New York, May 18, 2026, 15:04 (EDT)
- Tesla shares dropped 3.8% Monday afternoon as a softer Nasdaq and rising bond yields weighed on the stock.
- Tesla CEO Elon Musk said the company plans to roll out cars without human safety monitors across much of the U.S. later this year.
- Tesla bumped up prices for some U.S. Model Y vehicles over the weekend. It’s the first time in two years the company has made such a move.
Tesla Inc. shares fell 3.8% to $406.11 Monday afternoon, reversing some of last week’s gains as tech stocks sold off. Tesla, one of the busiest names in AI and autonomy trades, opened at $419.15, then slid to a low of $405.90. About 39.8 million shares changed hands.
Tesla’s stock isn’t just about EVs now. Investors want to see if Elon Musk can grow robotaxis and Full Self-Driving, or FSD, into a bigger, higher-margin business before the car business slows further. Tesla’s Q1 update listed 1.28 million active FSD subscriptions and 358,023 vehicle deliveries.
Stocks struggled this afternoon. The Nasdaq Composite lost 0.89% at 2:09 p.m. ET, the S&P 500 dropped 0.43% as oil and Treasury yields rose. “There’s concern about the rally we’ve had in a short period of time, and there’s some profit taking,” Tim Ghriskey, senior portfolio strategist at Ingalls & Snyder in New York, said to Reuters. Reuters
Tesla CEO Elon Musk put the spotlight back on autonomous driving during a remote appearance at the Smart Mobility Summit in Tel Aviv. Musk said via video that Tesla already has self-driving cars running without safety monitors in Texas, with plans to scale that across the U.S. this year. He also mentioned that in about five to ten years, AI could account for “probably 90% of all distance driven” in self-driving cars. Reuters
Tesla’s robotaxis aren’t risk-free. Reuters reporters trying out the service in Austin, Dallas and Houston dealt with long waits, at times no cars available, and were dropped off well away from their actual destinations. This month, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration said Tesla is recalling 218,868 vehicles in the U.S. for rearview-camera delays. Alphabet’s Waymo recalled roughly 3,800 robotaxis last week for a different safety problem.
Tesla adjusted its prices again. Model Y premium all-wheel-drive and rear-wheel-drive models are up by $1,000, now $49,990 and $45,990. The Performance all-wheel-drive Model Y got a $500 bump, now $57,990. Tesla offered no comment on why it raised prices.
It might give margins a lift, but it puts demand on the line. Tesla’s Model Y is still the backbone of its deliveries. When Tesla moves prices, the market reads it as a sign of whether the company is holding the line on profit or just reaching for more buyers.
Xpeng said Monday it started mass production of its first robotaxi in Guangzhou, with plans for fully driverless service by early 2027. The move shows Tesla is up against active rivals in the push for autonomy.
Tesla said paid robotaxi miles almost doubled quarter-on-quarter in Q1. The company added that it expanded unsupervised robotaxi runs in Austin and started unsupervised rides in Dallas and Houston in April. Tesla also said it expects the Cybercab, when production starts, to eventually take over from the existing Model Y robotaxi fleet.
The stock is holding above $400, keeping Tesla’s market cap near $1.44 trillion. There’s not much margin for error. Any delay in Musk’s schedule, regulatory holdups, or more pressure from higher rates on growth stocks could make Monday’s drop seem less like a blip and more like a reset on the autonomy trade.
