Tesla stock popped Monday on a report that President-elect Donald Trump's transition team wants a federal framework for self-driving vehicles. Tesla CEO Elon Musk, a huge Trump supporter who has become part of the inner circle, has argued for this.
Currently, autonomous driving efforts must get approval state by state, though some such as Texas and Florida have no restrictions. Still, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration could issue rules that could ease the path toward self-driving adoption. Congressional legislation would be more important.
The Trump team is looking for policymakers for the Transportation Department's NHTSA to develop a framework to regulate self-driving vehicles, Bloomberg reported Sunday night, citing sources.
Of course, regulation isn't the current barrier for Tesla launching robotaxis. Its Full Self-Driving system, despite its name, is a Level 2 driver-assist system. Musk says he expects Tesla to achieve self-driving in Texas and California by mid-2025, but he's said "this year" or "next year" for almost a decade. FSD safety-critical interventions are still around 100-200 miles. They may need to be 1,000 times higher before Tesla robotaxis are viable.
A national framework could help current robotaxi companies, such as Waymo and Zoox, expand. Waymo is a unit of Google parent Alphabet, which is rapidly expanding actual robotaxi rides in San Francisco, Los Angeles and Phoenix, with more cities coming soon. Amazon.com owns Zoox, which just starting to test robotaxis on public roads in Las Vegas and San Francisco.
Tesla Soars On Trump Victory; Rival Set To Grab BEV Crown
Tesla Model Y Lease
On Sunday, Tesla cut the Model Y starting lease price in the U.S. to $299 a month from $349 a month. That's the same as the entry lease for a Model 3.
Tesla has made a series of moves, including Model 3/Y discounts and shifting to the non-Foundation Cybertruck, to try to boost fourth-quarter sales to achieve Musk's forecast of a full-year delivery gain.
Tesla Stock
Tesla jumped 5.6% to 338.74 on Monday. Investors view the self-driving rules report as another big win for Tesla, or at least TSLA.
TSLA stock edged down 0.2% last week, but that's after surging 29% in the prior week on Trump's election win.
Google stock rose 1.6% Monday. Amazon lost 0.4%.
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