Tesla keeps rallying even with +100 new battery electric models hitting the market this year
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Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA) poked out a small gain of 1.30% in early trading on Thursday and extended its 2023 rally to carve out a new YTD high of $217.59.
Momentum on Tesla (TSLA) continues to be strong despite some potentially negative news in the mix. There are report the electric vehicle maker terminated dozens of employees at its Buffalo, New York plant just as unionization campaign began to fire up. The organizers reportedly have filed a complaint with the National Labor Relations Board. Consumer Reports also came out with its auto brand rankings and slotted Tesla (TSLA) in 17th place out of 32 brands.
On Wall Street, one of the noted bears on Tesla (TSLA) dug in a little more. Bernstein thinks the thesis that electric vehicle competition will impact Underperform-rated Tesla (TSLA) will finally come into play over the next few years with a massive proliferation of new models on the way.
"Global OEMs are launching 121 new BEV models this year, compared to 93 in 2022. This will bring the total number of BEV models up to 408. Given that Tesla currently operates with a lineup of 4 models, of which the Model Y (launched in 2020) is the newest, it could face incremental market share pressure," updated analyst Toni Sacconaghi.
Sacconaghi and team said they struggle to see how Tesla (TSLA) can meet consensus expectations of around 2.5M units in 2024 without a new high-volume model offering.
Benrnstein noted it is difficult to make call on TSLA in the short term, but set a price target of $150 on the view that valuation will matter in the long term.
Read the latest breakdowns on Tesla (TSLA) from Seeking Alpha authors.