Tesla CEO Elon Musk introduces the Cybertruck at Tesla's design studio in Hawthorne, Calif.The Canadian Press
Tesla Inc. shares rose 4 per cent on Monday after chief executive Elon Musk tweeted on the weekend that the company had already received 200,000 orders for its futuristic Cybertruck pickup.
The truck, made of stainless steel used in rockets and priced at $39,900 and above, failed to impress Wall Street last week after its “armoured glass” windows shattered in a launch demonstration and analysts argued the design would not have mass appeal.
Tesla opened preorders immediately, however, and allowed potential buyers to book the truck by depositing a fully refundable US$100, compared to the US$1,000 Tesla charged for booking Model 3 sedans in 2016, drawing the flood of reservations and sending the company’s shares back up on Monday.
Tesla received 325,000 orders for the Model 3 in the first week of bookings three years ago, and the initial number for the trucks suggested preorders could rival that.
Not all orders translate into sales as many are likely eventually to be cancelled and money refunded to depositors. Tesla plans to start manufacturing the Cybertruck around late 2021.
Even with Model 3’s bigger deposit there was high churn, Roth Capital analyst Craig Irwin said. “$100 deposit for the truck? That’s fluffy. Just a fluffy order number.”
The U.S. pickup truck market is one of the world’s most profitable vehicle segments and is dominated by Ford Motor Co., General Motors Co. and Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV.
Technology reviewer Marques Brownlee called the Cybertruck a “tech-world disruptor” and said for Tesla to enter the pickup truck market, it had to stand out.
From touting the features of Cybertruck to taking a dig at Ford’s F-150 pickup truck, Mr. Musk has been tweeting furiously to boost sales since Thursday’s launch.
“Better truck than an F-150, faster than a Porsche 911,” he tweeted over the weekend, posting a video of the Cybertruck dragging the F-150 uphill.
Mr. Musk has long been using his 30 million Twitter following as a platform to sell Tesla’s vehicles, but landed in trouble last year when he tweeted he would take Tesla private before withdrawing the statement.
As a result, he agreed with U.S. regulators to submit his public statements about the company to vetting by legal counsel. Tesla did not respond to Reuters inquiries as to whether all of the tweets had been vetted.
Shares of Tesla were last up 1.3 per cent at $337.41 after touching a high of $344.57.