Tesla Stock Surges Following Record Deliveries

Tesla shares surged on Monday after it said it delivered a record number of electric vehicles in the quarter to the end of June, following ongoing price cuts in markets including the US, the UK and China.

Chinese car makers also reported rising sales in June, with Shenzhen-based BYD, China’s top car brand, posting its best-ever quarter with sales of 700,244 fully electric and plug-in hybrid vehicles.

BYD gained groudn on Tesla in fully electric vehicle sales, nearly doubling deliveries to 352,163 units in the second quarter.

That compares with Tesla’s deliveries of 466,140 fully electric cars worldwide.

Sales surge

Tesla’s sales beat analysts’ estimates and soared 83 percent from a year ago, when lockdowns were creating logistical difficulties for the company’s operations in China.

China is Tesla’s No. 2 market after North America, and the company operates a key production hub in Shanghai.

The company said its inventory levels are beginning to diminish as deliveries caught up with production. Tesla produced 18,000 more cars than it sold in the first quarter, with the figure falling to 13,560 in the second quarter.

Owner Elon Musk has portrayed the price cuts as a strategic shift toward volume production and greater affordability.

“We’re not ‘starting a price war’, we’re just lowering prices to enable affordability at scale,” Musk wrote in April on Twitter, which he also owns.

China demand

While Tesla is by far the EV market leader in the US, it faces stiffer competition in China from BYD and others.

BYD’s sales figure was 98 percent up year-on-year, and included a record 251,685 new-energy vehicle sales in June.

Smaller Chinese electric vehicle firm Li Auto posted a new monthly high of 32,575 deliveries, while Xpeng and Nio saw more gradual increases.

Aion, the EV brand produced by Guangzhou Automotive Group, stood out with 45,013 deliveries in June.

Tesla is due to report its second-quarter financial results on 19 July.