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Tesla (TSLA) shares rose more than 3% on Tuesday after promising global electric vehicle sales data and media reports that Chinese authorities could allow the electric vehicle giant’s CEO Elon Musk to buy the US operations of social media platform TikTok.
Bloomberg i The Wall Street Journal reported that Chinese government officials have discussed selling TikTok’s US unit to Musk, who is also the CEO of X, formerly known as Twitter.
A TikTok spokesperson responded to Bloomberg’s report saying that “we can’t be expected to comment on pure fiction.”
As of 10:28:15 EST. Open Market
Tesla shares extended gains from Monday, when the stock slipped into positive territory in the afternoon, ending the session up more than 2%.
The promotion comes as research company Rho Motion reported that global sales of all-electric and plug-in hybrid vehicles rose 25.6% year-over-year to 1.9 million in December.
Although sales slowed for the second consecutive month, 2024 turned out to be a record year for electric vehicle sales.
By and large, Wall Street has been taking note of Elon Musk’s reach into a variety of companies and data collection that spans everything from electric vehicles and satellites to social media.
On Monday, Morgan Stanley’s Adam Jonas issued a note on Tesla, making a bullish case for $800 a share, while raising his 12-month price target for the stock from $400 to $430.
“In our view, the recent appreciation in Tesla’s stock price has begun to discount the expanding ‘surface’ between Tesla and physical AI, including the company’s natural advantages in terms of data collection, robotics, energy storage, AI/computing, manufacturing and supporting infrastructure. including the benefits of working at Elon Musk’s other companies (SpaceX, xAI, etc.),” Jonas wrote.
Tesla stock has been an indicator of the “Trump trade” following the presidential election in early November. The stock is up about 65% since Donald Trump won the White House.
The move in stocks this week is a reversal of recent trends, as investors abandoned tech stocks in reaction to lowered expectations of Fed rate cuts this year.
Tesla shares are about 13% off their all-time close of $479.86 on Dec. 17.
Ines Ferre is a senior business reporter at Yahoo Finance. Follow her to X a @ines_ferre.
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