Wall Street today: Tesla stock rallies 10% after Q2 sales beat analyst forecasts

Tesla Inc. stock rallied 10% on Tuesday after the EV maker reported a milder drop in sales for April through June.

At 10:36 am EDT, Tesla stock was at $230.86, higher by $21.00 or 10.01%.

The electric vehicle maker’s global sales dropped for the second straight quarter despite price cuts and low-interest financing offers, but the numbers were better than analysts had forecast.

Austin, Texas-based Tesla said it sold 436,956 vehicles from April through June, down 4.8% from 466,140 sold the same period last year.

The carmaker also sold over 33,000 more vehicles during the quarter than it produced.

Tesla’s nearly all sales came from the smaller and less-expensive Models 3 and Y, while the company sold only 21,551 of its expensive models including X and S, as well as the new Cybertruck.

For the six months of 2024, Tesla’s sales were more than 910,000 vehicles worldwide. Its rival China's BYD sold 726,153.

Earlier, chief executive officer Elon Musk had said that Tesla will roll out new and more affordable models by early next year.

The company is slated to report its second quarter earnings on July 23.

In January, Tesla had predicted “notably lower” sales growth this year.

US stock markets

US stocks edged lower on Tuesday after Federal Reserve chair Jerome Powell said more economic data was needed before cutting interest rates.

At 10:11 a.m. ET, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 38.01 points, or 0.10%, at 39,131.51, the S&P 500 was lower 7.23 points, or 0.13%, at 5,467.86, and the Nasdaq Composite fell 19.51 points, or 0.11%, at 17,859.79.

Shares of Microsoft and Apple reversed early losses, gaining 0.1% and 0.8%.

Chip giant Nvidia fell 2.3%, Alphabet dropped 0.4%, and Meta Platforms lost 0.5%.

The jobs report showed that job openings rose to 8.14 million in May.

In the bond market, the yield on the 10-year Treasury slipped to 4.41% from 4.46% late on Monday.