Tesla Motors Inc (NASDAQ:TSLA) was fast becoming a dream growth story pertaining to the automobile industry in USA when the Wall Street Journal questioned its sales figures as also the authenticity of its claims. On reading what had been published, the electric auto-car maker’s CEO Elon Musk could not refrain from countering the claims. An argument that has triggered as a result has sent not just customers but even the industry analysts and observers into a spin.
Covering the issue was CNBC and they chose to discuss it with the Editorial Director of WardsAuto, David Zoia. On being asked if the estimates were correct, Zoia remarked that their estimates were much lower than those projected by Tesla Motors Inc (NASDAQ:TSLA) and also went on to point out that while the numbers were subject to revision, they were accurate on an annual basis.
In response to Elon Musk’s September 2014 figures, David Zoia said that one individual month hardly served as a reliable yardstick for measuring actual growth. He contended that long-term trends were more meaningful and that the focus should be on numbers which reflect on growth on an yearly basis as per a single date rather than any particular month.
There could be several reasons for the discrepancy and much would be revealed when Tesla Motors Inc (NASDAQ:TSLA) declares its Q3 results in 5th November, 2014. While people might be coming up with several explanations, one that seems truly plausible is the company’s announcement in July, 2014, wherein it announced its decision to shut down Model S factory at Fremont. This could have resulted in disruption in supply, meaning many of the cars that may have been ordered were added in the sales figure but never really reached their end users.
Overall, the damage suffered by Tesla Motors Inc (NASDAQ:TSLA) was not much and following CEO Elon Musk’s tweet, its shares jumped by 9% to close at $241 on Tuesday.
This article has been written by Vinita Basu.
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