Telsa CEO Elon Musk made a pit stop in Gruenheide, Germany, on Wednesday to visit the electric vehicle maker’s factory that had been forced to temporarily shut down after an arson attack.
On March 6, an anti-fascist group forced a shutdown at Tesla’s Gigafactory Berlin-Brandenburg by setting a nearby electricity transmission tower on fire, cutting off power at the facility and nearby settlements.
The self-identified “Volcano Group” claimed responsibility (link in German) for the incident and labeled Musk a “technofascist” who “stands for colonialism, land grabbing, and an exacerbation of the climate crisis.” They also compared Tesla’s workplace practices to China’s treatment of ethnic Uyghur Muslims, many of whom have been pressed into forced labor.
The arson completely shut down the factory near Berlin for nearly a week and cost Austin, Texas-based Tesla around $1 billion before German energy supply company E.Dis AG repaired the damaged electricity transmission tower.
“They can’t stop us!” Musk told employees at the facility Wednesday while carrying his son X Æ A-12 on his shoulders.
Gigafactory Berlin-Brandenburg’s senior director, Andre Thierig, thanked staff for their handling of the “attack on the Gigafactory” and announced annual wage changes and a bonus system, according to pro-Tesla blogger Alex Voight.
Musk — notorious for his anti-union stances in the U.S. and abroad — has faced an organizing challenge from the IF Metall labor union. Last November, Tesla raised salaries for Giga Berlin’s more than 11,000 workers; IF Metall has claimed credit for the wage hikes, although Tesla has denied any such connection.
Although production has resumed at Giga Berlin, the incident has helped shake analysts’ and investors’ confidence in Tesla. The share of “bullish” ratings on Tesla stock has dropped to its lowest level since April 2021, Bloomberg reported.
Wells Fargo analyst Colin Langan wrote in a note Wednesday he expects Tesla’s sales volumes to be flat this year and decrease in 2025; the German gigafactory usually makes 375,000 Model Y SUVs annually — or between 1,300 and 1,400 each day — which sell for about €45,00 ($49,000)
Tesla “is a growth company with no growth,” Langan wrote, downgrading the stock to the equivalent of a sell rating. In January, the EV maker warned that sales growth would be “notably lower” in 2024.
Deutsche Bank analysts said on Monday that they expect Tesla’s earnings for the first three months of 2024 to miss Wall Street’s expectations, citing increased costs from the low-margin Cybertruck and weakening global demand for electric vehicles. They also expect fewer deliveries for the first quarter.
“The slower ramp up in Model 3 in the U.S. and earlier factory shut down, as well as the recent arson attack at the Berlin facility, will impact factory efficiency gains,” Deutsche Bank said in a note to investors.
And Morgan Stanley analyst Adam Jonas has openly wondered, “Could Tesla lose money (sometime) this year?” in a note to clients on March 6. Jonas cut his price target for Tesla to $320 from $345, pointing out several concerns with the EV market.
Tesla stock fell by nearly 4% on Wednesday. The stock has declined more than 31% so far in 2024. As a result, the company is no longer one of the top 10 U.S. companies by market capitalization, trailing behind Visa and — more recently — J.P. Morgan Chase.