Main positive - the automotive segment. Revenue from car sales $20.56 billion versus expectations of $19.83 billion, that is, $730 million above consensus. Gross margin (the share the company keeps from every dollar sold after direct costs) - 19.6% versus the forecast 17.8%.
Main negative - in net profit without adjustments. There it is 22 cents per share versus 39 cents a year earlier, that is, a decline of almost half over the year. The gap between 48 and 22 cents is precisely explained by adjustments: the adjusted figure does not account for one-off expense items, the standard one accounts for everything.
₿ A separate point for the crypto market: with its BTC on the balance sheet, the company did nothing in the third quarter - it neither sold nor bought more. There was neither inflow nor pressure on the market from Tesla this quarter.
Why this matters to a trader: Tesla is part of the S&P 500 and Nasdaq 100 and drags the entire block of tech stocks with it. Reports of this scale come out after the close of the main US session, that is, the reaction falls in the evening and night by MSK - during hours when liquidity is lower and price swings are wider.
Were you holding the stock when the numbers came out?
The report drops at 23:04 MSK, and after that what decides everything is not your idea, but what is written in the program's rules. With some prop firms, trading at the moment the earnings are released is allowed; with others, a trade in those minutes is grounds for closing the account. The same goes for holding a position overnight and for which session the daily loss is calculated by. This is read in the terms before payment, not after the first wipeout. The next earnings season is in a quarter.