Tesla (TSLA): Dan Ives Puts SpaceX Merger Odds Above 80% by End-2027

Dan Ives Sets a 2027 Timeline

Tesla (TSLA) beat third-quarter delivery estimates with 486,532 vehicles, yet the Model 3 and Model Y made up 98% of the total, leaving all other models, the Cybertruck included, to account for the remaining 2%. Dan Ives, partner and senior managing director at Yorkville Ives & Co., argues that mix is exactly why the stock now trades on what comes next rather than on the quarter itself. In an interview published Friday, Oct. 2, he laid out a timeline: robotaxis, meaning driverless ride-hailing cars, reaching more cities in early to mid 2027, with Optimus, Tesla's humanoid robot, following in the second half of that year. Regulation has slowed the robotaxi rollout so far, he said. Demand is stabilizing, helped by a rebound in Europe after several years of declines, though Ives does not expect the Cybertruck, which sits at the high end of the market, to move demand much. “And that’s why 2027 I think could be a golden year for Tesla,” he said. Both programs, in his framing, belong to the company's shift from an electric vehicle maker to an artificial intelligence company. He put the odds of a Tesla and SpaceX merger above 80% by the end of 2027, and added that the AI trade is only in its third inning, with chip demand running 13-to-1 against supply. The case rests on businesses that have yet to prove themselves commercially, a point Ives does not dispute; his argument is about direction, not current income. What the delivery report shows is a core business that works, nearly half a million cars moved in a single quarter. What it does not show is robotaxi fare revenue or an Optimus unit sale, the bet he is asking investors to underwrite two years forward.

Wells Fargo's $130 Counterweight

The bull case has a measured counterweight. Wells Fargo analyst Colin Langan kept an Underweight rating on Tesla in July, a sell-equivalent call, with a $130 price target that sat about 67% below the roughly $396 share price at the time. Langan expects price cuts and rising input costs, including copper and lithium, to blunt the profit from higher volume, so more deliveries would not rescue margins in his model. Neither camp can point to a booked revenue figure for robotaxi or Optimus, and Tesla's investor-relations disclosures give no standalone line for either program, so both the 2027 thesis and the Underweight rating rest on projections rather than disclosed income. That is the honest limit of the debate, and it is why the next earnings report matters beyond the usual snapshot. Tesla reports on Oct. 21, and the print will give the next read on car margins, the line item Langan says price cuts are eroding and Ives says is stabilizing. The shares had been down nearly 20% year to date before mounting a comeback from late July, so the delivery beat landed on a stock already recovering its footing. The gap between the two targets frames the split plainly: $130 prices a shrinking car business with no AI payoff, while the bull case prices optionality that has not yet earned its first dollar. The question both analysts share reaches past the company to how long investors will keep funding AI bets before robots and driverless cars actually produce revenue. Until an answer appears in the accounts, the Oct. 21 margin print is the nearest scheduled test of it.

$365.66 Support in Focus

COINOTAG data shows Tesla (TSLA) last trading at $373.16, up 0.36% over 24 hours, inside a $371.35–$374.66 range. Our composite scoring rates the $365.66 support at 89/100, where a high-volume node, the Ichimoku Kijun and the Fibonacci 0.500 level converge, while the $382.86 resistance scores 78/100 on the ATR upper band and Fibonacci 0.618. The Bollinger Bands middle band anchors a nearer floor at $371.21, scored 74/100 alongside the 20-day SMA. RSI reads 57.4 with a bearish MACD signal and a sideways daily trend; perpetual open interest stands near $42.9 million. Since the delivery news, trading has held inside the $371.21–$382.86 corridor: a daily close above $382.86 would confirm the post-quarter bid, while losing $365.66 would invalidate it.