1-Star Stocks Poised to Plunge: Tesla Motors? (TSLA)

1-Star Stocks Poised to Plunge: Tesla Motors?

Based on the aggregated intelligence of 180,000-plus investors participating in Motley Fool CAPS, the Fool's free investing community, electric vehicle maker Tesla Motors (Nasdaq: TSLA ) has received the dreaded one-star ranking.

With that in mind, let's take a closer look at Tesla's business and see what CAPS investors are saying about the stock right now.

Tesla facts

Headquarters (founded)	Palo Alto, Calif. (2003)
Market Cap	$3.8 billion
Industry	Automobile manufacturers
Trailing-12-Month Revenue	$185.4 million
Management	Co-Founder/Chairman/CEO Elon Musk CFO Deepak Ahuja
Trailing-12-Month Return on Capital	(46.3%)
Cash/Debt	$243.6 million / $365.9 million
Competitors	General Motors Pininfarina Toyota Motor

Sources: S&P Capital IQ and Motley Fool CAPS.

On CAPS, 44% of the 921 members who have rated Tesla believe the stock will underperform the S&P 500 going forward.

A few months ago, one of those Fools, Straightener, succinctly summed up the Tesla bear case for our community:

Currently this stock is priced as though they are going to execute their business plan flawlessly. As with any auto start-up, there are bound to be bumps along the way, and electric cars are not really taking off as previously expected. They have always lost money, and will probably continue to do so for the foreseeable future.

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Fool contributor Brian Pacampara owns no position in any of the companies mentioned. Motley Fool newsletter services have recommended buying shares of General Motors. Try any of our Foolish newsletter services free for 30 days.

We Fools may not all hold the same opinions, but we all believe that considering a diverse range of insights makes us better investors. The Fool's disclosure policy always gets a perfect score.

Comments from our Foolish Readers

Help us keep this a respectfully Foolish area! This is a place for our readers to discuss, debate, and learn more about the Foolish investing topic you read about above. Help us keep it clean and safe. If you believe a comment is abusive or otherwise violates our Fool's Rules, please report it via the Report this Comment icon found on every comment.

Report this Comment On July 17, 2012, at 4:08 PM, devmonkey wrote:

Yeah.. Motley Fool. What a pitch. "Hey TSLA's a one star stock, but wait.. there's more. We've found a better investment opportunity for you viewers! NOW, how much would you pay? Don't answer yet!"
What is it this time? Something that's got Bill Gates scared? Possibly a 3-D printer company? Where's the soundtrack of the paid studio audience?
You guys had some respect a while ago. now it's just 3am infomercials.
Report this Comment On July 17, 2012, at 8:28 PM, STOCKNEWBIE86 wrote:

Tesla is a start up company and has already felt the sensation of failure with there first car the Roadster, fortunately they fixed all issues with the Roadster and has since perfected the Electric car for todays standards, and ultimately 300 miles and 0-60 in 4.4 seconds is unheard of in a sedan, much less an electric sedan. I give Tesla a thumbs up and will continue to invest in the company that will and has beat all previous accusations thus far. In fact, it has actually done something no start up has done in a long time, compete against companies that were once invulnerable to start ups. The car industry, that is why it is so vital that this company succeed, and according to my research it is doing a great job of it.
Report this Comment On July 18, 2012, at 7:42 AM, Borisbmx wrote:

the customer feed back from the Model S test driving is quite good. This may lead to an uptick in preorders. I hope TSLA has something concrete to say about the preorder count when quaterly report is released in August.

updated Moments ago Sponsored by:
	DOW	15,307.17	-80.41	-0.52%
	S&P 500	1,655.35	-13.81	-0.83%
	NASD	3,463.30	-38.82	-1.11%

TSLA	$87.24		-0.35	-0.40%
Tesla Motors		CAPS Rating:

4

1-Star Stocks Poised to Plunge: Tesla Motors?

Comments from our Foolish Readers

Report this Comment On July 17, 2012, at 4:08 PM, devmonkey wrote:

Report this Comment On July 17, 2012, at 8:28 PM, STOCKNEWBIE86 wrote:

Report this Comment On July 18, 2012, at 7:42 AM, Borisbmx wrote:

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