Coverage: Tesla stock jumps on record-setting deliveries, production

Tesla’s shares shot up 7% yesterday after the carmaker reported record-high production and delivery rates.

Elijah Shama had the news for CNBC:

Tesla shares surged Tuesday after the electric auto maker said it shattered its previous production and delivery records during the second quarter, soundly beating analysts’ estimates.

The company’s stock jumped by about 7% in after-market trading. Tesla also hinted at a strong third quarter, saying it’s entering the period with a backlog of orders.

CEO Elon Musk set investors’ expectations high in a companywide email on June 25, saying the electric car maker was on course to deliver a record number of vehicles throughout the quarter. He wasn’t exaggerating. The company delivered 95,200 cars during the three months ending June 30 — a 51.1% increase over an admittedly weak first quarter and besting its previous record of 90,700 deliveries set in the fourth quarter of 2018.

Electrek’s Fred Lambert noted achieving the feat remained questionable until the very end:

Over the last few weeks, we have been reporting Tesla is within reach of a new record quarter for deliveries, but it had some obstacles to overcome.

We have been tracking deliveries in North America, Tesla’s biggest market, and it seems that Tesla was at least very close to its goal.

However, it wasn’t clear if Tesla could beat its previous record of 90,700 deliveries globally as we were lacking data from other important markets like China.

Today, Tesla released the official global numbers and the company confirmed that it “achieved record production of 87,048 vehicles and record deliveries of approximately 95,200 vehicles globally.”

It’s a significant increase over the results from the previous quarter, which was a rare slump in quarter-to-quarter growth for Tesla.

During the first 3 months of the year, Tesla delivered 50,900 Model 3 vehicles and 12,100 Model S and X vehicles.

Alan Ohnsman reported for Forbes Model 3 unsurprisingly led the production surge:

The company said it got 95,200 of its electric vehicles to customers during the period that ended June 30, including 72,531 units of its lower-priced Model 3 sedan. Production of Model 3s, S sedans and X crossovers during the quarter totaled 87,048, surpassing the previous quarterly high set in the final months of 2018, Tesla said in a statement.

Additionally, “we made significant progress streamlining our global logistics and delivery operations at higher volumes, enabling cost efficiencies and improvements to our working capital position,” the carmaker said. “Orders generated during the quarter exceeded our deliveries, thus we are entering Q3 with an increase in our order backlog. We believe we are well positioned to continue growing total production and deliveries in Q3.”

Musk, who often makes highly ambitious predictions when it comes to Tesla’s sales and production, told shareholders at the company’s annual meeting in June that the quarterly numbers were likely to be strong.