Tesla Motors Inc. (NASDAQ: TSLA) has long been a controversial stock. It has made many investors rich now with ten-fold gains, and the stock has destroyed short sellers. While we recently covered how Consumer Reports showed that the Tesla Model S had more than its share of problems, the reality is that analysts keep chasing their ratings and targets higher and higher. 24/7 Wall St. wanted to take a look under Tesla’s hood.

First off, it seems that no one cares about the valuation of Tesla versus those of Ford Motor Co. (NYSE: F) and General Motors Company (NYSE: GM). Analysts keep cheering, and they expect the valuation gap to persist. Elon Musk’s net worth keeps rising as a result.

Three very bullish analyst calls have been made in the last 10 days or so. And the stock just seems to keep rising without a care in the world about traditional valuations.  The explanation is simple enough — investors are buying Tesla based on its growth and its earnings power as far out as 2017, 2018, or further.

Credit Suisse initiated Tesla as Outperform with a $325 price target on Thursday, August 14. Analyst think the company has many competitive advantages in this technology that will be difficult for the traditional automakers to overcome, particularly if Tesla can still offer $1,400 to $2,500 per year in fuel savings to the consumer. Their take is that it won’t even be a fair fight. As the Model X and Model 3 become more successful, investors will begin to expect Tesla to go into the true mainstream market. An analysis of Model S and Model X development costs and the gigafactory investment points to a return on invested capital in the 30% to 45% range.

Credit Suisse started coverage not only on Tesla, but also on Ford and GM. Ford was started at only a Neutral rating with an $18 price target. GM was initiated with an uglier Underperform rating and only a $33.30 price target.

There were two other analyst calls of late:

• Tesla was raised to Buy from Hold by Deutsche Bank on Monday, August 11. The firm lifted its price target to $310 from $220 based on many of the same reasons as Credit Suisse.
• Pacific Crest started coverage as Outperform with a $316 price target on Wednesday, August 6. It believes that demand remains healthy and production continues to increase and that near-term accountability for major long-term deliverables is relatively low.

We still cannot help but ask the most obvious question — at almost $33 billion in market cap, should Tesla be worth half of Ford Motor Co. (NYSE: F) with its $67 billion market value, and  just over 60% of the General Motors Company (NYSE: GM) $54 billion market value? Tesla’s market cap is almost $33 billion, based on its $262 share price. The electric vehicle maker is expected to have 2015 sales of almost $6 billion and is trading at almost 80 times expected 2015 earnings.

Here are some valuation metrics to consider:

• GM is expected to have sales of over $158 billion in 2014 and almost $164 billion in 2015. It trades at almost eight times expected 2015 earnings. Again, Tesla is worth just over 60% of GM in market cap terms.
• Ford is expected to have sales of over $139 billion in 2014 and over $149 billion in 2015. Ford is valued at almost nine times expected 2015 earnings. Tesla is worth just under half of Ford in market cap terms.

At $262, Tesla’s 52-week trading range is $116.10 to $265.64, and the consensus price target is nearly $250.00. Elon Musk is a happy man, and he probably keeps clapping and cheering with those analysts..

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