Tesla Revenue Beat Masks Eroding Margins and Cash Burn
Tesla topped revenue expectations for Q2 (~$28.2B vs. $26.2B consensus) but missed on earnings ($0.33 vs. $0.51 expected), triggering a sharp stock drop. More telling were the margin and cash metrics: net margin fell to 3.7% (well below the 3-year average of 8.7%), automotive margin excluding regulatory credits slipped to 16.3%, and free cash flow turned negative as capital spending more than doubled. Management projects over $25B of capex this year with even more in coming years to fund robots, AI compute, a semiconductor fab, and other ambitious bets. The market repriced Tesla on near-term profitability rather than revenue growth, highlighting the cost of its aggressive growth push rather than a flaw in the revenue story.













