Tesla Inc. may be falling short of its production goals for the Model 3, but investors may not necessarily care, analysts at Consumer Edge said in a note Friday.
Tesla TSLA, -1.31% likely will be making 2,000 Model 3 sedans a week by the end of this month, below its target of churning out 2,500 of the key mass-market vehicles, said the analysts, led by James Albertine.
Consumer Edge recently hosted meetings with Tesla executives, and the potential Model 3 production miss was one of its “key takeaways” after the discussions, the analysts said.
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Consumer Edge kept its buy rating on Tesla unchanged, with a price target of $385, which would represent 20% upside from Friday close. Even before the meetings, the analysts were not counting on 2,500 Model 3s a week by the end of first quarter, they said.
The production ramp is complex and Tesla “is being prudent by focusing on quality vs. quantity in this early production phase,” the analysts said. “We also believe many investors would view a figure of 2,000 or greater by 1Q-end as a positive, as it would indicate significant progress.”
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The Silicon Valley car maker kept mum on a Model 3 reservation count, a number it hasn’t updated since August, when it said it had 455,000 reservations. Tesla believes in pent-up demand for the Model 3 that cannot be seen through changes in reservations, Consumer Edge said.
Tesla said in January it would be making 5,000 Model 3 sedans a week by the end of the second quarter.
Tesla originally said it would ramp up Model 3 production to 5,000 sedans a week in 2017 and then on to 10,000 a week in 2018, but it pushed back its 2017 goal to late in the first quarter of 2018 and then again to end of second quarter.
If it misses its latest deadline, the company is likely to get a pass.
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Many investors are looking for Tesla to achieve that 5,000-unit production rate sometime in the end of the second half of the year, not necessarily by the end of June, the Consumer Edge analysts said.
“Given (Tesla’s) focus on quality, the complexity involved and TSLA’s history achieving production guidance, we think the Street has some cushion relative to current guidance,” and if Tesla achieves the 5,000 goal it will not need to raise additional capital, they said.
The analysts said they also had conversations about executive turnover at Tesla, given recent senior-level departures that included Jon McNeill and Eric Branderiz, Tesla’s former sales and service head and chief accountant.
“Based on our conversations with management, we do not believe there is a serious issue driving these exit decisions and we would caution against reading too much into these headlines at this time,” the analysts said. Tesla will need to replace the role of chief operating officer and/or head of services at some point, they said.
Tesla shares have gained 23% in the past 12 months, which compares with 16% gains for the S&P 500 index SPX, +0.17% in the same period.
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