Tesla posts Q1 beat, $97.9B

Tesla reported first-quarter 2026 earnings on April 22 that beat Wall Street’s profit estimates, even as revenue came in below analyst forecasts. (cnbc.com) (ir.tesla.com) Revenue rose 16% from a year earlier to $22.39 billion, while adjusted earnings per share came in at 41 cents versus 37 cents expected, according to analysts polled by LSEG. Net income increased to $477 million from $409 million a year earlier. (cnbc.com) Tesla said it generated $3.9 billion in operating cash flow and $1.4 billion in free cash flow in the quarter. Its shareholder update also listed $0.9 billion in GAAP operating income and $0.5 billion in GAAP net income. (assets-ir.tesla.com) The quarter landed after Tesla disclosed first-quarter deliveries of 358,023 vehicles and production of more than 408,000 vehicles on April 2. Energy storage deployments were 8.8 gigawatt-hours. (ir.tesla.com) Tesla’s automotive gross margin excluding regulatory credits reached 19.2%, its highest level in any quarter last year, according to CNBC’s reading of the results. Tesla also said total automotive revenue was $16.2 billion. (cnbc.com) (assets-ir.tesla.com) Management used the quarter to point investors past car sales and toward a more capital-intensive buildout in artificial intelligence, robotics and autonomous driving. Tesla said it had launched unsupervised Robotaxi rides in Dallas and Houston in April and received approval for Full Self-Driving, supervised, in the Netherlands. (assets-ir.tesla.com) On the earnings call, finance chief Vaibhav Taneja said 2026 capital expenditures will top $25 billion, up from the company’s prior forecast of $20 billion. CNBC reported the stock initially rose about 4% in extended trading before giving up gains after that spending increase. (cnbc.com) Tesla’s update said it is ramping additional artificial-intelligence compute, preparing lines for Megapack 3, Cybercab and the Tesla Semi, and pushing Optimus ahead of mass production. The company told investors it sees “tailwinds” for the autos business in 2026 alongside the Robotaxi ramp and energy expansion. (assets-ir.tesla.com) The filing for the quarter ended March 31, 2026, was submitted to the Securities and Exchange Commission on April 23. Tesla had 3,755,723,871 shares of common stock outstanding as of April 16. (sec.gov) The result leaves Tesla with a cleaner profit picture than bears expected, but a much bigger spending bill than investors had been modeling. For now, the company is asking shareholders to fund a shift from electric cars into robotaxis, robots and in-house AI hardware. (cnbc.com) (assets-ir.tesla.com)