Will Rise In Deliveries Drive Tesla's (TSLA) Q1 Earnings?

Tesla, Inc. (NASDAQ:TSLA) is scheduled to announce first-quarter 2018 results on May 2. In the last reported quarter, the company’s bottom line beat the Zacks Consensus Estimate while the top line missed the same.

In the last three months, shares of Tesla have underperformed the industry it belongs to. During the period, the stock has lost 18.4% in comparison with the industry’s decline of 12.9%.

In first-quarter 2018, the company delivered 29,980 vehicles compared with 25,000 vehicles in the prior-year quarter. Of the total, 11,730 were Model S; 10,070 were Model X and 8,180 were Model 3. This rise in deliveries will help to uplift its Automotive segment’s revenues.

Tesla, Inc. Price and EPS Surprise

The Zacks Consensus Estimate for Tesla’s Automotive segment’s revenues stands at $2.6 billion, up from the fourth quarter’s figure of $2.41 billion.

Now, let’s have a look at the company’s production targets. At fourth-quarter 2017 earnings release, the company announced its weekly target of Model 3 production of 2,500 by the end of the first quarter and 5,000 by second quarter’s end. However, Tesla narrowly missed the first-quarter weekly target by 480 units. This shortfall in unit production allowed the company to set an internal target of 6,000 units to achieve the 5k target of second-quarter 2018.

Further, Tesla is focusing to grow its energy storage deployment. In 2018, the company aims to deploy at least three times of what it deployed in 2017. However, due to production complexity, the company is increasing the production rate of energy-storage products at a steady pace.

Tesla offers powerpacks, large-scale battery packs, which can be plugged into the electric grid to offer services for utilities and companies. On Dec 1, 2017, the company completed installing a 100 kWh Tesla powerpack battery in South Australia. However, based on the commercial transfer of the site, the deployment is likely to be recognized in first-quarter 2018. In February, Tesla was awarded a project to install solar panels and batteries in roughly 50,000 South Australian homes over a period of five years. During the reported quarter, the company deployed another set of powerpack batteries to the Philippines and installed its first powerpack in France.

These advancements made by Tesla in its energy storage deployment will help the Energy and storage segment. In the last reported quarter, the segment’s revenues witnessed a year-over-year growth of 127% to $298 million.

Currently, the company has a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold). You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.

Earnings Schedules of Other Major Auto Companies

Among other automotive companies, American Axle & Manufacturing Holdings, Inc. (NYSE:AXL) is expected to release results on May 4 whereas Toyota Motor Corporation (NYSE:TM) and Magna International Inc. (NYSE:MGA) are expected to report earnings on May 9 and May 10, respectively. Each of the above-mentioned companies carries a Zacks Rank of 3.

The long-term earnings growth rate for American Axle, Toyota and Magna are 8.1%, 5.5% and 8.5%, respectively.

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