Tesla Inc. late Wednesday reported first-quarter results that surpassed Wall Street expectations and said it had made “significant progress” on Model 3 production, but the beat elicited a muted reaction from investors and shares tanked by the time the post-results conference call was over.
Tesla TSLA, +0.41%[1] said it lost $709.6 million in the quarter, or $4.19 a share, compared with a loss of $330.3 million, or $2.04 a share, in the year-ago period.
Adjusted for one-time items, the company lost $568 million, or $3.35 a share, compared with $215 million, or $1.33 a share, in the year-ago quarter. Sales rose to $3.41 billion, compared with $2.70 billion a year ago.
Analysts polled by FactSet had expected an adjusted loss of $3.54 a share on sales of $3.28 billion for the quarter. GAAP losses were $4.04 a share.
Live blog recap: Tesla results beat, stock waffles[2]
Shares rose modestly after the report, but by the time the conference call was over, the stock was off nearly 5%.
On the call, which lasted more than an hour, Chief Executive Elon Musk praised the strides the company has made with Model 3 production, said he expects profits in the second half of the year and said he had high hopes for the Model Y, the next vehicle in the company’s lineup.
About midway through the call, however, Musk cut off a Wall Street analyst mid-question, calling the questions that had been asked “dry” and “boring,” and pivoted to answer several questions from Gali Russell, who has a YouTube channel dedicated mostly to Tesla[3] and said he had waged an online campaign to represent a few retail investors.
Musk went on to say that some people should not invest in Tesla if they couldn’t stand the stock’s volatility; criticized the media for writing articles he called “misleading” about Autopilot, Tesla’s suite of advanced driver-assistance systems; and said Model Y production would likely start in early 2020 at a location yet to be determined and other than the current Tesla factory in Fremont, Calif.
Tesla said it expects a GAAP profit in the third and fourth quarters of 2018. It also reduced its capital expenditures projections for the year, to $3 billion from $3.4 billion.
Tesla said it paused production [4]in the third week of April to ”enable higher levels of output,” but in the week before the shutdown it produced a record 2,270 Model 3 sedans, its third straight week in April with more than 2,000 of the cars produced. Tesla said another production pause is expected in the second quarter.
Wall Street has grown increasingly more concerned about Tesla’s cash position,...