Tesla’s “Rough Quarters’ Begin as Auto Sales Crash While Elon Chases Robot Ghosts…

Tesla is definitely going through its “It’s just a phase, Mom” era… and unfortunately, shareholders don’t look amused. Shares cratered 8% Thursday after Tesla reported another quarter of reality-check-level earnings. Revenue dropped 12%. Automotive sales sank 16%. And Musk, ever the optimist in a disaster muzzle, warned that Tesla “probably could have a few rough quarters” ahead. You don’t say? 

(Source: Giphy) 

The culprit, you ask? Go ahead and pick one: A collapsing federal EV tax credit. Chinese EVs flooding Europe like Shein did to American closets. Elon Musk’s feral mouth. It’s basically all of the above. Specifically, Tesla’s auto business, which has now logged two straight quarters of falling sales… a trend that would send any other CEO into hiding, or at least into a carefully worded Medium post. Instead, Musk spent the earnings call doing his best preacher routine, sermonizing about robotaxis, humanoid robots, and the dawning age of driverless utopia. Which sounds great until you remember: the cars they’re supposed to replace aren’t selling. 

(Source: CNBC) 

Additionally, revenue from regulatory credits is drying up thanks to changes in federal law. Tariffs from President Trump’s global trade grenade are poised to cost the company hundreds of millions. And the $7,500 EV tax credit? Gone. Which means Tesla’s cars are now fully priced like the designer tech toys they always were, just with fewer subsidies and more panel gaps. And yet, to distract from the world’s smallest violin quarter, Musk announced that limited production of a cheaper Tesla model has begun and should ramp up in the second half of the year… assuming nothing bursts into flames, short-circuits, or unionizes. 

But thank the Lord above, because in the meantime, robotaxis are here and running. Tesla launched a paid pilot program in Austin last month and says it could be available to “half of the U.S. population” by year-end, pending regulatory approval. Which is sort of like saying I have a  a date lined up with Margot Robbie… it’s technically not false if no one asks for proof (and you don’t ask my wife LOL). But to continue the roast here, formal delivery guidance was also missed. And when I say missed, I mean non-existent. In Q1, Tesla said it expected to grow deliveries in 2025. In Q2, Tesla said... nothing. No guidance. Just defeat. Wall Street obviously took the silence as a white flag of failure. 

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Naturally, Morningstar’s Seth Goldstein didn’t mince words: “We interpret no guidance as a signal that management is no longer forecasting volume growth.” Translation: even the Tesla bulls are starting to realize the spaceship might not launch this year. Still, Musk insists that everything will be “very compelling” once autonomy hits scale in late 2025. He just needs a few more quarters of pretending the robot future will arrive before investors start pricing in the possibility that the next iPhone-on-wheels might end up just being… a car.

Meaning, for now, Tesla isn’t so much a car company as it is a speculative AI hallucination strapped to a factory. As for investors, the only thing I can tell you is to embrace the suck. There’s good days and bad days with Tesla and right now… it just happens to be a very, very long bad day. Until next time, friends… 

At the time of this writing, Stocks.News holds positions in Tesla as mentioned in the article.