WASHINGTON (dpa-AFX) - Luxury electric car maker Tesla Motors Inc. (TSLA), Wednesday reported a loss for the second quarter that more than doubled from a year ago, despite a sharp increase in revenues. Revenues for the quarter, however, trumped Wall Street analysts expectations.
Palo Alto, California-based Tesla's second-quarter loss widened to $717.5 million or $4.22 per share from $336.4 million or $2.04 per share last year.
Excluding items, adjusted loss for the quarter were $3.06 per share, compared to $1.33 per share last year. On average, analysts polled by Thomson Reuters expected loss of $2.92 per share for the quarter.
Tesla's revenues for the quarter rose to $4.00 billion from $2.79 billion last year. Analysts had a consensus revenue estimate of $3.92 billion.
'A total vehicle output of 7,000 vehicles per week, or 350,000 per year, should enable Tesla to become sustainably profitable for the first time in our history - and we expect to grow our production rate further in Q3,' Said CEO Elon Musk.
Tesla said that during the month of July, the company repeated weekly production of about 5,000 Model 3 cars multiple times while also producing 2,000 Model S and X per week. Tesla said it will now aims to reach Model 3 production of 6,000 vehicles per week by late August.
Tesla had been struggling to speed up the manufacturing process of its Model 3 at its factory in Fremont, California and had also missed Musk's Model 3 forecasts several times. However, the latest news that it reached its production forecast will boosts investors expectations that Tesla will meet its goal of profitability in the next two quarters.
In the second quarter, Tesla produced 53,339 vehicles and delivered 22,319 Model S and Model X vehicles and 18,449 Model 3 vehicles, totaling 40,768 deliveries.
Moving ahead, Musk said Tesla aims to 'increase production to 10,000 Model 3s per week as fast as we can.'
Tesla ended the second quarter with $2.78 billion in cash, while capital expenses for the quarter were $609.8 million.
TSLA closed Wednesday's trading at $300.84, up $2.70 or 0.91%, on the Nasdaq. The stock further gained $14.16 or 4.71% in the after-hours trade.
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