Tesla is flirting with its lowest close in over 1.5 years

Tesla CEO Elon MuskMaurizio Pesce / Wikimedia Commons

• Tesla shares have cratered 35% since approaching record highs following CEO Elon Musk’s “funding secured” tweet.
• On Monday, they were contending with their lowest close since March 2017.
• Watch Tesla trade in real time here.

Tesla shares were under pressure Monday, trading down more than 3% at $252.61, and are conteding with their lowest close since March 2017. A finish below $252.48 would be the lowest end-of-day price for shares since March 2017. 

Tesla’s stock hit a near-record high of $387.46 on August 7, the day CEO Elon Musk tweeted that he had “funding secured” to take the electric-car maker private at $420 a share.

But, since then, it has been a difficult two months for stockholders as Musk did not actually have the funding secured and was ultimately sued by the Securities and Exchange Commission, which accused him of making “false and misleading statements.” 

At the end of September, Musk settled the lawsuit, agreeing to step down as Tesla chairman for at least three years and to pay a $20 million fine that was matched by his employer. The fallout resulted in a 35% crash in Tesla shares over the past two months. 

And Tesla shares aren’t out of the woods just yet. While the Bloomberg consensus for the stock is at $291.65, — 15% above current levels — analysts are starting to grow a bit more skeptical of the electric-car maker.

Last week, Tesla reported deliveries that topped Wall Street estimates, but shares sold off as analysts have begun to look ahead to the company’s upcoming earnings report.  

Ultimately it will all come down to profitabilty. Tesla’s second-quarter results, released August 1, showed a negative free cash flow of $739 million, translating to a loss of about $3 a share. That caused many analysts on the Street to factor in a capital infusion to their models before the end of the year.

“We doubt that the all hands on deck burst mode for production and deliveries will result in profitability in 3Q, but believe the shift toward AWD production in 4Q could enable the company to achieve profitability on an adjusted basis in 4Q, though we are not forecasting GAAP profitability,” Cowen analyst Jeff Osborne said following the company’s September deliveries report.

“We still see the need for a raise in 4Q of $2 billion.” 

Markets Insider