There’s no stopping Tesla now. The company’s stock (Nasdaq: TSLA) rose over 7% to close at a new high on Monday after a bullish analyst’s report highlighted the strong sales of Model S, and the trickle of good news continued.
Jefferies analyst Elaine Kwei noted that most of this year’s gains in the large luxury sedan segment are thanks to the Model S, which is outselling competing models from BMW, Mercedes, Volkswagen, Audi and Porsche. She also predicted that Tesla was likely to sell even more units than projected this year:
We believe there is likely upside to prior 2Q guidance for deliveries of 4,500 units, as well as 2013 guidance of 21,000 units. We estimate TSLA has taken 9% market share in the U.S. full-size luxury sedan market, accounting for nearly all growth in the segment. We increase our estimates and PT (price target) to $130 based on a 10-year DCF (discounted cash flow) and update our EV market forecast.
We believe TSLA could flex up its stated single-shift production of 20,000 units annually by up to 20%. We increase our 2Q delivery estimate to 5,000 units from 4,500 units and our 2013 estimate to 21,500 units from 19,800 units.
Tesla will release earnings on July 22.
Meanwhile, the White House petition for the federal government to intervene in the war between Tesla and the major auto dealers’ associations quickly gathered signatures. At this writing, it had 91,771 signatures. The petition needs to earn 100,000 by July 5 for the Obama administration to review it.
Sources: Investor’s Business Daily, AutoNews