Tesla has reported a second consecutive drop in quarterly profits as the world’s biggest electric car maker cut prices in an attempt to boost falling demand.
Elon Musk’s company said profits fell by 45pc in the second quarter of the year to $1.5bn (£1.2bn). It came despite revenues rising slightly, to $25.5bn.
The company’s shares fell 4pc after the results as it said it continues to expect “notably lower” growth this year.
Tesla, the world’s most valuable car manufacturer, has reduced prices and resorted to cheap financing in an attempt to maintain sales of its vehicles amid a wider slump in electric car demand.
Its car sales have fallen for the last two quarters, the first back-to-back sales decline for more than a decade.
“We believe that a pure EV is the optimal vehicle design and will ultimately win over consumers as the myths on range, charging and service are debunked,” the company said.
Investors have warmed to the company in recent weeks after Mr Musk promised to speed up development of its new lower-cost vehicle and with sales declines less severe than feared.
Mr Musk has also invested heavily in artificial intelligence, touting improvements in the company’s self-driving software and promising that Tesla’s “Optimus” humanoid robots will be a feature in its factories as soon as next year.
The company said on Tuesday night that the Optimus robot was performing its first tasks, handling batteries in one of its facilities.
Tesla was due to unveil a fully autonomous “robotaxi” at an event in August but Mr Musk recently confirmed that the event had been delayed, saying he wanted to make changes to the car’s design.
Mr Musk, the world’s richest man, recently endorsed Donald Trump ahead of November’s US election, which has raised concerns that the left-leaning voters that have typically bought electric cars may boycott Tesla vehicles.
Meanwhile, Alphabet, Google’s parent company, revealed record profits amid continuing strength in its dominant digital advertising business.
Alphabet recorded a $23.6bn profit, up 29pc, as the search giant’s online advertising dominance continued. Quarterly revenues rose 14pc to $85bn.
It came after Google U-turned on controversial privacy changes that had led to warnings of a catastrophic drop in revenues at news websites.
The web giant said it was dropping a plan to block third-party cookies in its Chrome browser, more than four years after first unveiling the proposals.
Website publishers had warned that the changes would block them from selling targeted adverts, leading to huge declines in sales and threatening smaller sites.
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