Bracing for a New Product Line From Tesla, and Not a New Car

By Jon C. Ogg Published Mar 30, 1:15PM EDT

Follow 24/7 Wall St. on Google

This post may contain links from our sponsors and affiliates, and Flywheel Publishing may receive compensation for actions taken through them.

What does a visionary CEO like Elon Musk do when he sees that his shares of Tesla Motors Inc. (NASDAQ: TSLA) are close to 52-week lows and down over 35% from their highs? Well, apparently he tweets with a tease. Musk at his @ElonMusk Twitter has released a quick tweet on Monday:

Major new Tesla product line — not a car — will be unveiled at our Hawthorne Design Studio on Thurs 8pm, April 30.

The question to ask is what this new product line will be if it is not a new car line. Back in February, Musk indicated that the next line might be battery packs. With the Gigafactory development underway, it would make sense that it is somehow selling batteries and systems rather than just using the battery systems for the Tesla cars.

24/7 Wall St. would make a couple of notes here.

ALSO READ: How Often Will the Tesla Self-Driving Car Crash?

The first thing for Tesla investors and enthusiasts to keep in mind that would be that just a few minutes before the mystery product tweet, Musk tweeted out two messages:

Great trip to China seeing President Xi and many senior members of the govt. Pic w China team in state garden.

Am very optimistic about Tesla’s long term future in China, despite our earlier mistakes. Have great faith in the Tesla China team.

The second issue would be a very cautious Hold rating from Argus that came out in recent days. Just one of the cautious notes in that report was as follows:

Tesla shares are trading at a whopping 359-times our 2015 EPS forecast and at 49-times our 2016 forecast, reflecting investors’ high expectations for this innovative growth company. We note that these multiples are far above those of traditional auto manufacturers and of comparable tech companies, and that historical comparisons are meaningless given Tesla’s unprofitable history.

Before thinking that Musk is overly concerned with his share price, do not forget that he tried previously to talk his stock down — or so it seemed at the time. He had opined that the company’s market cap was higher than it should be.

Musk may not have intended to talk up the shares, because this new Tesla product line announcement is still likely one month away. Yet, shares were down as low as $181.80 on Monday, after closing at $185.00 on Friday — and shares were at $189.25 right at the 1:00 p.m. Eastern Time.

ALSO READ: Americans Drive 3 Trillion Miles

Tesla’s 52-week range is $177.22 to $291.42, and the consensus analyst price target is $264.18. If you want to know just how controversial Tesla is for a stock, just look at the analyst calls — the lowest target is $65, and the highest is $400.

About the Author Jon C. Ogg →

Jon Ogg has been a financial news analyst since 1997. Mr. Ogg set up one of the first audio squawk box services for traders called TTN, which he sold in 2003. He has previously worked as a licensed broker to some of the top U.S. and E.U. financial institutions, managed capital, and has raised private capital at the seed and venture stage. He has lived in Copenhagen, Denmark, as well as New York and Chicago, and he now lives in Houston, Texas. Jon received a Bachelor of Business Administration in finance at University of Houston in 1992. a673b.bigscoots-temp.com.