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Tesla Sales Drop For First Time In Over A Decade While China’s BYD Rises

Teslas may be booming, but sales aren’t. Elon Musk’s car company released its annual sales figures for 2024, revealing that it delivered 1.79 million—just below the 1.8 million the company shipped in 2023. It’s the first time in more than a decade that the company has seen a drop in vehicle sales despite lowered prices, big hype-driven events, and the wide availability of the Cybertruck.

The weak sales figures for the year, which fell short of analyst estimates, come despite a repeat of the recovery of lost time in the fourth quarter. From October to December, Tesla delivered 495,570 vehicles—a figure driven in part by the company offering whatever incentives it can find to entice potential buyers. Looking for 0% financing? You got it. Three months of free access to “Full Self-Driving” and Supercharging? Done. The cheapest rental? Of course. And yet, sales are slowly falling—and now the stock is falling, too.

Generally, if you know you’re going to miss an investor’s mark, you try to lower your future expectations until you can build a backup. But Musk has already laid the groundwork for massive growth. Back in October, Tesla’s CEO told investors that he expects sales to increase by 30% by 2025.

It would be fair to call that claim skeptical, especially if the company recently fell short of its sales goals in a year when market conditions are more favorable than they will be in the near future. Musk’s friend Donald Trump appears intent on killing the Biden-era electric car tax bill, which has been credited with juicing EV sales over the past few years. Even states that intend to keep the credit to encourage car buyers to go electric, like California, are now considering excluding Teslas from eligibility.

Globally, the market is about to get tougher for Tesla to compete, too. Although the company set a record for car sales in China last month, it is being eaten for lunch around the world by the Chinese company BYD. The company sold 4.25 million vehicles this year and is now threatening to overtake Tesla as the most popular EV in China.

There doesn’t seem to be a clear savior around Tesla, either. The Cybertruck is still the company’s most recognizable vehicle due to its futuristic dumpster vibe, but the company shipped less than 50,000 units in 2024 and it appears that demand for the truck is on the wane or declining.

Perhaps Trump’s plan to loosen federal regulations on self-driving cars will lead to a big rush for Tesla’s promised “Cybercab,” a two-seater autonomous car (that could actually be remotely controlled by humans) that Musk says will cost less than $30,000 and will. dump garbage on the streets every two to three years. But given the company’s challenges in ramping up production on anything, it would be hard to imagine it could meet demand even if it presents a chance to turn the sales chart.


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