Tesla just dropped Q4 earnings and made history - the wrong kind. For the first time ever, annual revenue declined. Deliveries fell for the second straight year. BYD officially dethroned them as the world’s top EV seller.
Musk’s response? Go all-in on the pivot. He’s killing the Model S and X after 14 years, converting those factory lines to build Optimus robots. Tesla’s pumping $2 billion into his AI startup xAI. And he claims unsupervised robotaxis will cover “a quarter to half” of America by year-end.
The stock trades at ~280x earnings - for a company with shrinking auto sales. Bulls say you’re buying the AI and robotics future at a discount. Bears say you’re paying growth multiples for a declining car business run by a distracted CEO.
Car company or robot company? You decide.
Here's how the community voted
Robotaxi is actually happening - Service live in Austin (unsupervised) and Bay Area (supervised) with ~240 vehicles. Cybercab production begins April 2026.
Energy is the margin story - $12.8B revenue with 31% gross margins vs 18% for autos. Growing steadily while the car business shrinks.
Optimus could be transformational - Production-intent robot unveiling in Q1 2026, with 1 million annual unit capacity planned by year-end at $20-30K each. At scale, more revenue than Tesla’s entire auto business today.
The car business is shrinking - Deliveries down two years running. BYD outsold them by 600K+ vehicles. Model 3/Y are aging with no replacements in sight.
Brand damage may be permanent - Brand value fell 36% in 2025. “Tesla Takedown” protests at 200+ showrooms. Musk’s political activities alienated the eco-conscious buyers who built the brand.
Valuation assumes perfection - At ~280x earnings, you’re paying for robotaxi dominance, Optimus success, AND energy growth - all at once. Musk has missed FSD timelines since 2016.
Robotaxi is actually happening - Service live in Austin (unsupervised) and Bay Area (supervised) with ~240 vehicles. Cybercab production begins April 2026.
Energy is the margin story - $12.8B revenue with 31% gross margins vs 18% for autos. Growing steadily while the car business shrinks.
Optimus could be transformational - Production-intent robot unveiling in Q1 2026, with 1 million annual unit capacity planned by year-end at $20-30K each. At scale, more revenue than Tesla’s entire auto business today.
The car business is shrinking - Deliveries down two years running. BYD outsold them by 600K+ vehicles. Model 3/Y are aging with no replacements in sight.
Brand damage may be permanent - Brand value fell 36% in 2025. “Tesla Takedown” protests at 200+ showrooms. Musk’s political activities alienated the eco-conscious buyers who built the brand.
Valuation assumes perfection - At ~280x earnings, you’re paying for robotaxi dominance, Optimus success, AND energy growth - all at once. Musk has missed FSD timelines since 2016.
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Surprised there is even 1% of Diamond! "Brand damage may be permanent" → this is the big one imo, this P/E ratio is unsustainable given the rise of good alternatives and people who will avoid Tesla simply because of Elon Musk. They could obviously turn things around with a new CEO, but who and when – and would this even be considered?
Somehow that "Why we're voting on TSLA this week" convinced me to vote Diamond. Intuitively it feels so wrong, yet if I'm being pragmatic, we've only scratched the surface on AI, even less with cars and robots. Dystopian future speedrun?
Waymo are so far ahead on the driverless taxi front, and I'm sceptical as to what Tesla will be able to do without Lidar (I'm assuming they're still using vision only - haven't researched in forever. No moat with the cars now. $1.3T is a crazy price to pay for a punt on the robots and some energy stuff. Easiest dud on here.
This is an *automaker* by the numbers, which is an intensely difficult business because it's capital intensive, has a lot of labor, and competes with other countries who see the auto industry as vital for growing their economies and employment (it's beyond competition with capitalists for "profit"), which is a negative for their ability to generate margins in the long term.
In that context, you're buying an automaker with a *potential* software business if their autopilot tools not only work out well, but stay ahead of competition, and do not get mired in expensive legal troubles.
In this way, it's a rather expensive bet on autopilot software (high risk) or you have to buy into something totally new like the robot business - I'm not saying either will or won't work, but they are not yet proven businesses and being assigned a rather high valuation. It feels more like a SPAC at this point for the weak existing economics and is more of a bet on moonshot outcomes. It happens to have become such a big weight in the indices too, amplifying everything.
Long term dud, but no clue where it goes in the short term. I just don't think if you pay the current price and hold forever you'll get enough cash flow to justify ownership. I think people only care because it's widely discussed and it's got such a large market cap.
basically a meme stock