faces heightened pressure with Tuesday's earnings report to reassure investors that recent stumbles are simply unexpected speed bumps -- and not indications of a road to decline.
Heading into 2024, Tesla watchers were already girding for a tougher path, with Musk's once-dominant leadership in EVs facing more competition from rivals, resulting in a series of price cuts.After disclosing on April 2 a disappointing 8.5 percent drop in first-quarter deliveries, Tesla last week announced plans to lay off more than 10 percent of its staff.Then, late last week, Tesla announced a recall of its Cybertruck due to an acceleration problem.
"There's a lot of confusion about what direction are they going," said Stephanie Valdez Streaty, director of industry insights at Cox, who pointed to a more than 40 percent drop in Tesla's share price in 2024 as an indicator of unease.Musk has endured other difficult periods with Tesla, such as when the company struggled to ramp up production on the Model 3 vehicle in 2018 while Musk sparred with US securities regulators over a brief flirtation with taking the company private.
Deutsche Bank analysts last week downgraded Tesla to a"hold," pointing to disappointments about the rumored Model 2 delay that weren't offset by the Robotaxi push.