Tesla says it delivered about 63,000 vehicles in the first quarter of 2019, a 31% drop from Q4 2018

Graham Rapier

Apr 4, 2019, 06:26 IST

Tesla says it delivered about 63,000 vehicles in the first quarter of 2019, a 31% drop from Q4 2018

Xinhua via Getty Images
Elon Musk.

Tesla produced 77,100 vehicles in the first quarter of 2019, the company said Wednesday.
Analysts polled by Bloomberg were expecting total production to be 64,400 vehicles.
Tesla's stock price sank by slightly more than one-tenth of a percent in after-hours trading following the announcement.

Tesla on Wednesday released total vehicle production and delivery numbers for the first quarter of 2019, which ended on Sunday.

Here are the important figures:

Total production: 77,100
Total deliveries: 62,950
Model 3: 50,900
Model S and Model X: 12,100

Wall Street analysts had an average estimate for total production of 64,400, according to Bloomberg.

Tesla had previously warned in its fourth-quarter update to investors that first-quarter numbers for Model S and X would likely come in "slightly below" the prior year's figures for the same period. In the first quarter of 2018, the company produced 24,728 Model S and X vehicles.

Tesla also cited challenges it encountered with deliveries overseas.

"We had only delivered half of the entire quarter's numbers by March 21, ten days before end of quarter," Tesla said in a press release Wednesday night. "This caused a large number of vehicle deliveries to shift to the second quarter."

Like many other previous quarters, this deadline was also met with an all-hands-on-deck rush to meet internal targets by Tesla. Emails obtained by Business Insider in March from CEO Elon Musk to company employees highlighted how important this quarterly deadline was for the company.

Shares of the company fell slightly more than one-tenth of a percent in after-hours trading following the production report, according to Markets Insider data.

Tesla is expected to report its first-quarter financials soon, but it has not yet confirmed a release date. Musk said in February that the company would likely dip back into the red for this quarter - a departure from his previous statement's about the company's continued profitability - as it expanded into Europe and China.

The company did not provide an update on how many $35,000 Model 3 orders it received. The company began taking orders for the long-awaited base model in February.