Tesla stock was flat after the company introduced a new version of its avant-gardeCybertruck.
Shares of the electric vehicle maker were down just 18 cents at $411.53 in premarket trading, while S&P 500 and Dow Jones Industrial Average futures were flat and down 0.1%, respectively.
The move came after Tesla unveiled an all-wheel-drive version of the Cybertruck starting under $60,000, $20,000 less than the premium all-wheel-drive version.
Lower prices are designed to boost volume, something important for EV makers who lost the $7,500 federal EV purchase tax credit in September. One problem with lower-priced new models is that they can cannibalize sales of other versions, pressuring profit margins.
Cannibalization is the fear for Future Fund co-founder Gary Black. He expects “little if any incremental volume” added by the new version. Tesla’s Rear-Wheel-Drive version of the Cybertruck didn’t do much to add volume in 2025. The Rear-Wheel-Drive version was discontinued months after its introduction.
Tesla sold about 20,000 Cybertrucks in the U.S. in 2025, down from about 39,000 in 2024 and a far cry from the 250,000 Tesla CEO Elon Musk thought he could sell annually.
For 2026, Wall Street projects vehicle sales of about 1.7 million, up from 1.6 million in 2025. Tesla’s EV sales have declined for two consecutive years.
Still, coming into Friday trading, shares were up 16% over the past 12 months, valuing the company at about $1.5 trillion—0r $1.8 trillion including Musk’s unexercised stock options—and about 200 times estimated 2026 earnings.
Tesla investors just aren’t that focused on EV sales lately. They are thinking more about “physical AI,” or AI that interacts with the real world, including Tesla’s AI-trained robo-taxis and robots.
Tesla launched a robo-taxi service in Austin, Texas, in June and expects to roll it out to new cities in 2025. The company also plans to unveil the third generation of its humanoid robot, Optimum, early this year.
Investors should still pay attention to EV sales for a while at least. They are how Tesla makes most of its money, funding its AI ambitions.