Elon Musks' inbox and calendar must be packed to the rafters this week. Hot on the heels of his court case with Twitter it was the turn of Tesla (TSLA, $742,50) to announce its Q2 earnings. Overall the popular EV maker reported higher-than-expected quarterly profits as a string of price increases on its best-selling electric vehicles helped offset production challenges caused by COVID-19 lockdowns in China. Tesla posted an adjusted profit of $2.27 per share versus analysts' consensus estimates of $1.81. While its revenue stood at $16.9 billion compared to analyst expectations of $16.8 billion.
The company also says it sold 75% of its Bitcoin, turning it into fiat currency, adding $936 million in cash to its balance sheet. The quarter, however, ended Tesla's streak of reporting record revenue. Last year, Tesla made a $1.5 billion investment in Bitcoin and announced that it would accept Bitcoin as payment. Tesla started accepting Bitcoin in late March, then abruptly reversed itself in May, just 49 days later. Automotive revenues made up $14.6 billion of the company’s total, with $1.47 billion coming from services and other revenue, and $866 million from the company’s energy segment.
CEO Elon Musk, on an earnings call Wednesday, said Tesla’s new factory outside of Berlin surpassed 1,000 cars per week in June, and he expects the company’s new factory in Austin, Texas to exceed the 1,000 per week production milestone in the next few months.
Why it matters
It's been a turbulent quarter for Tesla both on and off the production line. On the carmaking side, Tesla announced earlier this month that its deliveries have slowed down, dropping by around 18% compared to Q1. It also produced around 15% fewer cars this quarter compared to last - with the lockdown in China and rising costs making a dent in the bottom line. Elsewhere this quarter also saw Musk sell off billions of dollars worth of stock in the company to help pay for Twitter, a deal which has turned into a massive mess and is now being sorted out in the courts.
