Tesla makes a profit of $104 million in Q2 2020

On Wednesday afternoon, Tesla announced that it ended the second quarter of 2020 with a GAAP profit of $104 million. That is now the fourth profitable quarter in a row for the US automaker, which may help the company move to the S&P 500 index. It took home $143 million in 19Q3, $105 million in 19Q4, and $16 million in 20Q1. However, the past 12 months’ profits still don’t offset the company’s $408 million loss in 19Q2.

Tesla ends 20Q2 with a positive free cash flow of $418 million and $8.6 billion in cash and cash equivalents. Tesla says in its presentation to investors that lower operating costs and greater income from regulatory credits, plus recognizing $48 million in payments for its “Full Self Driving” feature, were big helps to the balance sheet. These contrast the costs it bore for having to shut down the factory due to a raging pandemic, as well as having to pay CEO Elon Musk $101 million for one of his compensation milestones.

The automaker had already released data on its 20Q2 deliveries earlier in July, but to reiterate, it built 6,326 Models S and X, delivering 10,614 of the same. Model 3 and Y production clocked in at 75,946; in total, it delivered 80,277 of these vehicles for the three months in question. Impressively, total deliveries are actually up 3 percent quarter-on-quarter and only down 5 percent year-on-year—not bad for the middle of a global pandemic that has cratered new vehicle sales across the globe. In total, the company’s automotive business brought in $3.9 billion for the quarter.

Tesla says that, at the end of June, its factory in Fremont, California, was operating at capacity and that this ramp-up occurred much faster than with the Model 3. That’s not been without consequence—fan sites and owner forums have reported a plague of poorly assembled vehicles, and Tesla’s inclusion for the first time in an industrywide survey of initial build quality showed the automaker in last place.

Tesla says that it is installing new equipment at Fremont that will allow it to build 500,000 Models 3 and Y a year. It says that its second factory in Shanghai will be able to produce Model Y crossovers in 2021 and that construction of its third plant in Germany is underway. However, the investor report makes no mention of a possible new factory in Texas.

Tesla’s battery storage business also had a good second quarter to the year, deploying 419MWh, a 61 percent increase over 20Q1. But the same was not true for its solar operation, which is down 23 percent quarter-on-quarter. However, it claims that installations of its solar roof “roughly tripled” between 20Q1 and 20Q2. These two parts of Tesla’s business contributed $349 million in revenue for the quarter.

Outlook unsure

The company remains committed to bringing a new sportscar to market, as well as the Tesla Semi and the Cybertruck. But its spending on research and development has decreased yet again, to just $279 million for 20Q2, from $324 million for the previous three months.

Tesla says it is difficult to predict how the rest of 2020 will turn out. The company is still targeting delivering 500,000 vehicles in 2020, but this would mean getting nearly 321,000 EVs into the hands of customers in the remaining six months of the year. Tesla also says it will exceed its current operating margin of 5 percent. The share price of the world’s most valuable carmaker closed at $1,592 and has risen in after-hours trading.