After Elon Musk recently made a name for himself with his takeover bid for Twitter, the electric car manufacturer Tesla, which he manages, is now moving into the spotlight again.

On Wednesday after the market closed, the company reported another record profit for the first quarter.

The numbers were generally better than expected, and the share price at times rose more than 5 percent in after-hours trading.

Tesla stock has previously lost more than 15 percent since the start of the year.

The company still has a market value of more than one trillion dollars.

It exceeded this threshold for the first time last autumn.

Roland Lindner

Business correspondent in New York.

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Overall, Tesla reported net income of $3.3 billion for the first three months.

This significantly exceeded the previous record of $2.3 billion from the final quarter of 2021.

Earnings per share of $3.22 were nearly a dollar higher than analysts had expected.

Tesla delivered around 310,000 cars last quarter, up 68 percent year-on-year.

This was achieved even though the company, like many of its competitors, suffers from bottlenecks in its supply chain.

It says it has not been able to operate at full capacity at its plants for several quarters and will continue to do so through the end of the year.

Recently, Tesla also had to temporarily close its factory in Shanghai due to corona restrictions.

The quarterly report said that production had now started again to a limited extent.

936,000 cars delivered

Last year, Tesla delivered a total of 936,000 cars.

The company aims to increase the number of deliveries by an average of 50 percent in the coming years.

The automaker is currently rapidly expanding its production network in order to maintain its market-leading position in an increasingly competitive environment.

In March, it opened its first European plant in Grünheide, Brandenburg, and just under two weeks ago, another production facility in Austin, Texas, officially went into operation.

The location in Austin is the second in Tesla's American home market after the main plant in California.

Tesla used to owe its profits entirely to its highly profitable emission point sideline.

The company gets these credits from governments for the production of electric cars and then sells them to competitors, which help them meet government emissions regulations.

In the end, however, this business only accounted for a comparatively small part of the profit.

In the first quarter it was $679 million.

Elon Musk made a purchase offer for Twitter about a week ago and offers more than 40 billion dollars.

The online platform has so far resisted the takeover attempt and has announced a so-called "poison pill" that would make the project significantly more expensive for the Tesla boss.

Musk may be the richest person in the world, but it's unclear if he'd be able to fund the acquisition, given that most of his wealth is tied to Tesla stock.

Recently, American media reported that there are financial investors who could participate in a takeover.