Tesla has released a series of sales forecasts, indicating that the outlook for its vehicle deliveries may fall short of the expectations of many investors.
The forecast data released by the automaker on its website shows that analysts on average expect the company to deliver 422,850 vehicles in the fourth quarter, a 15% decline from the same period last year. In contrast, the average forecast compiled by Bloomberg is 440,907 vehicles, a 11% drop.
For many years, Tesla’s investor relations team has been compiling sales forecast data and selectively sharing the average with analysts and investors, but the company has never disclosed these figures before.
“This is very unusual,” Gary Black, co-founder of Future Fund Advisors, wrote on X. “Clearly, someone at Tesla wants the consensus from the investor relations report to be as widely spread as possible,” he added, speculating that Tesla’s deliveries might be around 420,000.
Tesla’s annual vehicle sales are expected to decline for the second consecutive year, with the company’s average estimated deliveries at 1.6 million, a drop of more than 8% from the previous year. The automaker’s sales forecast for the next three years is also lower than the average estimate compiled by Bloomberg.
At the beginning of this year, Tesla’s sales dropped significantly as the company overhauled the production lines at all its assembly plants to manufacture its best-selling model, the Model Y. Meanwhile, CEO Elon Musk played a highly controversial role in the Trump administration.
In the third quarter, Tesla’s electric vehicle deliveries reached a record high, as American consumers rushed to purchase electric vehicles before the expiration of the $7,500 federal tax credit at the end of September. To partially offset the impact of losing these incentives at the beginning of the quarter, Tesla introduced simplified versions of the Model Y SUV and Model 3 sedan, each priced under $40,000.
