Transportation

Tesla's global market share fell to its lowest level in over 2 years as electric car competition heats up

Tesla CEO Elon Musk in a Suit in Manhattan.JPG
Tesla CEO Elon Musk. Brendan McDermid/Reuters
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Tesla's grip on the electric-car market is slipping.

In April, the carmaker's global market share fell to its lowest level since January 2019, according to Credit Suisse analyst Dan Levy. Tesla's slice of the global EV market share dropped from 29% to 11% between March and April as more automakers flooded the space.

Former Ford CEO Mark Fields told CNBC that Tesla CEO Elon Musk is facing pressure from several automotive companies.

"One of the many things [Musk] did is he pushed the industry toward taking EV seriously," Fields said. "He has real competition now, and that's why you're seeing some of their share in some of the major markets under a lot of pressure."

Tesla's market share decreased across the board from China to Europe, as well as the US, according to Levy.

While Tesla remains the leading electric car company in the US, its market share has continued to slip. In April, Tesla's market share dropped to 55% from 72% the previous month. 

Levy attributes the drop to recent price hikes for Tesla products, as well as emerging competition from automakers like Ford and General Motors who have capitalized on Musk's momentum. He noted that Volkswagen took the lead in Europe and Ford's new Mustang Mach-e has cut into Tesla's US sales.

Tesla's market share has been receding for several months. In February, the Mustang Mach-e became the third-highest-selling electric vehicle in its first full month of sales. Last month, Ford announced its electric F-150 and the vehicle quickly captured public attention after President Joe Biden toured Ford's plant. After its debut, Ford took in over 44,500 preorders for the vehicle within 48 hours.

GM has also garnered significant fanfare in recent months for details surrounding the future launches of its Hummer EV, as well as its Chevrolet Silverado electric pickup truck.

Meanwhile, Tesla has faced scrutiny over the safety of some of its vehicles. On Thursday, the car company announced its third recall this month. Its autopilot system has also come under fire this year amid several car crashes.

Tesla stock surged in 2020, but has already dropped over 14% in 2021. Tesla's stock dropped as much as 4% to its lowest level in three weeks after the market-share data was released on Wednesday. The company was trading just below $600 per share at the time of publication. 

Tesla's loss has been Ford's gain. Ford shares have rallied almost 69% this year.

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Grace Kay
Grace Kay was a Correspondent on Business Insider’s enterprise desk, where she covered the inner workings of Tesla, Elon Musk’s AI startup, xAI, and the broader robotics and electric vehicle industries.Her stories have been cited by multiple publications, including Reuters, Bloomberg, and CNBC. Before joining Business Insider, she worked at Bloomberg and Forbes.Tesla: Inside 'Project Rodeo,' the Tesla effort pushing the limits of self-driving technologyInternal Tesla salary database shows Elon Musk's strategy: Lower salaries, bigger stock grantsTesla tells staff it plans to roll out its Robotaxi service in San Francisco this weekendTesla has been working on modified Model Ys for its Robotaxi programTesla prioritizes Musk's and other 'VIP' drivers' data to train self-driving softwareAshok Elluswamy is the most powerful Tesla executive you've never heard ofxAI:Internal documents reveal how Elon Musk's xAI trains Grok to be the anti-woke chatbotXAI's Macrohard project stalls as Tesla ramps up a similar AI agent effortElon Musk's xAI plans to supply computing power to coding startup CursorWar rooms, group chats, and video games: Inside Elon Musk's AI startupBehind Grok's 'sexy' settings, workers review explicit and disturbing contentElon Musk's xAI lays off hundreds of workers tasked with training GrokEVs and robots:Fisker employees are fixing some customers' cars with parts from the company's vehicle 'graveyard,' sources sayFisker Ocean reservation cancellations top 40,000 as the EV company tries to fight off bankruptcy, leaked data showsInside the downfall of Henrik Fisker's second automotive startup, which just filed for bankruptcyInside the glass-walled Tesla lab where workers train the Optimus robot to act like a humanInside OpenAI's renewed push into robotics