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Tesla Q3 Earnings Miss Expectations, Revenues Increase Y/Y

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Key Takeaways

  • Tesla posted Q3 EPS of 50 cents, missing estimates, while revenues rose 12% year over year to $28.1B.
  • Vehicle deliveries jumped 7% to 497,099 units, with Model 3/Y up 9% and exceeding expectations.
  • Energy Generation and Storage revenues surged 44% to $3.4B, beating projections on robust deployments.

Tesla (TSLA - Free Report) reported third-quarter 2025 earnings per share of 50 cents, which missed the Zacks Consensus Estimate of 53 cents and decreased from the year-ago figure of 72 cents. Total revenues of $28.1 billion surpassed the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $26.4 and rose 12% year over year.  

Tesla, Inc. Price, Consensus and EPS Surprise

Tesla, Inc. Price, Consensus and EPS Surprise

Tesla, Inc. price-consensus-eps-surprise-chart | Tesla, Inc. Quote

Key Takeaways

Tesla’s third-quarter production totaled 447,450 units (435,826 Model 3/Y and 11,634 other models), which declined 5% year over year and missed our estimate of 451,948 units. The company delivered 497,099 vehicles, which rose 7% year over year and topped our estimate of 435,370 units. The Model 3/Y registered deliveries of 481,166 vehicles, which rose 9% year over year and topped our expectations of 416,456 units.

Total automotive revenues of $21.2 billion were up 6% year over year and topped our estimate of $18.86 billion. The reported figure also included $417 million from the sale of regulatory credits for electric vehicles, which decreased 43.6% year over year. Automotive sales, excluding revenues from leasing and regulatory credits, totaled $20.4 billion, which surpassed our projection of $18 billion on higher-than-expected deliveries. Automotive gross profit (excluding automotive leasing and regulatory credits) came in at $3 billion. Automotive gross margin came in at 14.7%, down from 16.4% reported in third-quarter 2024.

Tesla’s operating margin declined 501 basis points year over year to 5.8% in the quarter under discussion, but topped our estimate of 4.9%.

Energy Generation and Storage revenues came in at $3.4 billion in the third quarter of 2025, which rose 44% year over year and beat our estimate of $2.9 billion. Notably, energy storage deployments came in at 12.5 GWh. Services and Other revenues were $3.5 billion, up 25% year over year. The metric also topped our estimate of $3.35 billion. Tesla ended third-quarter 2025 with 73,817 Supercharger connectors.

Financials

Tesla had cash/cash equivalents/investments of $41.6 billion as of Sept. 30, 2025, compared with $36.6 billion as of Dec. 31, 2024. Long-term debt and finance leases, net of the current portion, totaled $5.78 billion, up from $5.75 billion as of Dec. 31, 2024.

Net cash provided by operating activities amounted to $6.24 billion in third-quarter 2025, down from $6.26 billion in the year-ago period. Capital expenditure totaled $2.25 billion in the quarter under review. Tesla generated free cash flow of $4 billion during the reported quarter compared with $2.7 billion generated in the third quarter of 2024.

Tesla’s Zacks Rank & Key Picks

TSLA carries a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold) at present.

Some better-ranked stocks in the auto space are Cooper-Standard Holdings Inc. (CPS - Free Report) , OPENLANE, Inc. (KAR - Free Report) and Mobileye Global Inc. (MBLY - Free Report) , each sporting a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy) at present. You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank stocks here.

The Zacks Consensus Estimate for CPS’ 2025 sales and earnings implies year-over-year growth of 2.5% and 137.8%, respectively. EPS estimates for 2025 and 2026 have improved 36 cents and 23 cents, respectively, in the past seven days.

The Zacks Consensus Estimate for KAR’s fiscal 2025 sales and earnings implies year-over-year growth of 5.6% and 37.7%, respectively. EPS estimates for fiscal 2025 have improved 13 cents in the past 90 days. EPS estimates for fiscal 2026 have improved 13 cents in the past 30 days.

The Zacks Consensus Estimate for MBLY’s 2025 sales and earnings implies year-over-year growth of 11.6% and 36%, respectively. EPS estimates for 2025 have improved a penny in the past 60 days. EPS estimates for 2026 have improved a penny in the past 30 days. 

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