NEW YORK, Dec. 28, 2025, 12:44 a.m. ET — Market closed
Tesla, Inc. (NASDAQ: TSLA) heads into the final trading days of 2025 with investors balancing a familiar Tesla cocktail: bold autonomy timelines, near-term delivery uncertainty, and ongoing regulatory attention. Shares last traded Friday, ending at $475.19, down about 2.1% on the session.
With U.S. markets shut for the weekend, the next real test for Tesla stock arrives at Monday’s open (with premarket trading typically beginning before the opening bell). In the meantime, the story driving the conversation around TSLA has shifted from “what happened Friday” to “what Tesla says (or shows) next” — especially on autonomy.
Robotaxi momentum ramps up into year-end
Over the past 24–48 hours, Tesla’s autonomy narrative has intensified as CEO Elon Musk pushes toward a self-imposed year-end milestone tied to robotaxis in Austin. Investor’s Business Daily reported Tesla has stepped up messaging around Full Self-Driving (FSD) as Musk referenced an unsupervised Model Y ride, and Tesla AI leader Ashok Elluswamy posted video meant to demonstrate driverless testing.
TipRanks also highlighted the same core developments — Musk’s claim of “perfect driving” on X and Elluswamy’s back-seat video showing empty front seats during real-world traffic movement in Austin. TipRanks
Why it matters for TSLA: for many investors, autonomy progress is the closest thing Tesla has to a near-term catalyst that can overpower softer auto-demand headlines. IBD noted analysts are treating the removal of safety monitors (if it occurs as framed) as a meaningful potential inflection point for the stock.
Autonomy optimism meets an industry-wide reality check
Tesla isn’t pitching robotaxis in a vacuum. On Saturday, Reuters reported that a San Francisco power outage earlier this month led to Waymo robotaxis stalling and adding congestion — rekindling debates about how robotaxi systems handle rare but chaotic “edge case” emergencies. Reuters
Two expert voices in that Reuters report help frame the broader regulatory direction investors should keep in mind for Tesla:
- Philip Koopman, a Carnegie Mellon computer-engineering professor focused on autonomous technology, warned that regulators risk being “derelict” if they don’t demand proof autonomous fleets can handle disaster scenarios (like earthquakes) after incidents such as a blackout response failure. Reuters
- Missy Cummings, director of George Mason University’s Autonomy and Robotics Center and a former adviser to the U.S. road-safety regulator, argued the federal government should regulate “remote operations” (teleoperation) to ensure robust backup support when systems fail. Reuters
Tesla is name-checked in the Reuters piece as one of the companies racing to expand robotaxi services — a reminder that even if Tesla hits its own product milestones, regulatory expectations for robotaxis could tighten across the sector, not loosen.
Deliveries: the next hard datapoint (and the forecasts are splitting)
While robotaxi headlines dominate the vibes, Tesla’s next major scheduled reality check remains vehicle deliveries.
IBD reported Tesla is expected to release Q4 2025 global deliveries around Jan. 2, with analysts forecasting a 9.5% year-over-year decline to about 449,000 units.
But not everyone is at the consensus number. In a delivery preview published Friday, investor/analyst Gene Munster (with Brian Baker) said their estimate is ~415,000 deliveries versus the Street’s ~449,000, implying a steeper year-over-year drop than consensus. Munster’s key takeaway: investors may look past a miss if the results reinforce the idea that Tesla’s auto business is stabilizing and the market remains focused on “physical AI” (FSD/robotaxi/Optimus) as the longer-term value driver. GeneMunster.com
That’s the Tesla paradox in one paragraph: deliveries still matter, but narrative often matters more — right up until narrative meets a number.
Safety scrutiny remains on the tape
Even though it didn’t break in the last 48 hours, one regulatory headline is still hovering over Tesla into the new week: the NHTSA door-release issue.
Reuters reported on Dec. 24 that the U.S. auto safety regulator opened a defect investigation covering an estimated 179,071 model-year 2022 Tesla Model 3 vehicles after a defect petition alleged the mechanical emergency door release is “hidden, unlabeled and not intuitive” in emergencies. Tesla did not immediately respond to Reuters’ request for comment, according to the report. Reuters
Reuters also noted NHTSA previously opened a separate preliminary evaluation into certain Model Y vehicles over reports of electronic door handles becoming inoperative.
For TSLA traders, this category of headline tends to matter less for the day-to-day “tape” than deliveries or autonomy updates — until it escalates into broader enforcement actions, recalls, or sustained reputational damage.
Analyst targets: huge dispersion, “Neutral/Hold” still common
If you’re looking for a clean Wall Street consensus on Tesla stock, you won’t find one — at least not a tight one.
- Investing.com shows a “Neutral” consensus rating (based on its tracked analysts) and an average 12-month price target around $399 (high estimate $600, low $120). Investing.com
- TipRanks shows an average price target around $385, with a high forecast of $600 and a notably low outlier forecast; TipRanks also lists a consensus that skews “Hold” based on its compilation. TipRanks
The takeaway isn’t the exact average target (different platforms track different analyst sets). The takeaway is the spread: Tesla remains a stock where analysts can agree it’s important — and disagree wildly on what it’s worth.
A “defining year” framing for 2026
Looking past the next session, the autonomy narrative is already being marketed as the core of Tesla’s 2026 story. Investor’s Business Daily reported Wedbush analyst Dan Ives is calling 2026 a “defining year” for Tesla, emphasizing a shift from self-driving promises to scaling robotaxi execution. IBD also reported Ives expects Tesla to deploy Cybercabs (steering-wheel-and-pedal-free vehicles) across 30 cities starting around April–May 2026, and he assigns enormous potential value to autonomy (with additional upside tied to Optimus and energy storage). Investors.com
What investors should know before Monday’s session
With the stock exchange closed right now, the near-term playbook is less about “what TSLA did today” and more about “what could change before the open”:
- Watch for weekend autonomy updates. Musk/Tesla posts can move expectations quickly for Monday’s trade, especially around the year-end robotaxi milestone.
- Deliveries are the next scheduled catalyst. Consensus and prominent independent forecasts are already diverging, raising the odds of a sharp move if the reported number surprises either direction.
- Regulatory headlines can resurface fast. The NHTSA door-release investigation is the kind of ongoing story that can escalate with new findings, legal actions, or official updates.
- Macro tone still matters in year-end trading. IBD’s weekend market coverage flagged strength into the year’s close and positioned Tesla among the mega-cap names drawing attention as 2025 winds down.
Tesla stock has always been part automaker, part software bet, part social-media event. Going into Monday, the most “Tesla” thing about TSLA is that the next big move could come from a delivery print — or from a 20-second autonomy clip that convinces the market the future arrived early.
