All you need is 3 figures.
Sales of $4.4bn (net loss was $702m)
So Q1 costs of $5.1bn
Cash position at end of quarter of $2.2bn,
... and Elon admitting on the earnings call that half of their sales completed in the last 10 days of the quarter (remember Tesla don't consider a car sold until all paperwork is complete. That only happens on completion/delivery).
So lets wind back 10 days to March 20, 2019.
They had only earned half their Q1 revenue ($4.4bn), so $2.2bn
Their costs at this time would have been close to the $5.1bn - lets assume $4.5bn.
So take $4.5bn away from $2.2bn and you are negative $2.3bn for the quarter. Now they only ended up with $2.2bn in cash - so you can start to see how close to bankrupt they were. Tesla's cashburn is $1.8bn a month.
Having at most a few hundred million in the bank is catastrophically close to bankruptcy!
If a ship or two had been delayed by a week, if they hadn't completed final paperwork for the cars that had landed, if the China import documentation/paperwork had not been resolved then losses would have been $2.4bn higher and they might have been bankrupt.
This I believe explains the desperate financial moves (crashing S and X prices, discounting FSD and AP, larger deposits for Model Y, redundancies, buying that trucking company with shares and not cash, etc).
Of course - this should not happen again as they will stagger production with a more balanced International vs National delivery. Elon said they strained the system too much with the massive international batch in Q1 - but remember they put this upon themselves to maximise sales in Q4 by only delivering to the US to maximise incentives, then do as much international in Q1 2019 to maximise ASP by only selling AWD and performance internationally!
Sales of $4.4bn (net loss was $702m)
So Q1 costs of $5.1bn
Cash position at end of quarter of $2.2bn,
... and Elon admitting on the earnings call that half of their sales completed in the last 10 days of the quarter (remember Tesla don't consider a car sold until all paperwork is complete. That only happens on completion/delivery).
So lets wind back 10 days to March 20, 2019.
They had only earned half their Q1 revenue ($4.4bn), so $2.2bn
Their costs at this time would have been close to the $5.1bn - lets assume $4.5bn.
So take $4.5bn away from $2.2bn and you are negative $2.3bn for the quarter. Now they only ended up with $2.2bn in cash - so you can start to see how close to bankrupt they were. Tesla's cashburn is $1.8bn a month.
Having at most a few hundred million in the bank is catastrophically close to bankruptcy!
If a ship or two had been delayed by a week, if they hadn't completed final paperwork for the cars that had landed, if the China import documentation/paperwork had not been resolved then losses would have been $2.4bn higher and they might have been bankrupt.
This I believe explains the desperate financial moves (crashing S and X prices, discounting FSD and AP, larger deposits for Model Y, redundancies, buying that trucking company with shares and not cash, etc).
Of course - this should not happen again as they will stagger production with a more balanced International vs National delivery. Elon said they strained the system too much with the massive international batch in Q1 - but remember they put this upon themselves to maximise sales in Q4 by only delivering to the US to maximise incentives, then do as much international in Q1 2019 to maximise ASP by only selling AWD and performance internationally!
Last edited: