts shortages and other supply chain issues, it was widely successful in maneuvering the issues, getting cars to customers frequently.
In terms of quarterly year-over-year comparisons, Tesla was one of two automakers to see positive gains from Q1 2022 compared to Q1 2021. Tesla sold 127,432 vehicles in Q1 2022, with only 69,300 in Q1 2021, which represents an 83.9 percent growth. Hyundai saw a 0.9 percent increase, delivering 176,920 vehicles in Q1 2022, with 175,352 cars in Q1 2021.
As an industry, TrueCar expects total new vehicle industry sales to reach 1,246,993 units in March 2022, down 25 percent from a year ago and up 5 percent from February 2022.
TrueCar also offered additional industry insights:
- Total sales for March 2022 are expected to be down 25% from a year ago and up 5% from February 2022 when adjusted for the same number of selling days.
- Fleet sales for March 2022 are expected to be down 30% from a year ago and up 31% from February 2022 when adjusted for the same number of selling days.
- Incentive spend is down 54% from last year.
- Average transaction price is projected to be up 15% from a year ago and down 1% from February 2022.
- Total SAAR is expected to be down 23% from a year ago at 13.6 million units.
- Used vehicle sales for March 2022 are expected to reach 3.6 million, down 13% from a year ago and up 11% from February 2022.
- The average interest rate on new vehicles is 4.6% and the average interest rate on used vehicles is 8%.
- The average loan term on a new vehicle for March 2022 is 70 months and the average loan term on a used vehicle is about 71 months.
- Quarterly average transaction price is projected to be up 16% from a year ago and up 3.5% from Q4 2021.
- Quarterly incentive spend is down 51% from Q1 2021
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Elon Musk
Elon Musk confirms xAI’s purchase of five 380 MW natural gas turbines
The deal, which was confirmed by Musk on X, highlights xAI’s effort to aggressively scale its operations.
xAI, Elon Musk’s artificial intelligence startup, has purchased five additional 380 MW natural gas turbines from South Korea’s Doosan Enerbility to power its growing supercomputer clusters.
The deal, which was confirmed by Musk on X, highlights xAI’s effort to aggressively scale its operations.
xAI’s turbine deal details
News of xAI’s new turbines was shared on social media platform X, with user @SemiAnalysis_ stating that the turbines were produced by South Korea’s Doosan Enerbility. As noted in an Asian Business Daily report, Doosan Enerbility announced last October that it signed a contract to supply two 380 MW gas turbines for a major U.S. tech company. Doosan later noted in December that it secured an order for three more 380 MW gas turbines.
As per the X user, the gas turbines would power an additional 600,000+ GB200 NVL72 equivalent size cluster. This should make xAI’s facilities among the largest in the world. In a reply, Elon Musk confirmed that xAI did purchase the turbines. “True,” Musk wrote in a post on X.
xAI’s ambitions
Recent reports have indicated that xAI closed an upsized $20 billion Series E funding round, exceeding the initial $15 billion target to fuel rapid infrastructure scaling and AI product development. The funding, as per the AI startup, “will accelerate our world-leading infrastructure buildout, enable the rapid development and deployment of transformative AI products.”
The company also teased the rollout of its upcoming frontier AI model. “Looking ahead, Grok 5 is currently in training, and we are focused on launching innovative new consumer and enterprise products that harness the power of Grok, Colossus, and 𝕏 to transform how we live, work, and play,” xAI wrote in a post on its website.
Elon Musk
Elon Musk’s xAI closes upsized $20B Series E funding round
xAI announced the investment round in a post on its official website.
xAI has closed an upsized $20 billion Series E funding round, exceeding the initial $15 billion target to fuel rapid infrastructure scaling and AI product development.
xAI announced the investment round in a post on its official website.
A $20 billion Series E round
As noted by the artificial intelligence startup in its post, the Series E funding round attracted a diverse group of investors, including Valor Equity Partners, Stepstone Group, Fidelity Management & Research Company, Qatar Investment Authority, MGX, and Baron Capital Group, among others.
Strategic partners NVIDIA and Cisco Investments also continued support for building the world’s largest GPU clusters.
As xAI stated, “This financing will accelerate our world-leading infrastructure buildout, enable the rapid development and deployment of transformative AI products reaching billions of users, and fuel groundbreaking research advancing xAI’s core mission: Understanding the Universe.”
xAI’s core mission
Th Series E funding builds on xAI’s previous rounds, powering Grok advancements and massive compute expansions like the Memphis supercluster. The upsized demand reflects growing recognition of xAI’s potential in frontier AI.
xAI also highlighted several of its breakthroughs in 2025, from the buildout of Colossus I and II, which ended with over 1 million H100 GPU equivalents, and the rollout of the Grok 4 Series, Grok Voice, and Grok Imagine, among others. The company also confirmed that work is already underway to train the flagship large language model’s next iteration, Grok 5.
“Looking ahead, Grok 5 is currently in training, and we are focused on launching innovative new consumer and enterprise products that harness the power of Grok, Colossus, and 𝕏 to transform how we live, work, and play,” xAI wrote.
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.
Elon Musk confirms xAI’s purchase of five 380 MW natural gas turbines
Elon Musk’s xAI closes upsized $20B Series E funding round
