Tesla announced its second-quarter financial report after the market closed yesterday. As price cuts continued to squeeze profits and the company continued to increase its investment in AI technology, Tesla’s second-quarter profit margin fell to its lowest level in more than five years. In addition, CEO Ma Skoda confirmed that Robotaxi will be postponed to October, and its stock price fell more than 7% after the market closed.
Table of contents
ToggleRobotaxi press conference postponed to October
At this financial report meeting, the Robotaxi launch event originally expected to be held in August has been postponed to October 10 by Musk himself. Asked when he would see "the first self-driving taxi on the road," Musk said: "I would be shocked if we couldn't do it next year," but added that his predictions have always been overly optimistic. The timing of Robotaxi's deployment remains subject to technological advancements and regulatory approvals.
But Alphabet's self-driving taxi-hailing service Waymo already provides paid rides in the San Francisco and Phoenix areas. Alphabet also announced plans to expand investment.
Capital spending on AI projects continues to increase
In order to keep up with the development of AI technology and continue to improve the performance of its self-driving system FSD, Tesla continued to increase capital expenditures on AI projects in the second quarter. The financial report showed that research and development expenses in the second quarter were US$1.07 billion.
This year, Tesla encountered price-cutting competition from Chinese automakers and the slow recovery of the overall automotive market. CEO Musk had to lay off employees to save costs. This quarter's restructuring costs were as high as US$620 million.
However, looking at Tesla’s free cash flow, although it turned positive in the second quarter to US$1.342 billion (versus -US$2.531 billion in the first quarter), if it continues to increase capital expenditures, it may encounter headwinds. Sometimes there is a shortage of cash.
Tesla invests 5 billion in xAI?
After the meeting, Musk asked everyone on X for their opinions on investing 5 billion in xAI. Although such a huge investment needs to be voted on by the board of directors and shareholders, Musk still wants to test the water temperature on the social platform first.
Musk's xAI , founded in 2023, has raised US$6 billion in a round of financing this year, with Sequoia Capital and Andreessen Horowitz also among the investors. Musk once said: Tesla is learning a lot from xAI. It's really helpful in improving full self-driving and building new Tesla data centers.
Tesla did not sell Bitcoin, a total of 10,800
After Tesla bought 48,000 Bitcoins in 2021, it sold 4,800 Bitcoins in the first quarter of 2021 and 32,400 Bitcoins in the second quarter of 2022. There has been no change since then. Tesla There are still 10,800 Bitcoins in stock, with a book value of $184 million.
