Tesla shares close at 13-month high

A day after their biggest rally since 2013, Tesla shares closed at their highest level in more than a year on Friday, as investors and analysts continued to rave about the electric vehicle company’s third-quarter results.

According to CNBC, Tesla shares rose 3.3% to end at $269.19, putting the stock at its highest close since September 2023. With the two-day gain, the stock erased its losses for the year and is now up about 8% in 2024, still lagging the Nasdaq’s 24% rally.

An economic analyst from Piper Sandler boosted Tesla’s price target after Wednesday’s earnings report. The company, which already has a buy rating on the stock, said it was raising its 12-month price forecast to $315 from $310 to reflect higher deliveries and higher margins. Tesla CEO Elon Musk has forecast that car sales will grow 20% to 30% next year, reassuring electric vehicle investors.

Tesla shares rose 22% on Thursday after the earnings report, their second-best performance since the company’s IPO in 2010. That came after Tesla reported revenue of $25.18 billion, which missed analysts’ expectations of $25.37 billion but was up 8% from a year earlier.

Tesla earned adjusted earnings per share of 72 cents, beating analysts’ average estimate of 58 cents.

Tesla’s profit margins were boosted by a $739 million charge for environmental regulatory credits, which JPMorgan Chase analysts noted in a report was a “potentially unsustainable driver” of earnings and cash flow. The results were also boosted by $326 million in revenue from FSD, the company’s supervised full self-driving system.