Tesla Tops Third-Quarter Forecasts as Robotaxi and FSD Growth Offset a Slide in Car Revenue

AUSTIN, Texas, Oct. 21 (TodayViralUSA) — Tesla reported better-than-expected third-quarter results on Wednesday, leaning on growth in its driver-assistance subscriptions and services business to offset another decline in sales of its cars. The shares slipped more than 3% in extended trading.

The electric-vehicle maker posted adjusted earnings of 48 cents a share on revenue of $28.05 billion, ahead of analyst forecasts of 43 cents and $27.9 billion compiled by LSEG, CNBC reported. Revenue was roughly flat from a year earlier. GAAP net income attributable to shareholders came in at $787 million, or 22 cents a share.

Cars down, services up

Automotive revenue fell 3% from a year earlier to $20.56 billion, and revenue from energy generation and storage dropped about 16% to $2.88 billion, according to the company’s quarterly update. Services and other revenue rose roughly a third to $4.61 billion.

Tesla blamed weaker car revenue on lower average selling prices and tight battery supply, which it called the main factor limiting vehicle output despite what it described as its largest order backlog in four years. Deliveries for the quarter totaled 486,532, about 2% below a year earlier. Free cash flow was $1.53 billion.

Robotaxis and self-driving

The company said active subscriptions to FSD (Supervised), its partially automated driving system, rose 67% from a year earlier to 1.74 million. Tesla began giving Robotaxi rides in its two-seat Cybercab in Austin on Sept. 3, and executives said they plan to expand Cybercab service beyond Austin this year.

Musk said the driverless fleet would start to show up in Tesla’s financials in 2027, becoming “noticeable in Q2 and then probably a big deal by Q3 or Q4 of next year.” Ashok Elluswamy, Tesla’s vice president of Autopilot, said some customer cars could get access to unsupervised FSD around the second quarter of next year.

On the Optimus humanoid robot, Musk said there was “still quite a lot of work to do” before it is useful for open-ended tasks, and that he expects the main design and AI issues to be resolved around the end of next year.

Merger questions

The results came a day after Musk told SpaceX investors that combining his rocket company with Tesla would be a “good idea” and that both boards had formed special committees to study a possible deal. He offered nothing new on Wednesday’s call. “I think I said everything that should be said yesterday,” he said.

Tesla also lowered its 2026 capital spending forecast to about $20 billion from more than $25 billion, Reuters reported.