Elon Musk’s Tesla posts sales above estimates despite global chip shortage

Elon Musk’s
Tesla announced on Saturday that it delivered 241,300 electric vehicles in the
third quarter of the year even as the company grappled with a global shortage
of computer chips that has plagued the entire auto industry for some time now.

The sales
of the company, based in Palo Alto, California, from July through September
beat Wall Street estimates, which had said that it would complete up to 227,000
sales worldwide, according to data provider FactSet.

Third-quarter
sales rose 72% over the 140,000 deliveries Tesla made for the same period a
year ago, according to a report by the Associated Press.

So far this
year, Tesla has sold around 627,300 vehicles and is set to beat its last year’s
tally.

Wedbush
analyst Daniel Ives wrote in a note to investors that the pace of electric
vehicle deliveries in the United States and China has been strong for the past
month or so. That means an “eye-popping growth trajectory heading into 4Q
and 2022 for Musk & Co,” the Associated Press reported.

Still, the
chip shortage will knock 40,000 vehicles from Tesla’s annual delivery number.
He estimates the deliveries to be at least 865,000 vehicles, with a bull case
of around 900,000, according to the estimates done by Ives.

“In a
nutshell, with chip shortage headwinds, China demand still recovering from
earlier this year, and EV competition coming from all angles, Tesla’s ability
to navigate these challenges this quarter has been very impressive,” he
wrote.

In the
third quarter, the smaller Model 3 sedan and Y SUV led the way with 232,025
sales, followed by the larger Models S and X at 9,275. Tesla said it produced
237,823 vehicles for the quarter.

(With AP inputs)