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Tesla Faces Falling Sales—But Is That the Wrong Story?
Authored by Sam Quirke. Publication Date: 2/19/2026.
Key Points
- Tesla’s delivery numbers are continuing to fall, yet the stock is managing to stay above key support.
- CEO Elon Musk’s new “Amazing Abundance” mission reframes Tesla as a robotics and autonomy company, not just an EV maker.
- With the uptrend from last April still intact and fresh Buy ratings targeting $550, this is a stock that should be on every watchlist.
Tesla Inc (NASDAQ: TSLA) once again finds itself balanced on a knife-edge, but the backdrop is different this time: headlines are cautious, delivery data looks soft, and critics say the electric-vehicle growth story is losing momentum.
At the same time, investors increasingly view Tesla as more than an EV maker — and that changes how materially falling sales affect valuation.
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Heading into the second half of Q1, raw sales data warrants caution: deliveries have fallen by double digits again.
From an EV-only perspective, those numbers argue for restraint. Yet the stock has stayed afloat and remains in the uptrend that began last April.
That uptrend has been tested in recent weeks, but bears have repeatedly failed to push shares below the post-earnings dip around $390. Given the price refuses to lean into a bearish narrative, the market may already be looking past the EV slowdown. Here's how to think about the opportunity with Tesla right now.
The Bear Case Is Clear
Declining month-over-month deliveries are not trivial. Slowing demand, inventory build, and margin compression are legitimate risks for any automaker, even one as vertically integrated as Tesla. Investors who focus purely on auto fundamentals can draw a straightforward conclusion: sales are falling; therefore, earnings pressure should follow.
EV competition is intensifying globally. Pricing adjustments and incentives increasingly resemble panic measures rather than strategic levers. Viewed in isolation, Tesla's core auto business doesn't promise much upside. But Tesla has historically traded on future growth prospects rather than past performance — and that's where the bear case weakens.
“Amazing Abundance” Changes the Frame
On last month's earnings call, CEO Elon Musk introduced a new mission for the company: "Amazing Abundance." That framing signals a structural pivot from carmaker to robotics and autonomy platform.
Musk argued that Tesla's Optimus humanoid robots could eventually reshape U.S. economic output and have a meaningful impact on GDP. This isn't incremental upside on top of core EV growth — it points to a fundamentally different total addressable market.
To underscore the shift's seriousness, Tesla is sunsetting the Model S and Model X this year and reallocating production capacity toward Optimus. That is real capital redeployment, not just conference-call rhetoric, and it shows management is positioning autonomy and robotics as the next chapter of value creation.
For investors, this reframes the question. If Tesla can successfully execute a pivot into a robotics and AI manufacturing leader, near-term volatility in delivery numbers would become far less relevant.
Analysts Are Leaning Into the Pivot
The sell-side reaction reflects this evolving narrative. Tigress Financial last week upgraded the stock from Neutral to Buy and set a $550 price target, implying roughly 35% upside from current levels. That call echoes reiterated Buy ratings from Benchmark and Deutsche Bank in recent weeks.
Importantly, this bullish positioning is occurring even as sales headlines remain negative, suggesting analysts are banking on the company successfully making the pivot.
How to Play the Setup
The key question is time horizon. Short-term investors will focus on quarterly delivery data, where volatility is likely to remain elevated. Over the next few quarters, sales trends will dominate headlines, and any further weakness could spook investors.
For those thinking in multi-month or multi-year terms, the robotics thesis is beginning to take shape. If Tesla can show tangible progress on Optimus production, autonomy deployment, and AI integration into manufacturing, the market will increasingly price the company on future robotics cash flows rather than current auto numbers.
If the stock can continue to hold support around the $390 mark in the coming weeks, it would confirm that the market is willing to look past EV softness. In that scenario, the path toward $500 and beyond becomes plausible. If, however, $390 fails and the uptrend from last April breaks cleanly, the bulls will have blinked — suggesting the market is not yet ready to fully embrace the robotics pivot.
Berkshire & AI Hyperscalers: Buffett Holds GOOGL, Dumps AMZN
Authored by Leo Miller. Publication Date: 2/18/2026.
Key Points
- Berkshire Hathaway's latest 13F filing revealed interesting moves from Q4 2025, especially regarding AI hyperscalers.
- The company initiated a position in a top media company, pushing hard into the digital economy.
- While Berkshire sold a portion of its AAPL holdings, the Magnificent Seven stock remains its largest position.
Investment giant Berkshire Hathaway (NYSE: BRK.B) just released its Q4 2025 portfolio moves. The company's 13F filing details the trades it made during the quarter ending Dec. 31, offering insight into its views on several notable names. The firm's key portfolio changes include one of the world's best-known media companies and multiple Magnificent Seven stocks.
This round of trades is particularly noteworthy because at the end of 2025, Berkshire founder Warren Buffett officially retired as CEO. Greg Abel has taken over the role, while Buffett remains influential as Chairman of the Board.
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These were Berkshire's final moves while Buffett served as CEO. As he steps away after an extraordinary 60 years, here are the most significant trades from Q4 2025.
The New York Times: Berkshire's Shiny New Holding
In Q4, Berkshire initiated a new position in The New York Times (NYSE: NYT), buying nearly 5.1 million shares. While notable, the stake is relatively small compared with the size of Berkshire's overall portfolio.
At the end of Q4 the position was worth roughly $352 million, or about 0.13% of Berkshire's equity holdings.
NYT shares performed well in Q4, rising roughly 21%, and the stock has continued higher into 2026. NYT's November earnings report was a key catalyst for the rally.
That quarter the company added 460,000 net new digital subscribers, a 77% year-over-year increase. Digital advertising revenue also grew by 20%, accelerating each quarter since Q4 2023 and reaching 25% in NYT's latest earnings.
Berkshire's purchase signals confidence in NYT's digital transformation, which has made meaningful progress.
Berkshire Reduces Apple Stake, Trims Several Key Names
Berkshire trimmed its stake in Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL) by about 4% during Q4, continuing a recent pattern of selling the iPhone maker. In Q2 2025 the firm reduced Apple holdings by roughly 7%, and cut the position by 15% in Q3 2025.
Despite the reductions, Apple remained Berkshire's largest holding at nearly $62 billion at the end of Q4, representing almost 23% of its equity portfolio — indicating continued long-term confidence.
Other notable reductions included selling 48% of its stake in the Atlanta Braves (NASDAQ: BATRK), trimming Bank of America (NYSE: BAC) by 9%, and cutting Constellation Brands (NYSE: STZ) by 3%. The largest headline, however, was Berkshire's sale of hyperscaler and Magnificent Seven giant Amazon.com (NASDAQ: AMZN).
AMZN vs GOOGL: Berkshire Dumps One, Holds the Other Steady
During the quarter, Berkshire sold more than 7.7 million Amazon shares, cutting its holdings from 10 million to about 2.3 million shares — a roughly 77% reduction. That sale was abrupt compared with previous changes; Berkshire hadn't materially reduced its AMZN position since trimming 11 million to 10 million shares in Q3 2023.
There are several possible reasons for the dramatic reduction. Amazon reached an all-time closing high of $254 in Q4 and has since fallen roughly 20%, and Berkshire may have taken profits near those peak levels. Another factor could be Amazon's aggressive capital expenditure outlook: the company plans about $200 billion in CapEx for 2026, the highest among hyperscalers and roughly $50 billion above analyst expectations. That guidance helped put downward pressure on Amazon's share price after its latest earnings.
By contrast, Berkshire left its position in Amazon's cloud rival, Google parent company Alphabet (NASDAQ: GOOGL), unchanged. Alphabet also reached new highs in Q4, suggesting Berkshire is relatively more confident in Google's cloud and artificial intelligence strategy than in Amazon's.
Analyst Forecasts Clash with Berkshire's Long-Term Perspective
Overall, the most interesting takeaway from Berkshire's Q4 13F is not only what the firm bought and sold, but what it chose to hold. Selling Amazon while maintaining its Google stake indicates a clear preference for the latter.
That preference contrasts with some analyst forecasts. The consensus price target for AMZN implies roughly 43% upside, while the consensus target for GOOGL implies about 20% upside. Keep in mind these are 12-month forecasts; Berkshire, by contrast, typically invests with a multi-year horizon and appears to be signaling where it sees long-term value.
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