Tesla Motors stock is -- most likely -- about to end its nine-week losing streak. To move higher from current levels, it needs to break through a key price.
Shares of the electric vehicle maker were up 2% in premarket trading.
If Tesla stock can finish north of $248.71, its losing streak is over.
Coming into the week, Tesla stock had dropped for nine consecutive weeks, its worst weekly stretch ever. Shares gave up 42% over that span, which started with Tesla stock at about $427, up roughly $177 a share from levels before President Donald Trump's election victory on Nov. 5.
Investors expected the second Trump administration to benefit Tesla, mainly by helping facilitate the introduction of self-driving cars in America. Tesla plans to launch a robotaxi service this year.
After the inauguration on Jan. 20, investors started to worry that Tesla CEO Elon Musk's political activities were driving some buyers away after he was appointed to lead the Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE. The weekly losing streak started the week of Trump's inauguration.
Now Tesla has a nice cushion, with shares up almost 10% for the week. A couple of things boosted them. For starters, Musk hosted an all-hands meeting for employees on March 20. That helped calm investors' nerves. Next, the stock just seems to have fallen far enough. Shares are still down about 44% from record highs reached in mid-December.
In recent trading, Tesla stock has stalled around its 200-day moving average, which is currently about $285 a share. Moving averages can represent support or resistance -- they can be a level at which investors will step in and buy stock, or where they will take profits.
If shares can get through the 200-day moving average they can run to about $320, according to market technicians Katie Stockton of Fairlead Strategies and Frank Cappelleri of CappThesis.
They aren't making a fundamental call on Tesla stock. They study history and charts to understand investor behavior to help predict what will happen next.
With Tesla, it's almost impossible to know what comes next.
This week, Tesla stock went up despite tariffs that threaten U.S. auto industry profitability. General Motors shares were down 5% for the week. Next week, Tesla will report first-quarter deliveries. The most current Wall Street estimates are in the range of 360,000 vehicles. Tesla delivered about 387,000 in the first quarter of 2024.
How Tesla's stock will react to the results is anyone's guess.