While Tesla’s (NASDAQ: TSLA) latest quarterly double beat led to initial investor enthusiasm and some analysts, like Wedbush’s Dan Ives, to declare that the firm is ‘morphing into a physical AI stalwart,’ while assigning a $600 price target, others had a starkly different reaction.
Former Fidelity fund manager and veteran investor George Noble, for example, called the earnings and the associated call ‘the biggest disaster in the history of Tesla,’ while estimating that even a $65-70 TSLA share price forecast would be generous.
According to his detailed X post, published on April 23, Noble has four key criticisms of the electric vehicle (EV) company.
George Noble blasts Tesla for broken unsupervised ‘FSD’ promises
The first of the criticisms is that Elon Musk’s admission that Hardware 3 cars are incapable of unsupervised autonomous driving and the billionaire’s plan to compensate the customers by providing a ‘discounted trade-in’ for Hardware 4 vehicles constitutes a significant broken promise and a major liability.
Between Tesla CEO assuring customers that HW3 vehicles would be fully capable of ‘FSD’ as recently as 2022, and roughly 285,000 ‘FSD‘ purchasers affected, George Noble believes that the admission constitutes the worst example of the company breaking a promise on record.
On a related note, the veteran investor also reflected on the fortunes of drivers whose vehicles are allegedly capable of unsupervised self-driving. Indeed, he criticized Musk for first saying that FSD v14.3 was ready for unsupervised deployment before clarifying that significant improvements are in the ‘pipeline.’
The former Fidelity fund manager concluded that the remark means that ‘the software isn’t SAFE ENOUGH to deploy without a human watching,’ pushing back the public release for the fourth quarter (Q4) at the earliest.
How Tesla’s reliance on future products risks a catastrophic sell-off
Within the same text, Noble echoed several other Tesla stock bears by estimating that the majority of the company’s valuation – especially as it suffered another quarter of dwindling sales, showing a deteriorating core business – is accounted for by hopes for artificial intelligence (AI), ‘FSD,’ the ‘Cybercab,’ and the ‘Optimus’ humanoid robot.
Then, the veteran investor opined that Waymo is ‘the LEADING robotaxi company’ that is ‘YEARS ahead of Tesla in actual deployment’ before noting that its latest funding round set its valuation at $125 billion. At press time on April 24, Elon Musk’s EV maker’s market capitalization stands above $1.4 trillion.
Veteran investor warns 2026 Tesla CapEx is unsustainable
Lastly, and related both to technological and valuation concerns, George Noble reflected on Tesla’s mounting capital expenditure.
According to the veteran investor, the quarterly increase from the forecasted $20 billion to the actual $25 billion, the fact that the figure is multiple times higher than the EV maker’s usual CapEx, and the firm’s admission that its cash flow is likely to be negative through the rest of 2026 all bode ill for shareholders.
Noble took particular care to juxtapose the fact that the ‘company generating roughly $6 billion in annual free cash flow on a good year’ is preparing to spend $25 billion while underlying the high probability that new equity would be issued, leading to dilution.
Tesla stock investors react to latest earnings report
Overall, investors appear, by press time on April 24, to be closer to George Noble’s reading of the situation than to Dan Ives’. While TSLA stock soared approximately 4% immediately after the quarterly report was released, it swiftly flipped into the red.
Indeed, Tesla shares declined 3.56% during the most recent regular session and, after the partial rally in the ongoing extended session, are changing hands at $373.16 for a total weekly loss of 5.72%.
Since 2026 started, the equity fell 14.69% and is trading 25.19% below its 52-week – and all-time – high of $498.83.
Featured image via Shutterstock
