Elon Musk listens to questions from U.S. President Donald Trump and South African President Cyril Ramaphosa during a press conference in the Oval Office of the White House on May 21, 2025 in Washington, DC.
Chip Somodevilla | Getty Images
There were many things missing Tesla’s Announcement of financial results for the third quarter.
CEO Elon Musk declined to say anything about demand for the company’s electric vehicles after a key federal tax credit expired last month. He did not mention the impact of tariffs on the Cybertruck or auto parts. Investors had no idea how the fourth quarter would pan out.
All of this may help explain why the stock fell about 4% in after-hours trading.
Rather than focusing on sales, margins and profits (which were lower than expected), Musk took the familiar path of making bold promises and laying out a futuristic vision for the business. It all starts with robotaxis, and Musk believes that skeptical investors and much of the public don’t understand what’s going to happen.
“It’s going to be like a shock wave, to be honest, and people don’t really understand how widespread this is going to be,” Musk said in his opening remarks. “There are millions of cars that can be fully self-driving with a software update, and we make millions a year.”
Mr. Musk has long promised that Tesla’s EVs could make money while their owners sleep by doing work for them, transporting passengers and goods without a driver. But on the other hand of the alphabet Waymo is aggressively entering new markets with its commercial robotaxi service. Baidu’s While Apollo has gained popularity in countries such as China, Tesla is still limited to a small number of pilot projects.
During Tesla’s last earnings call in July, Musk predicted that the company would have autonomous ride-hailing available to “probably half of the U.S. population by the end of the year.” The company still does not manufacture or sell vehicles that can be safely used without a human being always available at the steering wheel or brakes.
Musk said Wednesday that Tesla plans to operate its robotaxi service without human drivers in Austin by the end of the year and in eight to 10 cities with at least a driver on board by the end of 2025.
Regarding its current fleet, Finance Director Vaibhav Taneja said on a conference call that the customer base for Tesla’s partially self-driving system, FSD Supervised, is “still small,” with 12% of users paying for the system. Taneja did not provide the average selling price that subscribers are paying, after Tesla has run a number of promotions to drive adoption.
Tesla said in an investor document that FSD revenue was down from $326 million in the year-ago period. This means that FSD accounts for less than 2% of total revenue in the most recent quarter.
After robotaxis, Musk turned to humanoid robots, reiterating his prediction that Optimus “has the potential to be the biggest product ever.”
Optimus is Tesla’s bipedal humanoid robot that is under development but not yet commercially deployed. Musk has previously said that robots are so sophisticated that they could function as factory workers and babysitters.
Now he’s raising the bar.
“Optimus is going to be a great surgeon,” Musk said Wednesday. He said that with Optimus and autonomous driving, “we can actually create a world without poverty, a world where everyone has access to the best health care.”
Musk said Tesla will likely demonstrate a new version of Optimus, called V3, in the first quarter of 2026.
At the end of the call, Musk continued to focus on robots, but combined it with another important topic: pay packages.
The Tesla Optimus robot scoops popcorn and waves to attendees during the opening of the Tesla Diner, Drive-In Restaurant and Supercharger on Santa Monica Boulevard. July 21, 2025 in the Hollywood district of Los Angeles.
Patrick T. Fallon | AFP | Getty Images
Tesla will introduce a new pay plan worth $1 trillion in September that could increase Musk’s stake in the company by 12%. Tesla will hold its annual shareholder meeting in early November, where the plan will be voted on.
“If we build this robot army, will we at least have a lot of influence over that robot army?” Musk said on the call. “I don’t feel comfortable creating an army of robots, at least without strong influence.”
He was also targeted after proxy advisory firms Institutional Shareholder Services and Glass Lewis recommended that shareholders vote against approving his new pay plan.
Musk said there was “no weird clue” about the ISS and Glass Lewis, and described them as “corporate terrorists.”
Representatives for both companies did not respond to requests for comment.
Meanwhile, Tesla still relies on car sales for most of its revenue. Additionally, sales rose 12% year-over-year in the third quarter, but have since declined year-over-year for the second year in a row, and analysts expect them to decline by about 2% in the fourth quarter.
There was no discussion on the conference call about what Tesla would do in the short term to regain consumer enthusiasm.
Tesla’s brand ranking dropped from 12th in 2024 to 25th in the Interbrand 2025 Best Global Brands list released earlier this month. “Tesla was once a major disruptive force in the auto industry,” the report said, but Musk’s political activities and lack of new products “raise concerns about Tesla’s ability to maintain high profit margins.”
Investors submitted questions about new products in development through Tesla’s online forum. But on the conference call, investor relations director Travis Axelrod twice declined to read the document.
“This is not the right venue to report it,” he said.
WATCH: Traders break down Tesla’s third-quarter results
