Yes, wording can vary.
Normally when referring to "Gross Margin" or "Margin" they refer to direct revenue for vehicle sales less direct expenses which normally include marginal SG&A but not depreciation or amortization. As a general rule TSLA will report slightly higher Gross Margin than competitors because their sales revenue is retail, but will have slower income recognition for the same reason, and slightly higher SG&A, again because of direct sales.
Nearly all analysts fail to understand the implications of the direct sales model, consequently not understanding what WIP and inventory mean for TSLA vs all others.
Either way GM of >20% is an enviable place, ordinarily reached by only highly prized low volume manufacturers such as Ferrari and Porsche, both of which have many parts and other technology from corporate partners/parents which reduce all costs including capex. Almost unheard of vertical integration at TSLA also causes higher capex and higher GM, when at stable volumes. Obviously TSLA growth rates are also unprecedented, so tend to overstate current expenses and capex both. To the extent of Superchargers, stores, service vehicles etc being put in service faster than they would be in a steady state GM also is reduced on a current basis.
All the moving parts cannot easily be reconciled to any steady state because there is no way to know what a steady state would be for them. The gigantic unheralded story (by both bulls and bears) is that the combination of OTA updates, growing reliance on mobile service and fault anticipation plus rapidly improving manufacturing and design are yielding a virtuous cycle that is yielding increasing GM's in all TSLA products. Their accounting conventions are, IMHO, mostly understating their progress. At the present time we can estimate some of these items but there is not enough data or experience to do so accurately.
Overall in the US, roughly a third of MSRP goes to support dealer distribution systems. What is TSLA total distribution costs on a comparative basis? Truthfully we do not know. We do know advertising costs are nearly zero for TSLA vs ~7-10% for competitors. Nearly all of that goes to increased GM's for TSLA.
