It may be a few years later than expected, but the debut of Tesla's (TSLA) -) Cybertruck is finally here.
Beginning Thursday, the world's preeminent electric vehicle maker will start delivering its first entrant into the pickup truck space that has dominated the U.S. market for years.
Related: Elon Musk backpedals on harsh Cybertruck resale guidelines
While electric pickups have failed to gain popularity, the ICE version of the vehicle has consistently been the one type of vehicle in America that seems immune to the downturns sedans and other vehicles have experienced.
In 2022, Ford (F) -) sold 640,000 F-150 pickup trucks, marking its 41st consecutive year as the country's bestselling vehicle.
Tesla may never reach that level of saturation with the Cybertruck, but finding the right price range for the vehicle will go a long way to determining how competitive the company will be in the space.
The company announced that the vehicle price would start at $39,000 when the Cybertuck was first unveiled in 2019. Musk has said in the past that he wanted to keep the base model of the vehicle under $50,000.
But Wedbush analyst Dan Ives doesn't think the company will be able to accommodate Musk's wishes when the price tag is officially announced later this week.
"This is another historical moment for Tesla and Musk with the Cybertruck unveil as the Street is excited to see the formal vehicle launch featuring the dual-motor trim and its top-level tri-motor AWD performance model along with updates regarding production and scaling of the Cybertruck platform which is expected to be ~250k units per year by FY25," Ives said in his note, according to Street Insider.
"We believe updated pricing will come out at Thursday's event on each of the trim levels as the company scales the Cybertruck production story to give more clarity to the Street. Whisper numbers for the single motor are in the ~$50k range, with prices for the dual and tri-motor variants likely to be in the $60k - $80k range."
Small details have been leaking out about the vehicle ahead of Thursday, with confirmation that the pickup will have a 2,500 pound payload and 11,000 pounds of towing capacity.
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