Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA) Issues Earnings Results

Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA) released its earnings results on Wednesday. The electric vehicle producer reported $0.66 EPS for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.74 by ($0.08), Zacks reports. Tesla had a return on equity of 10.24% and a net margin of 13.07%.

Tesla Stock Performance

NASDAQ:TSLA traded down $8.99 during mid-day trading on Wednesday, hitting $389.10. The company’s stock had a trading volume of 54,030,051 shares, compared to its average volume of 72,583,477. Tesla has a 1 year low of $138.80 and a 1 year high of $488.54. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.08, a current ratio of 1.84 and a quick ratio of 1.37. The stock has a market cap of $1.25 trillion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 106.60, a PEG ratio of 8.42 and a beta of 2.30. The business’s fifty day moving average is $401.04 and its two-hundred day moving average is $296.63.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other Tesla news, CFO Vaibhav Taneja sold 7,000 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, January 6th. The stock was sold at an average price of $413.56, for a total transaction of $2,894,920.00. Following the transaction, the chief financial officer now owns 108,965 shares in the company, valued at approximately $45,063,565.40. This represents a 6.04 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Also, Director Kimbal Musk sold 60,500 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, November 1st. The stock was sold at an average price of $250.23, for a total value of $15,138,915.00. Following the transaction, the director now directly owns 1,563,220 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $391,164,540.60. The trade was a 3.73 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 617,886 shares of company stock valued at $212,451,751 over the last ninety days. Company insiders own 20.70% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of research analysts have recently weighed in on TSLA shares. The Goldman Sachs Group raised their price objective on Tesla from $250.00 to $345.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research report on Wednesday, December 11th. Canaccord Genuity Group increased their target price on shares of Tesla from $254.00 to $278.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, October 24th. Morgan Stanley raised their price target on Tesla from $400.00 to $430.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Monday, January 13th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised their price target on shares of Tesla from $130.00 to $135.00 and gave the stock an “underweight” rating in a research note on Thursday, October 24th. Finally, HSBC reaffirmed a “reduce” rating and set a $124.00 target price on shares of Tesla in a research report on Friday, October 11th. Eight analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, fourteen have issued a hold rating, sixteen have issued a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $313.84.

About Tesla

Tesla, Inc designs, develops, manufactures, leases, and sells electric vehicles, and energy generation and storage systems in the United States, China, and internationally. The company operates in two segments, Automotive, and Energy Generation and Storage. The Automotive segment offers electric vehicles, as well as sells automotive regulatory credits; and non-warranty after-sales vehicle, used vehicles, body shop and parts, supercharging, retail merchandise, and vehicle insurance services.