The company led by Elon Musk is selling fewer electric cars, and its big bets on driverless taxis and artificial intelligence could take many years to pay off.
Tesla on Tuesday reported a significant drop in profit in the three-month period between April and June, a result of the electric car company’s sluggish sales.
The automaker said it earned $1.5 billion in the second quarter of the year on revenue of $25.5 billion. In the second quarter of 2023, Tesla made $2.7 billion and had revenue of $24.9 billion.
The company’s current operating profit margin, a measure of how much money it makes on every dollar of revenue, was 6.3 percent, compared with 9.6 percent in the same period a year ago.
The results will most likely heighten pressure on Tesla and its chief executive, Elon Musk, to show that the company can find new ways to grow and make money.
Tesla shares have jumped 40 percent since the end of the May in large part because investors are betting that Mr. Musk will successfully remake Tesla into an artificial intelligence company that operates a driverless taxi service and sells robots that can efficiently perform manufacturing and other tasks.
“While we continue to execute innovations to reduce the cost of manufacturing and operations, over time, we expect our hardware-related profits to be accompanied by an acceleration of A.I., software and fleet-based profit,” Tesla said in a statement.