Tesla shares closed at $382.70 on Friday, Oct. 9, up 2.05% on the day. With third-quarter earnings due after the market close on Wednesday, Oct. 21, here is where the analysts who cover the stock stand. Every figure below is attributed to a named firm or data provider; we have not added projections of our own.

The consensus depends on the tracker

  • S&P Global data via StockAnalysis (44 analysts): average 12-month target $396.57, median $412.50, range $128.11 to $600. Consensus rating: "Buy."
  • MarketBeat data via PriceTargets.com (47 analysts): average target $412.19, range $25.28 to $840. Consensus rating: "Hold" (24 buy, 1 strong buy, 17 hold, 5 sell).

The two providers use different analyst pools and methods, which is why their averages, extremes and even overall ratings differ. Both put the average target only modestly above Friday's price, about 3.6% and 7.7% respectively.

Recent calls from named analysts

  • Tigress Financial (Ivan Feinseth): reiterated Buy, $550 target, Oct. 8.
  • UBS (Joseph Spak): raised target to $391 from $385, Oct. 7. StockAnalysis lists the rating as Hold; MarketBeat's entry for that day says Buy, while its earlier UBS entries say Neutral, so treat the rating as unconfirmed.
  • Yorkville Ives & Co. (Daniel Ives): initiated at Buy with a $500 target, Oct. 7, per StockAnalysis.
  • Deutsche Bank (Edison Yu): maintained Buy, $420, Oct. 5.
  • HSBC (Michael Tyndall): reiterated Reduce, $157, Oct. 5.
  • Goldman Sachs (Mark Delaney): upgraded to Buy from Neutral, Oct. 5; no new target listed by MarketBeat.
  • JPMorgan (Rajat Gupta): Neutral, target cut to $415 from $445, Sept. 28.
  • BNP Paribas Exane: Underperform, target cut to $268 from $280, Sept. 24.

The highest target in MarketBeat's data is $840 from Morgan Stanley's Andrew Percoco, logged Sept. 12. We could not confirm the rating attached to it, because the tracker's Morgan Stanley entries around that date are inconsistent. GLJ Research's Gordon Johnson holds the lowest target, $25.28, with a Sell rating.

What analysts expect for Q3

MarketBeat's consensus calls for earnings of about $0.46 per share on revenue of $27.92 billion, compared with $0.50 a share on $28.10 billion a year earlier. In Q2, Tesla reported $0.33 a share, missing the $0.50 consensus.

Deliveries already beat: Tesla's 486,532 Q3 deliveries topped every estimate on its company-compiled list, Electrek reported. But energy storage deployments of 13.7 GWh fell short of the 15.9 GWh analysts expected, which matters because that business has been a profit contributor.

What to watch Oct. 21: automotive margins, energy profitability, Robotaxi and Cybercab ride data, Optimus output and spending plans. This article is for information only and is not investment advice.