I don't think that's the case; they do an accounting thing where they store the money and don't register all of it as profits until they deliver a set of benchmark features.
So some of it is recognized as profits right away because the car drives into a tree autonomously in a parking lot, or grinds the wheels against a curb when asked to self park, or when it slams on the brakes randomly when going under an overpass while the lane keeping cruise control is enabled. Each new feature allows them to claim more of that $10k as profits, but they still haven't gotten their FSD delivered out of beta so they don't get all of it.
I really like my tesla, BTW. It doesn't quite live up to the promises but it is quite lovely for everything I use it for.
If you seriously believe this I have a bridge to sell you LOL. Elon has a history of shilling FSD and FSD payments at let’s say… opportune times in history when Tesla was at risk of running out of runway.
So some of it is recognized as profits right away because the car drives into a tree autonomously in a parking lot, or grinds the wheels against a curb when asked to self park, or when it slams on the brakes randomly when going under an overpass while the lane keeping cruise control is enabled. Each new feature allows them to claim more of that $10k as profits, but they still haven't gotten their FSD delivered out of beta so they don't get all of it.
I really like my tesla, BTW. It doesn't quite live up to the promises but it is quite lovely for everything I use it for.