Tesla stock (NASDAQ:TSLA) ended 2023 trading at $248.48 per share. While it may seem like the electric vehicle maker’s shares have been stuck between $200 and $250 per share for months, a closer look at TSLA stock’s performance over the year suggests that the electric vehicle maker actually saw some impressive growth in 2023.
As observed by avid Tesla watchers on social media, TSLA stock closed out 2023 with a total gain of 101.7%. This represented the stock’s third-best yearly gain to date. For context, Tesla grew an impressive 344% in 2013 and a whopping 743% in 2020. Tesla delivered a total of 499,550 vehicles in 2020, a number that the company achieved in but a few months this year.
The 102% gain experienced by Tesla stock is particularly impressive as it shows a strong rebound from 2022. Tesla had a brutal 2022, with the stock taking a 65% drop over the year. This represented TSLA stock’s worst year on record. Tesla saw numerous challenges in 2022, such as the mandatory shutdown of Giga Shanghai due to Covid-19 and Elon Musk’s offloading of shares to fund his takeover of Twitter.
NEWS: $TSLA stock closed out 2023 with a total gain of 101.7%, the stock’s third best yearly gain ever.$TSLA yearly performance:
2011: +7%
2012: +18%
2013: +344%
2014: +48%
2015: +8%
2016: -11%
2017: +46%
2018: +7%
2019: +25%
2020: +743%
2021: +49%
2022: -65%
2023: +102% pic.twitter.com/mebrfUDHVz— Sawyer Merritt (@SawyerMerritt) December 29, 2023
Tesla’s 2023 proved to be a lot smoother than 2022. The company immediately adopted an aggressive stance against its competitors by initiating a series of serious price cuts to its entire vehicle lineup, with some vehicles receiving as much as 20% off their previous price. Tesla’s price cuts became such a notable force that it triggered a price war in China. The company eventually had to sign a truce of sorts with its Chinese rivals to ensure that the country’s EV market remained competitive and fair.
Tesla also successfully launched two new vehicles in 2022. The first is the upgraded Model 3, better known in EV circles as the Model 3 Highland, which is currently produced exclusively in Giga Shanghai. The highly-anticipated Tesla Cybertruck also started its consumer deliveries in late November.
Even Elon Musk’s activities on X, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter, have leveled out. Musk still attracted controversy after controversy in 2023, but he no longer offloaded his personal Tesla shares to fund the social media platform. This was a departure from 2022, when Musk offloaded a total of around $22.9 billion worth of TSLA shares for his acquisition of Twitter.
Don’t hesitate to contact us with news tips. Just send a message to simon@teslarati.com to give us a heads up.
Tesla stock (NASDAQ: TSLA) closed at an all-time high on Tuesday, jumping over 3 percent during the day and finishing at $489.88.
The price beats the previous record close, which was $479.86.
Shares have had a crazy year, dipping more than 40 percent from the start of the year. The stock then started to recover once again around late April, when its price started to climb back up from the low $200 level.
This week, Tesla started to climb toward its highest levels ever, as it was revealed on Sunday that the company was testing driverless Robotaxis in Austin. The spike in value pushed the company’s valuation to $1.63 trillion.
Tesla Robotaxi goes driverless as Musk confirms Safety Monitor removal testing
It is the seventh-most valuable company on the market currently, trailing Nvidia, Apple, Alphabet (Google), Microsoft, Amazon, and Meta.
Shares closed up $14.57 today, up over 3 percent.
The stock has gone through a lot this year, as previously mentioned. Shares tumbled in Q1 due to CEO Elon Musk’s involvement with the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), which pulled his attention away from his companies and left a major overhang on their valuations.
However, things started to rebound halfway through the year, and as the government started to phase out the $7,500 tax credit, demand spiked as consumers tried to take advantage of it.
Q3 deliveries were the highest in company history, and Tesla responded to the loss of the tax credit with the launch of the Model 3 and Model Y Standard.
Additionally, analysts have announced high expectations this week for the company on Wall Street as Robotaxi continues to be the focus. With autonomy within Tesla’s sights, things are moving in the direction of Robotaxi being a major catalyst for growth on the Street in the coming year.
Elon Musk
Tesla needs to come through on this one Robotaxi metric, analyst says
“We think the key focus from here will be how fast Tesla can scale driverless operations (including if Tesla’s approach to software/hardware allows it to scale significantly faster than competitors, as the company has argued), and on profitability.”
Tesla needs to come through on this one Robotaxi metric, Mark Delaney of Goldman Sachs says.
Tesla is in the process of rolling out its Robotaxi platform to areas outside of Austin and the California Bay Area. It has plans to launch in five additional cities, including Houston, Dallas, Miami, Las Vegas, and Phoenix.
However, the company’s expansion is not what the focus needs to be, according to Delaney. It’s the speed of deployment.
The analyst said:
“We think the key focus from here will be how fast Tesla can scale driverless operations (including if Tesla’s approach to software/hardware allows it to scale significantly faster than competitors, as the company has argued), and on profitability.”
Profitability will come as the Robotaxi fleet expands. Making that money will be dependent on when Tesla can initiate rides in more areas, giving more customers access to the program.
There are some additional things that the company needs to make happen ahead of the major Robotaxi expansion, one of those things is launching driverless rides in Austin, the first city in which it launched the program.
This week, Tesla started testing driverless Robotaxi rides in Austin, as two different Model Y units were spotted with no occupants, a huge step in the company’s plans for the ride-sharing platform.
Tesla Robotaxi goes driverless as Musk confirms Safety Monitor removal testing
CEO Elon Musk has been hoping to remove Safety Monitors from Robotaxis in Austin for several months, first mentioning the plan to have them out by the end of 2025 in September. He confirmed on Sunday that Tesla had officially removed vehicle occupants and started testing truly unsupervised rides.
Although Safety Monitors in Austin have been sitting in the passenger’s seat, they have still had the ability to override things in case of an emergency. After all, the ultimate goal was safety and avoiding any accidents or injuries.
Goldman Sachs reiterated its ‘Neutral’ rating and its $400 price target. Delaney said, “Tesla is making progress with its autonomous technology,” and recent developments make it evident that this is true.
Investor's Corner
Tesla gets bold Robotaxi prediction from Wall Street firm
Last week, Andrew Percoco took over Tesla analysis for Morgan Stanley from Adam Jonas, who covered the stock for years. Percoco seems to be less optimistic and bullish on Tesla shares, while still being fair and balanced in his analysis.
Tesla (NASDAQ: TSLA) received a bold Robotaxi prediction from Morgan Stanley, which anticipates a dramatic increase in the size of the company’s autonomous ride-hailing suite in the coming years.
Last week, Andrew Percoco took over Tesla analysis for Morgan Stanley from Adam Jonas, who covered the stock for years. Percoco seems to be less optimistic and bullish on Tesla shares, while still being fair and balanced in his analysis.
Percoco dug into the Robotaxi fleet and its expansion in the coming years in his latest note, released on Tuesday. The firm expects Tesla to increase the Robotaxi fleet size to 1,000 vehicles in 2026. However, that’s small-scale compared to what they expect from Tesla in a decade.
Tesla expands Robotaxi app access once again, this time on a global scale
By 2035, Morgan Stanley believes there will be one million Robotaxis on the road across multiple cities, a major jump and a considerable fleet size. We assume this means the fleet of vehicles Tesla will operate internally, and not including passenger-owned vehicles that could be added through software updates.
He also listed three specific catalysts that investors should pay attention to, as these will represent the company being on track to achieve its Robotaxi dreams:
- Opening Robotaxi to the public without a Safety Monitor. Timing is unclear, but it appears that Tesla is getting closer by the day.
- Improvement in safety metrics without the Safety Monitor. Tesla’s ability to improve its safety metrics as it scales miles driven without the Safety Monitor is imperative as it looks to scale in new states and cities in 2026.
- Cybercab start of production, targeted for April 2026. Tesla’s Cybercab is a purpose-built vehicle (no steering wheel or pedals, only two seats) that is expected to be produced through its state-of-the-art unboxed manufacturing process, offering further cost reductions and thus accelerating adoption over time.
Robotaxi stands to be one of Tesla’s most significant revenue contributors, especially as the company plans to continue expanding its ride-hailing service across the world in the coming years.
Its current deployment strategy is controlled and conservative to avoid any drastic and potentially program-ruining incidents.
So far, the program, which is active in Austin and the California Bay Area, has been widely successful.
Tesla dominates in the UK with Model Y and Model 3 leading the way
Tesla Insurance officially expands to new U.S. state
