Shares of Tesla Inc. were down 26.5% for 2024 through Thursday.
It is one thing for investors to be disappointed at the electric-vehicle maker’s continuing series of price cuts and increasing competition from others such as BYD Co. CN:002594 and Nio Inc. NIO. But even Wedbush analyst Daniel Ives, normally a relentless cheerleader for Tesla TSLA, called Elon Musk’s performance during the company’s earnings call on Wednesday a “train wreck.”
“We were dead wrong expecting Musk and team to step up like adults in the room on the call and give a strategic and financial overview of the ongoing price cuts, margin structure and fluctuating demand,” Ives wrote in a note to clients on Thursday.
He still rates Tesla an outperform but lowers his 12-month price target for the stock to $315 from $350. Tesla closed at $182.63 on Thursday.
In its letter to shareholders, Tesla said it was “currently between two major growth waves” and that its growth rate might be “notably lower” than it was in 2023, when the company delivered 1.8 million EVs. The company also said its production capacity had increased to an “annual run rate” of 2 million vehicles during the fourth quarter.
Claudia Assis covered Tesla’s fourth-quarter results and reaction from analysis.
Netflix Inc. NFLX hit one out of the park when it reported late on Tuesday that its fourth-quarter sales rose 12.5% from a year earlier, with profit spiking, and that it added 13 million subscriptions, blowing past the 8.7 million consensus estimate among analysts polled by FactSet.
Therese Poletti details how the streaming pioneer’s newer advertising-supported subscriptions are driving increases in revenue and subscriptions.
Investors were thrilled with Netflix’s blowout quarter, sending the shares up 11% Wednesday and adding another 3% Thursday, when the stock closed at $562.
Emily Barry explains why Deutsche Bank downgraded Netflix to a neutral rating after the earnings report. Other analysts maintain positive ratings.
Here’s a deep look for investors at the 19 companies in the S&P 500 communications services sector, which includes Netflix, its streaming competitors, other content creators and social-media companies. Based on consensus price targets, there are six companies for which analysts expect double-digit share-price rises over the next year; Netflix isn’t one of them.
