Tesla Q1 Loss Widens - Update

(RTTNews) - Luxury electric car maker Tesla Motors Inc. (TSLA), Wednesday reported a loss for the first quarter that was widened from a year ago, despite reporting a more-than-double increase in revenues. The company said its Model 3 remains on track to begin production in July.

Palo Alto, California-based Tesla reported first-quarter loss of $330.28 million or $2.04 per share, compared to last year's loss of $282.27 million or $2.13 per share.

Excluding items, adjusted loss for the quarter were $1.33 per share, compared to adjusted loss of $1.46 per share last year. On average, 17 analysts polled by Thomson Reuters expected loss of $0.81 per share for the quarter.

Tesla's revenues for the quarter more-than-doubled to $2.70 billion from $1.15 billion last year. Analysts had a consensus revenue estimate of $2.60 billion.

Automotive gross margins for the quarter improved to 27.4 percent from 24.0 percent a year ago.

"We have made a solid start to what should be an exciting 2017. Vehicle production in Q1 increased by 64% compared to a year ago, which enabled us to set new quarterly records of 25,051 deliveries and $2.7 billion in GAAP revenue," said CEO Elon Musk in a letter to shareholders.

Musk said Model 3 vehicle development, manufacturing equipment installation and supplier readiness remain on plan to start production in July. The company said it is on track to support the ramp of Model 3 production to 5,000 vehicles per week at some point in 2017 and to 10,000 vehicles per week at some point in 2018.

Moving ahead, Tesla continues to see 47,000 to 50,000 new vehicles deliveries in first half of 2017, representing a growth of 61 to 71 percent from same period last year.

TSLA closed Wednesday's trading at $311.02, down $7.87 or 2.47%, on the Nasdaq. The stock further slipped $2.21 or 0.71% in the after-hours trade.