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What a perfect PR headline. Exciting, confusing, non-specific. "Wow a 52% quarterly surge, Tesla's on fire!" I thought that meant they sold 52% more cars tha
by aresant 11y ago
What a perfect PR headline.
Exciting, confusing, non-specific.
"Wow a 52% quarterly surge, Tesla's on fire!"
I thought that meant they sold 52% more cars than Q1.
But what they really are saying is "Tesla sold 52% more cars in Q2 2015 than Q2 2014"
And they are still less than halfway through year end's target 2 quarters in which analysts feel certain they will not hit without the Model X release (2)
With all the discussion around the Unicorns preferring to stay private how much of a factor must avoiding the colossal pain in the ass of having to engineer this kind of financial-speak every quarter on top of just trying to run your business.
(1) http://www.ibtimes.com/tesla-motors-inc-tsla-likely-miss-2015-delivery-target-55000-model-s-model-x-cars-1881582 http://www.ibtimes.com/tesla-motors-inc-tsla-likely-miss-201...
- greglindahl 11y agoThe default in financial magazines is year-based comparisons. Headlines are short.
- mikeash 11y agoHow often are percentages used in a financial context that aren't year-over-year percentages? Your statement about the Model X confuses me. Of course analysts think that they need Model X shipments to meet their year-end target, because that's exactly what the company itself has said.
- sp332 11y agoMaybe when it explicitly says "quarterly", as in the headline?
- epistasis 11y agoNope, quarters are always compared year over year.
- sp332 11y agoWhat's the term for "compared to last quarter"?
- greglindahl 11y agoSequentially.
- damoncali 11y agoThat's generally what people mean in finance - YOY growth. Otherwise you get seasonal data problems (pretty much every retailer's Q4 is huge relative to Q3 because of Christmas, for example). As always, dig deeper. Tesla isn't out of the woods yet.
- jws 11y agoThat is the case. But I think the word "surge" is confusing people. If it said "up 52%" I'd assume year on year. But somehow "surge" implies a change in continuous state.
- deleted 11y ago[deleted]
- abc_lisper 11y agoThey are always YOY, because of seasonal sales. A spurt during thanksgiving season, does not always mean you did better than previous quarter.