Tesla misses 2022 Q4 target, share price drops further

On Monday evening, Tesla revealed its production and delivery numbers for Q4 2022 and the year as a whole. It was another record quarter for the American automaker, which built 439,701 electric vehicles and delivered 405,278.

The vast majority of these were split between Models 3 and Y—419,088 of those were built and 388,131 found customers, with just 20,613 Models S and X leaving the production line and only 17,147 of those finding homes.

That brings the automaker to a total of 1,369,611 EVs built and 1,313,851 EVs delivered in 2022. Again, the Models 3 and Y made up the lion’s share: Tesla built 1,298,434 of these EVs and delivered 1,247,146 in 2022. The Models S and X accounted for 71,177 cars built and 66,705 cars delivered last year.

That represents a 47 percent increase in production year on year and a 40 percent increase in deliveries over the same time period, Tesla says.

Unfortunately, that’s not quite good enough for Wall Street. Tesla had told investors to expect 50 percent growth year on year for deliveries, and as a result, the company’s share price—which lost more than 70 percent of its value during 2022—dropped even further when trading began and is already down more than 8 percent as of press time.

The failure to meet the delivery target happened even after Tesla heavily discounted its EVs at a time when most other EVs are sold out and often subject to dealer markups.

Tesla will release its financial results for the year at the end of January.