It may be uncertain times for Tesla with the closure of its USA plant during Covid-19 lockdown, but there is a silver lining with a successful first quarter for the electric vehicle manufacturer.

Tesla handed over 88,400 vehicles worldwide in the first quarter of 2020, a record for the period, but down 21 per cent from the last three months of 2019, says Automotive News.

But the total beat analysts’ average estimate for about 78,100 vehicles.

In the first quarter of 2019, Tesla had 63,000 sales worldwide when Model 3 deliveries were increased. While New Zealand customers didn’t get their Model 3 until late August, 657 were delivered to Kiwis by the end of 2019.

For the first two months of this year, 75 Model 3s have been delivered to New Zealand.

But overseas, analysts were surprised by Tesla’s success so far this year.

“I’m shocked they did so well,” Gene Munster, managing partner of US venture capital firm Loup Ventures told Automotive News.

 “I don’t know how they did it. They had every excuse in the world to put out a bad number.”

Tesla tried to salvage as much business as possible in March by introducing “touchless” deliveries at a time when authorities around the globe were urging would-be car buyers to shelter in place, says Automotive News.

It also saw the reopening of its China assembly plant this week while the first Model Y crossovers started reaching US customers in mid-March.

Tesla said production and deliveries of the Model Y were significantly ahead of schedule.

Tesla founder Elon Musk predicted the Model Y would be a big seller, potentially eclipsing the combined volume of the Model 3, S and X.

But Musk in July 2019 said that the first quarter of 2020 would be “tough”. Tesla’s vehicles are no longer eligible for federal tax credits in the U.S., and buyers also are getting less-generous support from the Netherlands, a market that contributed to record fourth-quarter deliveries, says Automotive News.