Tesla China's Dec wholesale sales rise to 97,171 units, its 2nd-highest ever (full year wholesale sales down 7.08%)

Remember that China added Tesla to the list of brands government agencies could purchase in July 2024. It's the only foreign OEM on the list. That's very likely enabled China to artificially boost Tesla's sales in the nation since then. We also have to consider the astounding levels of fraudulent shenanigans that Chinese vehicle producers have used to inflate their delivery numbers. Does that mean Tesla has as well? As we learned with Musk's video game cheating admission early in 2025, where he unapologetically justified his cheating by insisting that everyone else cheats too, and that it's the only way to win, would anyone put it past him to have justified fraud at his companies to boost their numbers and to remain competitive with the other companies? (at least on paper) Ironically the video game he cheated in was produced by Tencent, the same Chinese company that bailed Tesla out in 2017 with a $1.8 billion stock purchase, approved by the Chinese government. 1.5 years after that bailout, Musk agreed to build Tesla's second assembly plant in China, with the promise that this plant would only produce vehicles for the Asian markets. I think it's become pretty clear that China did all of the work to design the plant, gave Tesla massive land and tax deals, gave them huge loans, did all the construction, did all of the hiring and training, and even forced NIO to sell Tesla an assembly line's worth of manufacturing equipment to move up Tesla's start of production by 6 months. They also allowed Tesla to operate in the country without a Chinese corporate partner... the first OEM they've ever allowed this for. The more you know... 9 months after Tesla's Shanghai plant stated production, again only to supply the Asian region, the first ship with a hull full of Teslas arrived in Europe, with Tesla quickly becoming by far the largest exporter of Chinese made vehicles to Western economies, and as far as I know, they're still the largest today. Prior to Tesla, very few Chinese made vehicles were exported to Western economies. This plant also quickly ramped to produce the majority of Tesla's annual global vehicle supply, peaking at about 60%, and still produces nearly 50% of Tesla's global supply today. Tesla's more Chinese company than they are US company today. Even Tesla's US made battery storage products are, I believe, using Chinese LFP cells. Their grid storage products are the only growing product line in Tesla's portfolio. This should all bring into question why exactly China has been so set on boosting Tesla, even today as their own companies have ramped, and how much influence the Chinese government holds over Elon Musk. It's very easy to show how firmly China has Tesla by the balls, and Elon Musk by extension given that he's the CEO and has a tremendous amount of wealth rolled into his Tesla stock. China could cut off Tesla today, now that their own battery and EV industries are pumping along, and boost their own domestic companies. Begging the question of why they haven't... We also recently learned that China was being allowed to heavily invest into SpaceX, just as they seemed to produce nearly an exact replica of SpaceX's reusable rocket. Funny enough, when you look at a lot of the infotainment software and ADAS software being used in various brands in China, it all looks an awful lot like Tesla's... If this makes you wonder why a man whose company... excuse me... **companies** that are so reliant on the Chinese government was allowed unfettered access to US government data early in 2025, along with significant influence over administration policies, then you're not alone. USAID for instance, a direct counterpart to China's Belt and Road initiative that has helped China lock up a near monopoly of critical resources for batteries, was quickly ended by Elon Musk/DOGE in early 2025 as his first act of power, giving China a huge advantage in global resource accumulation. I think we have to be clear here. At no point has Elon Musk shown any special loyalty to Western economies. His main loyalty has seemingly been to himself, and his own accumulation of wealth and power, given his massive inferiority and narcissistic God complex. His companies are all crazy over valued, yet have repeatedly failed to deliver on the world disrupting products that Musk always claims are just a year away. Which makes you wonder... if it benefits him in the long run... what exactly would this man be willing to use his wealth and power to do, and which countries would he be willing to sabotage for his own benefit? What would this man be willing to do if a single country held his balls in their hands and began to squeeze, much like China is currently doing...

That can't be right! Deutsche Bank values ​​Tesla's car business (excluding FSD) at $175 per share. That would mean Tesla would have to increase production tenfold, and that's with rising margins. Looking at the numbers, Tesla's car business should be valued at $3 per share, and that figure should be trending downwards! Could Deutsche Bank's analysts really be that far off the mark?

> Deutsche Bank Almost all large scale frauds run through DB, if memory serves.

Just love these kinds of suggestive titles. Q4 sucked, FY25 sucked, but start off with December being less horrible than thought..?

I rarely look at investment bank corporate valuations anymore, that are more often than not used to manipulate stock prices than to give real assessments of a company's financials. I think we've learned by now that all investment banks are corrupt. Their main concern is making money any way they can. They're no different than any other for-profit corporation. Their main goal is to return shareholder value. They don't care if they have to falsify stock estimates to manipulate stock prices; it isn't like there's any actual SEC oversight or analysts/companies being held accountable for lying. By now, I think all of the investment firms have realized that Musk gamed and trapped them into their oversized investments into Tesla and his overall conglomerate. The only question is how do they escape the over valued trap with the largest possible gain? Maybe they boost their stock valuation while exiting their positions, wait for the stock price to tank (as it often does), and then buy in at a significantly lower valuation as panic selling ensues... then rinse and repeat the stock boosting and sell off process all over again. You can look back across the last 5 years or so of Tesla's chart and see massive moves up followed by massive moves down. Ironically, Tesla's value is only up about 8% from the 2021 peak. Weren't stock pumpers like Cathie Wood claiming Tesla would be worth many trillions of dollars by now? These banks don't care. They want to buy low and sell high... and Tesla is a stock trader's dream. The market makers know the levels, likely coordinate with one another, and move the stock in a way that best benefits them. IMO, the stock is excessively overvalued today, much like its been time and time again. Usually that resolves in a major sell off, followed by yet another massive run up. Rinse and repeat. Investment banks, and Elon Musk + billionaire friends & family, are using Tesla and its gaming of the markets as a mechanism to increase their own wealth.

Yeah, I posted the URL as is, which copies the headline from the article, but I couldn't help but manually add the context in parenthesis to show their performance in 2025 was terrible, no matter how much lipstick they try to apply to this pig.

IMO high likelihood that Musk is in bed with the Chinese government and they are willing to help him fudge his numbers for whatever they’re clearly getting from musk. No way the US government would be able to audit and verify data from China. Tesla has always received extraordinary favorable treatment by the Chinese government that no other foreign company receives. Very suspicious.

Maybe the CEO shouldn’t have thrown Nazi salutes at the inauguration broadcast on global television

Very high likelihood considering he already got caught having secret communications with Putin.

So China production accounted for 245,368 out of 418,227 deliveries - almost 60% of TSLA is now coming out of China. IMHO that's not great - since the least competitive BEV market is the US.

The key word is "wholesale". They have yet to actually be sold.

More than half of Tesla's sales come from China. That can't be good.

> This growth may partly stem from Tesla accelerating deliveries in China toward year-end to enable consumers to benefit from more favorable purchase tax policies in 2025. This is 100% why. Several other Chinese EV makers posted record high December numbers. The Chinese NEV (EV + PHEV + FCEV) market grew 25% in 2025 and now commands well over 50% of passenger vehicle marketshare. Tesla being down 7% for the year in this environment is very bad news for them. The overall Chinese vehicle market hasn't really been growing. NEVs have been significantly canibalizing ICE sales and are arguably already on the back half of the S-curve. At some point this will reach saturation and either brand growth will stall across the board or it'll start coming at the expense of sales declines for other brands. I wouldn't bet on American company Tesla to win that war over domestic brands in China that are pumping far more serious resources into making cheaper and better cars.

But ai robots and blockchain [waves hands]

Interesting points. It deserves a dedicated post.

Are China produced Tesla cars subjected to the same import tax?

I'm not well versed in this. I think European nations have an import tax on the Chinese builds coming in.

Something tells me there's probably an exception there

So Tesla is for a 3rd year decreasing sales, and accelerating losses with less 8,6% globally . If it was a German brand we would have all Tesla cult fanboys screaming legacy brands are dead, Tesla is the ultimate luxuary, long live the king. Yet… 😝