The Daily Populous Saturday January 3rd, 2026 morning edition
Authored by news.sky.com and submitted by VectorChing101

Tesla has lost its crown as the world's bestselling electric vehicle maker.

The US firm faced a difficult year with unease over chief executive Elon Musk's political activities and stiff overseas competition that pushed sales down for a second year in a row.

Tesla said that it delivered 1.64 million vehicles in 2025, a decrease of 9% from a year earlier.

Chinese rival BYD, which sold 2.26 million vehicles last year, is now the biggest EV maker.

Tesla sales totalled 418,227 between October and December, falling short of the 440,000 that analysts polled by FactSet expected.

The sales total may have been hit by the end of a $7,500 (£5,500) tax credit phased out by the Trump administration at the end of September.

Get Sky News on WhatsApp Follow our channel and never miss an update Tap here to follow

Despite this Tesla stock finished 2025 with a gain of approximately 11%. Investors hope Musk can deliver on his ambitions to make the company a leader in robotaxi services and get consumers to embrace humanoid robots that can perform basic tasks in homes and offices.

Shares of Tesla rose almost 2% before the opening bell on Friday, with stock mostly unchanged at $450.27 in early trading.

Musk's $1trn pay package approved by Tesla

Tesla looks to cheaper model amid sales slump

Be the first to get Breaking News Install the Sky News app for free

The latest quarter was the first with sales of stripped-down versions of the Model Y and Model 3 that Musk unveiled in early October as part of an effort to revive sales.

The new Model Y costs just under $40,000 (£30,000) while customers can buy the cheaper Model 3 for under $37,000 (£27,000).

The new versions are aimed at helping Tesla to compete with Chinese models in Europe and Asia.

For fourth-quarter earnings coming out in late January, analysts are expecting the company to post a 3% decrease in sales and a nearly 40% drop in earnings per share, according to FactSet.

Analysts expect the downward trend in sales and profits to eventually reverse itself further into 2026.

In November, Musk won a shareholder vote that will see him net a $1trn (£742bn) pay package if the firm meets a series of extremely ambitious performance targets over the next 10 years.

Already the world's richest man, he scored another huge windfall last month when the Delaware Supreme Court reversed a decision that deprived him of a $550bn (£408bn) pay package that Tesla gave him in 2018.

JerryDipotosBurner on January 2nd, 2026 at 23:00 UTC »

BYD surpassing Tesla whilst not even being in the US market simply says more about Tesla than anything else, really.

But nothing about that company makes any sense for the past like 2 years. Their sales are declining, the quality of their vehicles is decreasing, yet their stock goes up and they continue to give Elon all the money in the world.

Tiny_Xander_Klaxon on January 2nd, 2026 at 22:56 UTC »

And China also just banned retractable car door handles due to the obvious safety issue.

So unless Tesla can reengineer every model, they won’t be able to sell new vehicles in China as of 2027.

ObliviousRounding on January 2nd, 2026 at 22:54 UTC »

Well now the board has no choice but to offer him a 50 bazillion dollar pay package.