Tesla Q1 Deliveries Drop 13% To 336,681, Miss Wall Street Estimates – But Retail Stays Bullish

Shares of Tesla Inc. (TSLA) fell over 1% on Wednesday after the EV giant reported its first-quarter deliveries at 336,681 units, marking a dip of nearly 13% from the corresponding quarter of 2024 and the company’s worst quarterly performance in at least two years.

According to consensus estimates compiled by FactSet, analysts expected Tesla to deliver 408,000 cars in the first three months of 2025, implying a 5% rise from the year-ago period.

Deliveries of the company’s mass-market offerings- the Model 3 and Model Y- fell by 12.4%, while those of its three more premium offerings collectively fell by about 24%.

Several analysts, however, backtracked on their bullish estimates recently after protests erupted against the company in the U.S., owing to company CEO Elon Musk’s involvement in politics and reports of lower deliveries across Europe and China.

The company produced 362,615 vehicles in the three months through the end of March across its many gigafactories worldwide, marking a year-on-year drop of about 16%.

Tesla launched a refreshed version of its best-selling Model Y SUV in January. The company said on Wednesday that although the changeover of Model Y lines across all four of its factories led to the loss of several weeks of production in Q1, the ramp of the New Model Y continues to go well.

The company, known primarily for its EV manufacturing, also manufactures energy storage products.

In the first quarter, it deployed 10.4 GWh of energy storage products, more than twice the amount deployed in the first quarter of 2024. However, in the quarter that ended in December, the company had deployed 11 GWh of energy storage products.

On Stocktwits, retail investor sentiment about Tesla fell within the ‘bullish’ territory while message volume dropped marginally within ‘normal’ levels.

TSLA's Sentiment Meter and Message Volume as of 9:40 a.m. ET on April 2, 2025 | Source: Stocktwits

In a Stocktwits poll, 42% of the 4,200 surveyed respondents said they would not recommend Tesla stock to a friend.

In yet another poll, 62% of the poll respondents believe in shorting the stock, while 15% believe it’s a buy-on-dip opportunity.

Wedbush analyst Dan Ives termed the delivery numbers “bad” in a post on the social media platform X.

“We knew 1Q Tesla deliveries would be soft but these numbers were bad. We are not going to look at these numbers with rose colored glasses...they were a disaster on every metric. Refresh issues but brand crisis key. The time has come for Musk...fork in the road moment for Tesla,” he wrote.

The Future Fund LLC Managing Partner Gary Black said in a post that the weak delivery numbers will push analysts to reduce their delivery estimates for the full year as “as the debate intensifies whether the 1Q miss was due to Elon’s political rhetoric and DOGE actions vs consumers delaying purchase of Model Y so they could get the new refreshed version.”

Tesla said in January that its plans for new vehicles, including more affordable models, remain “on track” for the start of production in the first half of 2025. The company has not provided more details on the new vehicles since.

Tesla shares are down nearly 30% this year but up over 60% over the past 12 months.

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