Tesla stock sinks 4% after Q2 earnings: has Elon Musk’s AI pivot gone too far?

Tesla stock NASDAQ:TSLA sank more than 4% in after-hours trading after second-quarter results exposed the mounting cost of Elon Musk’s push into artificial intelligence, autonomous taxis and humanoid robots.

Revenue rose 26% to $28.24 billion, beating Tesla’s company-compiled consensus of $27.58 billion.

Adjusted earnings were 33 cents a share, missing the 55-cent consensus. Capital expenditure more than doubled to $5.79 billion, pushing free cash flow to negative $1.09 billion.

The reaction came before regular US trading on Thursday and suggested investors now want more than ambitious timelines.

Tesla stock: Revenue recovery came at a steep price

Tesla delivered a record second-quarter deliveries of 480,126 vehicles, up 25%, helping automotive revenue rise 23% to $20.52 billion. Energy generation and storage revenue increased 13% to $3.14 billion.

The strain appeared below the top line. Operating expenses climbed 47% to $4.35 billion, including a 49% increase in research and development spending to $2.37 billion.

Operating income fell 57% to $398 million, while operating margin narrowed to 1.4% from 4.1%.

Automotive gross margin excluding regulatory credits dropped to 16.3% from 19.2% in the first quarter.

Lower selling prices and a sharp fall in regulatory-credit revenue showed that higher deliveries did not translate cleanly into stronger profitability.

Tesla also booked a $763 million after-tax unrealised gain on its SpaceX stake. Because adjusted earnings exclude it, the profit miss reflected underlying operations rather than accounting.

Tesla Q2 earnings: AI progress is visible, but monetisation remains limited

Tesla reported 1.48 million active Full Self-Driving subscriptions, up 56% year on year.

Cybercab production began, Robotaxi operations expanded across seven US metros, and on-site AI-computing capacity in Texas more than doubled during the first half.

Those milestones support Musk’s argument that Tesla is becoming a physical-AI company, but do not establish how quickly autonomy and robotics will become material revenue sources.

Truist analyst William Stein described Tesla’s AI progress as “positive, but imperfect” in a note reported by TipRanks.

Stein views FSD and Robotaxi as the most important near-term projects and Optimus as the larger long-term opportunity, while maintaining a Hold rating.

Morgan Stanley analyst Andrew Percoco entered the report with an Equal Weight rating and a $417 target, expecting constructive but relatively modest AI updates rather than an immediate catalyst for a major re-rating.

Spending raises the stakes for Robotaxi and Optimus

Tesla generated $4.70 billion in operating cash flow but spent $5.79 billion on factories, computing infrastructure and new products.

Management expects full-year capital expenditure to exceed $25 billion and remain elevated as AI, Cybercab and Optimus capacity expands.

BNP Paribas analyst James Picariello expects annual capital expenditure to average at least $22 billion through 2030.

That forecast suggests the second-quarter surge was an early stage of a multiyear investment cycle, not a temporary spike.

The bullish case remains that Robotaxi and Cybercab could become scalable, high-margin businesses, while rising FSD subscriptions create recurring software revenue.

The risk is that spending continues to outrun monetisation while weaker vehicle margins reduce Tesla’s financial cushion.