A new year begins, with an opportunity for Tesla to share its 2022 sales numbers. The company set new production and delivery records, but fell short of analysts’ expectations.
As at the end of each quarter, Tesla just announced that it delivered 405,278 vehicles to customers in the last three months of 2022., which is a new record for the company. As a reminder, the automaker had shipped “only” 343,830 vehicles in the previous quarter.
Specifically, Tesla delivered 388,131 Model 3 compact sedans and Model Y sport utility vehicles, compared to 17,147 Model S luxury sedans and Model X luxury SUVs. Tesla failed to meet the expectations of Wall Street analysts, who rather expected 431,117 vehicles shipped in the fourth quarter of 2022.
New sales record for Tesla in 2022
In 2021, Tesla was not very far from the million vehicles shipped. The company had announced that it had sold a total of 936,172 vehicles, which remains more than any of its competitors in the electric market. In 2022, by adding the figures for the four quarters, Tesla’s total shipments reach 1.31 million unitsand the total production is at 1.37 million.
While the uptick is quite significant from the prior year, it’s a far cry from the 50% year-over-year growth the company is aiming for. In 2022, vehicle deliveries increased by 40% compared to 2021, while production soared by 47%.
More than 34,000 cars were still in transit at the end of the quarter, and it is on these that Tesla recently applied fairly aggressive prices to try to sell them as quickly as possible. Discounts were applied if customers wished to collect the vehicles from the storage locations.
Either way, since Tesla missed its targets, that shouldn’t help it get back on the stock market. The company is currently going through a very bad patch, its market capitalization having fallen by almost 65% since January 2022. Investors are therefore showing skepticism, and these new figures should not encourage them to lift the action of the company.
