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Tesla Stock Is Rising. Its Robo-Taxi Fleet Is About to ‘Double.’

Nov 26, 2025 07:31:00 -0500 by Al Root | #Technology

Coming into Wednesday trading, Tesla stock was up 4% in 2025 and up 24% over the past 12 months. (Photo by THIBAUT DURAND/Hans Lucas/AFP via Getty Images)

Key Points

Tesla stock rose on Wednesday, helped by another tweet from CEO Elon Musk.

Shares of the electric-vehicle maker added 1.7%, closing at $426.58, while the S&P 500 and Dow Jones Industrial Average both rose about 0.7%.

The move came after Musk tweeted late on Tuesday that Tesla’s Austin, Texas, robo-taxi fleet should “roughly double next month.”

Musk has seemingly helped Tesla’s stock a couple of times this week. Over the weekend, he tweeted about Tesla’s design chips for AI computing. Shares jumped almost 7% on Monday, though a market rebound helped, too.

Tesla launched its robo-taxis service in Austin in June with a limited number of cars and safety monitors in the front passenger seat. The company has expanded its service area in Austin over time.

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Now it’s time for more cars, which is pleasing investors. Tesla stock has become more about AI, robo-taxis, and robots than EVs lately.

Coming into Wednesday trading, Tesla stock was up 4% in 2025 and up 24% over the past 12 months, despite falling car sales and earnings estimates.

Tesla is expected to deliver fewer than 1.7 million cars in 2025, down from just over 1.8 million in 2024. Earnings per share are expected to be $1.65, down from $2.42 earned in 2024.

Tesla shareholders, however, believe AI-trained robotaxis and other AI applications, such as humanoid robots, will unlock a new era of earnings growth for the car maker.

Robo-taxi expansion is a necessary part of expected growth. It’s gone a little slower than Musk might have liked. Earlier in 2025, he suggested that Tesla robo-taxis would cover half the U.S. population by the end of the year. That’s unlikely to happen. Along with Austin, Tesla has limited operations in San Francisco, with safety drivers in an invite-only test service. It has sought permits to test and operate robo-taxis in several other cities, such as Las Vegas, too.

Alphabet is close to covering 10% of the U.S. population with its Waymo robotaxi service, according to Melius Research analyst Connor Cunningham.

Waymo vehicles in commercial operation have no one in the front seat. There still aren’t any Tesla robo-taxis without a human in the front seat.

Being as safe as possible, however, is prudent. And despite the modest rollout, Tesla shareholders expect robo-taxi growth to drive shares of their EV maker higher in 2026 and beyond.

Write to Al Root at allen.root@dowjones.com