Tesla is doing well in China, with deliveries up sharply last week, but has yet to recover from sluggish sales in Europe.
Tesla's deliveries in the first half of this year fell compared to the same period last year for the first time in several years.
Tesla's quarterly sales fell compared to the same period a year ago early in the pandemic, but even then the company quickly recovered and saw increases the following quarter.
This is the first time since Tesla became a major automaker that the company's deliveries have declined year-over-year for two consecutive quarters.
The problem lies in Europe: in the old continent alone, Tesla deliveries based on registration data are down by about 60,000 so far this year compared to 2023.
Tesla faces stiff competition in Europe, where many believe its lineup is becoming stale.
The company calls this “being between two waves of growth.”
CEO Elon Musk has made no secret of his focus on autonomous driving and Tesla's Full Self-Driving (FSD) package, but the latter is not available in Europe, making the European market an afterthought for Tesla.
But China is another market where the FSD has yet to be approved, and while Tesla has made some progress on that front recently, the automaker has performed much better in what is now by far the world's largest EV market.
According to registration data from Li Auto, 15,500 insurance registrations for Tesla vehicles were made in China last week, up 23% from last year.
Tesla also registered just over 74,000 vehicles in China last month, about half the number it has delivered in Europe so far this year.
Electrek's take
This indicates that Tesla is increasingly dependent on the Chinese market for its performance.
The US is stalling and Europe is stagnating.
This isn't surprising, given that the Cybertruck is the only new vehicle Tesla has launched in the last four years and it's not sold in Europe.
Tesla needs a broader lineup to keep delivering more cars, that's all.
Sure, solving the self-driving problem would help, but at some point Tesla has to admit that they don't know when they'll actually solve this problem.
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