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Comment by alkonaut | Hacker News Reader

A lot of this was down to the huge sales of the Model Y in Europe in the past year or two with subsidized loans at rock bottom rates. The lowest I saw was 0%. Obviously today that's no longer the case. Also the MY is due to be replaced so a lot of would be Tesla buyers are holding off. But I don't doubt that some part, perhaps even a large part, of this is down to personality.

So it'll be interesting to see what happens when the new Model Y is launched and how much they retake of this lost market share. My guess is, some, but not nearly all of it. People held their noses and bought the Tesla when they were at a huge (interest rate) discount. Tesla obviously can't give people long sub 1% loans and make a profit in 2025.

For me personally (in Europe, looking for a new EV this year) I'd be happy to pay more north of a $10k premium to not have the car that says Tesla on it.

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According to the more detailed data for January 2025, published by the Kraftfahr-Bundesamt:

  Model 3   272
  Model S    13
  Model X    13
  Model Y   979
  ∑        1277

For comparison the data for January 2024:

  Model 3   695
  Model S    31
  Model X    33
  Model Y  2393
  ∑        3152

Model Y in both Januaries is still a multiple of ~ 3.5 of the Model 3.

Your theory, that people were waiting for the MY refresh doesn’t seem likely. According to my experience most people aren’t as much informed of the inside baseball when a new model arrives. Nerd stuff.

Edit, Sources, the F10 Excel spreadsheets here:

2025: https://www.kba.de/DE/Statistik/Fahrzeuge/Neuzulassungen/Mon...

2024: https://www.kba.de/DE/Statistik/Fahrzeuge/Neuzulassungen/Mon...

> Tesla obviously can't give people long sub 1% loans and make a profit in 2025.

I think this is not the right way to look at it. Essentially, Tesla sells the car for a price that is higher than the sum of all the input costs (the margin). Say this margin is around $10k per car. If the factories have more inventory, they could give customers a $5k discount, but they could also sell it for the full price but give a sub 1% loan. They probably loan that money for about 3 to 5%. So they only take a hit of a few procent for 2 years meaning $60k * 0.04 * 0.04 = $4800. My point is that a low percentage loan is essentially the same as discount on the purchase price.

Do these continues price decreases mean that things look dire? Based on solely this information, not necessarily. Battery costs are a large part of the cost of the car, and battery costs are consistently coming down. This saves a few thousand dollars per year. So I expect prices to come down each year. That fact alone is not a problem.

Having said that, we know that Tesla's margins have consistently come down for the last 3 years, and we know that Chinese cars become more competitive each year. So things aren't looking great. But again, price declines are expected and not necessarily a problem. I would say market share is the most important metric to look at.

The problem is R&D. Tesla absolutely is not and will not compromise on all that self driving car R&D and other engineering work.

And that's expensive.

Except for not using LIDAR?

...or using consumer-grade parts.

Yeah I’m aware the interest rebate is just a rebate like any other but the cost of such rebates is much higher if the baseline interest is 4% than if it’s 1%. The difference between 0% and 2% is as expensive as the subsidy between 7% and 5% but I don’t think it will sway as many customers

There's also been a significant increase in competition. BYD are competing agressively across the continent, backed by Chinese subsidies, and European automakers are increasing their EV offings. For example, Volvo went from having 1 EV to 6 EV models available.

Also keep in mind that many European countries entered a recession over the past year. Also keep in mind that the cost of electricity has tripled since Putin attacked Ukraine.

The partisan types will ascribe Tesla's sales fall to Musk's politics, but I suspect that's actually a small effect compared to some of the broader market dynamics.

Sales are also way down in Australia [1].

[1] https://electrek.co/2025/02/06/tesla-sales-crash-in-another-...

All of these same market dynamics exist in Australia as well, except Australia’s recession is a per capita recession, not an aggregate recession.

I honestly think a key ceo skill in this day and age is managing to side step every single culture war issue, and unhelpfully for Tesla, Elon seems to disagree with me (though clearly working out for him personally)

Well, I don't think most folks could name a CEO of another car company. So they seem to be doing fine in that category, but maybe not gaining any marketing advantage? I guess a great trick would be for a CEO to have a large social media presence but still side step culture war issues?

> Well, I don't think most folks could name a CEO of another car company.

Yup, and I don’t care. I liked the brand better without the drama queen.

I mean, knowing the CEO of a car company only seems to be working against that car company. He's not exactly known as "The Tesla guy" anymore.

> I guess a great trick would be for a CEO to have a large social media presence but still side step culture war issues?

Most CEO's these days do, yes. Maybe not "large" but a noticeable precense.

Yep look at Sundar Pachai or Tim Cook, they just always go with the flow, that's the way I prefer my CEOs when I invest in corps. It's up to a democracy to fix itself, not corporations. I don't need culture wars in corporations, those need to happen at the voting booths, Washington DC, and protests.

>I don't need culture wars in corporations, those need to happen at the voting booths, Washington DC, and protests.

given America these days: what's the difference? Elon bought the election for much cheaper than Twitter.

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