Tesla (TSLA) releases Q1 2021 results: delivers on high expectations with $10 billion in revenue

Fred Lambert | Apr 26 2021 - 4:10 pm PT

Tesla (TSLA) has released its financial results and shareholders letter for the first quarter of 2021 after market close today.

We are updating this post with all the details from the financial results, shareholders’ letter, and the conference call later tonight. Refresh for the latest information.

Tesla Q1 2021 Earnings Expectations

As we reported in our Q1 earnings preview post earlier today, the market was expecting very similar results to last quarter’s record results thanks to a new record quarter for deliveries despite some challenges.

Wall Street was expecting revenue of about $10.5 billion from Tesla for the quarter and a gain of $0.75 per share.

Tesla Q1 2021 Earnings Results

Tesla has roughly delivered on expectations with a slight miss on the revenue at $10.389 billion and beating earnings expectations with $0.93 per share (non-GAAP).

The automaker rote about its profitability this quarter:

“Our operating income improved in Q1 compared to the same period last year to $594M, resulting in a 5.7% operating margin. This profit level was reached while incurring SBC expense attributable to the 2018 CEO award of $299M in Q1, driven by an increase in market capitalization and a new operational milestone becoming probable.”

Tesla’s net cash on hand went down for the first time in a long time, but it was due to the previously disclosed Bitcoin purchase and debt repayment:

“Quarter-end cash and cash equivalents decreased to $17.1B in Q1, driven mainly by a net cash outflow of $1.2B in cryptocurrency (Bitcoin) purchases, net debt and finance lease repayments of $1.2B, partially offset by free cash flow of $293M.”

Tesla’s stock (TSLA) is down a bit on the news in after-market trading.

Here we will be posting our follow-up posts about the earnings and conference call to expand on the most important points (refresh the page to see the most recent posts):

Here’s Tesla’s Q1 2021 shareholder letter and presentation in full:

[scribd id=505009133 key=key-PXyXMT508fEsGkvyspo7 mode=scroll]

Here’s Tesla’s conference call: