Tesla's stock rose more than 7.4% in early trading, now up 5%, rising for 11 consecutive days, with a cumulative increase of up to 38%. Tesla's alliance with General Motors and Ford Motor has given the market a huge surprise. Tesla's charging stations are expected to "unify North America", and its self-driving technology FSD is expected to be the next cooperation. In addition, the tax exemption for its models exceeded expectations... There are too many good news for Tesla recently.
On Friday, Tesla rose more than 7.4% in early trading, now up 5%, leading the NASDAQ-100 component stocks, and has been rising for 11 consecutive trading days, with a cumulative increase of more than 38% in 11 days.
The alliance between Tesla, General Motors, and Ford Motor has given the market a huge surprise, and Tesla's charging stations are expected to "unify North America". FSD autonomous driving technology is expected to be the next cooperation, and its vehicle tax deduction exceeds expectations... Tesla has had too much good news recently.
Tesla's charging stations are expected to "unify North America"
The latest catalyst for Tesla's surge is its cooperation with General Motors on Tesla's charging stations. On Thursday, another US auto giant, General Motors, joined the ranks after Ford Motor announced that its next-generation electric vehicle will use Tesla's charging station standard. Like Ford Motor, General Motors will install Tesla's charging port, NACS, in its electric vehicles from 2025, rather than the current industry standard CCS.
Analysts generally view Tesla's cooperation with General Motors and Ford Motor on charging stations as positive. Tesla's long-term bull, Wedbush Securities' top analyst Daniel Ives, added Tesla to his "best" list, reiterated his buy rating, and raised his target price from $215 to $300. Ives' target price is currently the highest on Wall Street, with more than 20% upside potential from Tesla's Friday price.
Ives believes that Tesla's cooperation with General Motors makes its valuation calculation method of adding up all its components more dominant in the current pricing. This includes Tesla's foray into autonomous driving, supercharging network, battery ecosystem, solar roof, insurance, and decisions to expand production capacity globally. Cooperation with General Motors can help Tesla better monetize its supercharging network and further increase its value.
RBC analyst Tom Narayan expects that Stellantis will also announce a similar announcement to General Motors and Ford Motor and cooperate with Tesla.
Evercore analyst Chris McNally estimates that by 2030, Tesla's supercharging network may generate $4 to $6 billion in revenue, with $1 to $1.1 billion in revenue from non-Tesla customers.
FSD autonomous driving technology is expected to be the next cooperation
A few days ago, as a pioneer in the field of autonomous driving, Tesla was "excited" when it heard Ford Motor CEO Mary Barra praise Tesla's technology and responded on Twitter that Tesla has always been committed to helping other automakers and is willing to authorize Autopilot or fully autonomous driving FSD to other automakers. Tesla said in a recent interview with CNBC that the arrival of ChatGPT for autonomous driving is accelerating. He believes that once the model scale and data accumulation of FSD pass a certain threshold, it will also begin to grow explosively like ChatGPT. Almost instantly, 3 million, 5 million, or even 10 million vehicles will achieve full autonomous driving. Currently, no car company or technology company can claim to be second only to Tesla.
At the Tesla shareholder meeting held last month, Tesla mentioned that the development of FSD is really fast, but emphasized again that it will take some time to achieve true fully autonomous driving.
With giants such as Ford Motor cooperating with Tesla in the charging pile field, Tesla's idea of authorizing FSD for use by other car companies undoubtedly opens up the market's imagination.
Tax Deductions for Tesla Models Exceed Expectations
This week's news shows that miraculously, all Tesla models are eligible for the full $7,500 consumer tax deduction provided by the US federal government's "Inflation Reduction Act," which has shocked the outside world. Prior to this, Tesla RWD and Tesla AWD Long Range, which use lithium iron phosphate batteries from CATL in China, were only eligible for half ($3,750) of the tax subsidy.
It is speculated that Tesla may purchase key battery minerals from whitelist countries such as Australia or Canada, while still using CATL's battery cells.
Specifically, Tesla can purchase key battery minerals such as lithium from whitelist countries such as Australia or Canada, thereby meeting the requirements of the law for the origin of mineral raw materials. In addition, assembling battery packs in the United States from Chinese battery cells, rather than importing battery packs directly from China, makes the value-added portion of the battery pack exceed 50% in the United States, which can also meet the requirements. Some analysts believe that Tesla may have turned to producing these battery packs in the United States while still using CATL's battery cells.
The "Inflation Reduction Act" allows electric vehicle manufacturers to use another method to calculate the critical mineral content. According to the regulations, Tesla "may calculate the average qualified critical mineral content for vehicles from the same model line, factory, category, or some combination thereof for a limited time (such as one year, one quarter, or one month)." In other words, if Tesla produces enough Tesla batteries that meet the requirements in the United States, it can offset the part of Tesla RWD that does not meet the requirements from CATL.
Wall Street is Cautiously Optimistic about Tesla
Looking at Wall Street analysts, they hold a cautious and optimistic attitude towards Tesla's stock, including 15 buy ratings, 10 hold ratings, and 4 sell ratings.
However, the current average target price for Tesla among analysts is $194 per share, which is still far below Tesla's Friday stock price, even though it has been raised by a few dollars in recent days. Just a few weeks ago, Tesla was still around $185, which is quite close to analysts' target prices. Bullish Ives not only gave a target price of $300 on Friday, but also stated that in this broader green wave of electric vehicles, Tesla is playing chess while other car manufacturers are only playing checkers.