A recent company earnings release has revealed Tesla's profits were down 71 per cent over the first three months of 2025. According to a report by the American Broadcasting Company (ABC), the EV maker’s performance fell short of analysts' expectations.
Total revenue decreased by nine per cent from last year, to $19.3 billion, while revenue from car sales fell 20 per cent over the first three months of this year compared to 2024.
The ABC commentary has stated that the new financial details arrived as some shareholders called on Musk – whose temporary status as a US government employee expires next month – to step down from his White House role of reducing government spending and return full-time to the helm of Tesla.
Musk addressed the Trump administration's tariffs in the ABC article, saying: "I've been on the record many times as saying that I believe lower tariffs are generally a good idea”.
"But this decision is fundamentally up to the elected representative of the people, being the president of United States. So, you know, I'll continue to advocate for lower tariffs … but that's all I can do,” he added.
Earlier, he had said Tesla was in a relatively good position to weather tariffs because it has localised supply chains.
The ABC reported that in a statement ahead of the earnings release, Tesla noted that "changing political sentiment" could impact demand for the company's products in the near-term.
Tesla also cautioned about business impacts as result of the "current tariff landscape," saying the company is "taking actions to stabilise the business in the medium to long-term and focus on maintaining its health”.
"Uncertainty in the automotive and energy markets continues to increase as rapidly evolving trade policy adversely impacts the global supply chain and cost structure of Tesla and our peers," Tesla added.
Australian Tesla sales figures provided to Drive.com.au by the EV Council show a 59.7 per cent fall in the first quarter of 2025 compared to the same period in 2024, with a 53 per cent decline in March 2025 alone when electric vehicles made up a record 14.25 per cent share of overall new car sales.