© Reuters. Tesla bull case 'more intact' than ever claims Gerber, earnings will plummet argues Gordon Johnson
By Sam Boughedda
In a Bull vs. Bear debate on Tesla (NASDAQ:) Thursday afternoon, hosted by Investing.com and Street Insider.com, GLJ Research analyst Gordon Johnson and Co-Founder, President, and CEO of Gerber Kawasaki Wealth and Investment Management, Ross Gerber outlined their view on the current health of Tesla and where they believe the stock is headed.
In a wide-ranging heated debate, Gerber opened up by stating he believes the bull case for Tesla "is more intact than it's ever been," pointing to Tesla's cash on the books, two new gigafactories ramping, and "total dominance" in battery technology and charging.
"Tesla is the leader in EV sales globally, with over 1.3 million in sales and growing to probably over 2M in sales this year," argues Gerber.
"Now, with the price cuts bringing the prices back down to a range where a whole new level of consumers can afford the car, we've seen demand skyrocket over the last couple days and week," he adds, clarifying that recent data shows inventory has dropped dramatically since the price cuts.
In addition, Gerber also said that the adoption of EVs is growing dramatically, and with the U.S. still behind other markets, he sees so much upside in the market and industry.
"Tesla will be like Apple (NASDAQ:) and capture a large percentage of this upside," Gerber declared, also saying that EVs are better cars than ICE (internal combustion engine) vehicles.
The Gerber Kawasaki President and CEO, see's Tesla shares at $150-$200 by year-end, although he believes it could double to $240 if they execute well.
On the other hand, Johson sees Tesla stock at a 6x multiple on around $2 EPS, so about $12 per share. The analyst said he "couldn't disagree more" with Gerber's argument and started by clarifying that his firm's research estimates that the price cuts come in at around $7,250 on average across all of Tesla's cars.
"If you look at their profit per car in Q3, it was around $12,797. They just cut prices by $7,250, so the new implied profit per car on these cuts is $5547," explains Johnson. "That's a 56.7% hit to their margin on these price cuts."
Johnson argues that for Tesla to get back to profit/breakeven, it will need to grow unit sales by 167.2% year-over-year in 2023. "What that also means is that their roughly 26% auto gross profit would drop to about 12.5%," he adds, going on to explain that in 2023, Tesla is "going to do around $2.18," referring to Tesla's EPS, with the current consensus estimate being $4.20.
"You're talking about a company that's going to see its earnings drop from 2022 to 2023 based on these price cuts and assuming no more price cuts of just under 50%. That would put their forward multiple today at 58.2x" said Johnson.
"This is just a car company," expressed the GLJ analyst, "this is not a growth company anymore."
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