Even people who are bullish on Tesla Inc. stock can see why it’s going down after the company’s much-talked-about event with the robotaxi.
Some analysts at Piper Sandler think that Tesla TSLA -8.69% is “irrefutably unique.” They thought that Thursday night’s “We, Robot” event was inspiring for “true believers” in the company’s story.
“However, it’s hard to confidently raise estimates for 2025 and 2026, and we believe that many investors were looking forward to this event delivering something more concrete,” he wrote.
Potter said that investors might not be able to believe everything Chief Executive Elon Musk says. “Elon says 2026, but in reality, the Cybercab probably won’t be out until 2027,” he wrote, adding that he still thought Tesla’s stock was a buy and setting a target price of $310.
Potter also said that the company didn’t give any information about the pricing or other parts of the business plan for the robotaxi service. He did say that the Cybercab’s price point of about $30,000 was “exciting,” though.
Tesla shares are down almost 8% in early trading on Friday, making them the worst-performing stock in the S&P 500 SPX 0.68% for the day. William Blair’s Jed Dorsheimer also pointed out a gap between announcements he thought were very impressive and their ability to have an instant effect on shares.
He wrote, “‘We, Robot’ was Tesla’s most ambitious and impressive event the company has held to date. They took over all of Warner Bros. Studios’ town sets and turned them into a futuristic theme park with rides, shows, and Tesla Easter eggs around every corner.”
But, “even though we were amazed by the event and the technology, our takeaway is about making plans for the long term, but we don’t see much that will stick it to the bears in the short term,” Dorsheimer said. Analysts have also said that Tesla should have released a cheap Model 2 car, which would have helped the company compete.
He thought that people would “sell the news” about Tesla, but he also said that “significant pullbacks should be used opportunistically as businesses like Tesla Energy ramp up earnings contribution today.”
Toni Sacconaghi, a bearish Bernstein expert on Tesla stock, said that the “We, Robot” event was “underwhelming and shockingly lacking in detail.”
Sacconaghi says that investors were missing out on important information like how to get governmental approval and the “purported cost/mile” of Tesla’s Cybercab, among other things.
According to him, the event “reaffirmed our belief that it will be challenging for Tesla to win in FSD/Robotaxis and capture sustained, outsized profits.” This was in reference to the company’s fully autonomous driving technology.
Sacconaghi isn’t sure if Tesla will be able to get ahead of current robotaxi operators because of technical and legal issues. He also believes that even if Tesla were to reach Level 5 autonomy before competitors, those competitors would quickly catch up, making the chance for Tesla less likely. At level 5, a car would be able to drive itself without any help from a person.
The Bernstein team thinks that Tesla’s stock will fail, but they think that Uber Technologies Inc.’s stock UBER 10.83% will do better than expected.
However, the Bernstein team wrote that Tesla’s talk “adds credence to the view that the transition to [autonomous vehicles] remains a longer term journey for the industry.” This meant that the event had a kind of effect on Uber shares.
Uber shares are up 5% in premarket trading on Friday. Investors seem happy that Tesla’s news doesn’t immediately pose a threat to the ride-hailing giant.
After having a good quarter, seeing its credit score rise, and getting a good regulation outcome in California, the Bernstein team wrote that Tesla’s Robotaxi day was one of the biggest hurdles Uber had to get over.
