Tesla's logistical challenges overshadow record deliveries

On Sunday, Tesla Inc. announced a drop in electric vehicle deliveries in the third quarter. Logistical problems were the obstacle for the company to achieve its record deliveries. 

The representatives of the company said that it was becoming increasingly difficult to secure vehicle transportation capacity at a reasonable price. Some analysts are also concerned that demand for high-priced products may fall amid a weakening global economy.

As stated by Wedbush Securities analyst Dan Ives, the impact of economic difficulties on Tesla is obvious, especially on logistics. There’s no denying that it affects demand volume as well. According to him,  there is a cloud hanging over the car industry, and the manufacturer of electric cars is not protected from it. 

According to Ed Moya, senior market analyst at OANDA, the electric vehicle market is likely to go through a period of great difficulties as consumers will be less active in making the decision to purchase something new. 

Refinitiv data revealed that Tesla delivered 343,830 electric cars to customers, marking a new record for the world's most valuable automaker. However, it failed to hit 359,162 deliveries that analysts had been targeting. A year earlier the delivery volume was at  241,300 units.

This time, the company anticipated that it would deliver 365,923 vehicles but the deliveries fell short of the forecast. It’s rare enough for the automaker whose deliveries have exceeded or been close to production in recent quarters. 

Tesla CEO Elon Musk said Sunday that the company decided to reduce the number of deliveries at the end of the quarter. It was done to reduce expedite costs and employee stress levels. 

Tesla asked employees to help with the end-of-quarter delivery push in California. This was reported by Reuters, citing an email the agency received.

According to the company's internal plan, Tesla set an ambitious goal to manufacture nearly 495,000 Model Y and Model 3 in the fourth quarter of 2022. 

The company's great plans appear with an increasingly bleak outlook for the global economy. In June, Elon Musk reported that he had a "very bad feeling" about the economic situation and that he was planning to downsize.

During a conference call in July, Musk noted that macroeconomic uncertainty could somehow influence demand for the electric vehicles produced by Tesla. However, he said later that the company didn’t have problems connected with demand. What it had problems with was production.

In September, Tesla saw a decline in order backlog, especially in China, according to the tweet from Troy Teslicke, Tesla data tracker.