2017 Investor Roundtable:General Discussion

[mmd]

Speaking about TE products, California flood of green energy could drive a record 8GW of curtailment this spring.

Here is the framework of how California Independent System Operator (CAISO) deals with oversupply of electricity:

So, here lies an opportunity for the innovative entrepreneurship. Welcome to the era of commercial battery energy storage, supplied by Tesla

The article is not clear on the energy capacity of the behind-the-meter portfolio to be managed by AWS, but assuming 2 to 4 hours will yield 100 to 200MWh, which is between 25% and 150% larger than Mira Loma BES. Given 8GW of curtailement looming just this spring, 50GW of BES is a drop in the bucket. The BES market is bound for huge growth, and Tesla had foresight to invest heavily in infrastructure to exploit this opportunity.

Well, there is already 16.5 GW of hydro (or wil be soon), with over 200 GWh of total storage in California. Storing 8GW of peak solar generation is no problem. There is still a while before batteries can catch up with hydro in scale.
CA pumped storage hydroelectric project to provide state clean energy

 

[neroden]

While poking around on institutional ownership, I discovered that Renaissance (the high speed quants) moved into Tesla end of December.

Anyway, as long as Fidelity is "weak long", which it is right now when you net the positions it holds for different funds and clients, the short-sellers can basically buy shares from Fidelity funds, which provides them the liquidity they need to avoid a true squeeze.

 

[Mike Smith]

When 5M shares of TSLA trade in a day, I wonder how many of those are actually the same shares being traded more than once by computers and day traders. Does anyone know approximately what percentage of traded shares are repeats in a given day?

 

[luvb2b]

estimates range from 30-40% on typical days

When 5M shares of TSLA trade in a day, I wonder how many of those are actually the same shares being traded more than once by computers and day traders. Does anyone know approximately what percentage of traded shares are repeats in a given day?

 

[neroden]

When 5M shares of TSLA trade in a day, I wonder how many of those are actually the same shares being traded more than once by computers and day traders. Does anyone know approximately what percentage of traded shares are repeats in a given day?

To a first approximation, all of them. Does that help? Didn't think so.


Seriously, there are way too many day traders and high-speed traders in the market. I don't remember the numbers, but I read some years back that serious long-term buys and sells (with intent to hold for over a year) are far under 5% of trades in most stocks, and it's probably worse now.

(Edit: luv2b has a more useful answer. I wasn't distinguishing between intraday trades and slightly longer short-term trades.)

 

[vgrinshpun]

Well, there is already 16.5 GW of hydro (or wil be soon), with over 200 GWh of total storage in California. Storing 8GW of peak solar generation is no problem. There is still a while before batteries can catch up with hydro in scale.
CA pumped storage hydroelectric project to provide state clean energy

Pumped storage is useless when there is a drought, or it is full, as the article I linked (and you apparently did not read) explained. Overfilled pumped storage that will be in forced spilled IS one of the reasons for the glut of energy and expected curtailment California will face this spring. Next time please do your homework before posting.

 

[ggies07]

Since the price action today is "soaring" and "going up to its highest height" I find this extremely applicable.

 

[Mike Smith]

Here's something to think about - we only found out about Tencent's buying because they hit the 5% mark. I wonder how many other companies had the same idea and have been accumulating as well? After all, everyone knows that a massive short position means a temporary sale price on a stock. The short position is still there. The number of shares actually available at this point could be shockingly low.

 

[doctoxics]

Knows someone were the self driving car video from Jonas is, I would like to rewatch it but can't find it

This one from an article in Electrek?

Analyst warns of Tesla’s Autopilot machine learning potentially rendering all other cars obsolete

 

[Ovulation]

This one from an article in Electrek?

Analyst warns of Tesla’s Autopilot machine learning potentially rendering all other cars obsolete

No he (and others at Morgan Stanley) made a pretty comprehensive analysis of the impact of self driving cars in the future, how Detroit thinks vs. how Silicon Valley thinks, in the light of the tencent thing I would like to rewatch it.

 

[NicoV]

Here's something to think about - we only found out about Tencent's buying because they hit the 5% mark. I wonder how many other companies had the same idea and have been accumulating as well? After all, everyone knows that a massive short position means a temporary sale price on a stock. The short position is still there. The number of shares actually available at this point could be shockingly low.

Who says Tencent will stop buying when they have 5%? If that was the plan, they would probably stop at 4.9999% so that they don't have to report.

 

[rallykeeper]

Re: Service Center Ramp and Model 3 Deliveries

This must have been posted by now, but I searched and couldn't find anything.

Tesla may be further along than speculated in dealing with the Model 3 delivery problem.

They are currently experimenting with centralized delivery centers. For the past couple weeks in Los Angeles, all deliveries have been routed through a brand new (temporarily-leased) fancy-schmancy delivery center in Culver City. In this case, it was a converted warehouse (that looks like it had been abandoned by a defunct tech company).

Looks like they could probably deliver 15-20 cars/hour at that facility (and it's open 7 days/week) -- it was too big for me to estimate the overall square footage. Obviously, still just a beta test, but a pretty easy fix to start dealing with deliveries in larger metropolitan areas.

There have to be plenty of such facilities ready to be leased throughout California (and I expect in most other larger Tesla markets) -- location doesn't matter as much as it does for service centers since customers are willing to drive once for a pick-up.
Source: Me. I took delivery there....

 

[neroden]

The number of shares actually available at this point could be shockingly low.

Just watch the interest rates. The shares available to borrow are highly unlikely to be low as long as they're cheap to borrow.

I personally suspect Fidelity is providing most of the liquidity for short-sellers right now, which... well... that does put the short-sellers in a risky position...

 

[MitchJi]

I'm not going to claim that everything will be ok, because nobody knows. I just hope that people keep an open mind and not jump to conclusions. And no, the market doesn't care... the financial results are what matters to them in the end.

I don't really care if people jump to conclusions and worry about this or not. I hope that people would at least have the courtesy and commen sense not to post all of their unfounded paranoid worries until there's at least a substantial likelihood of it happening.

 

[erthquake]

Could Tencent induce a squeeze all by themselves if they wanted to?

 

[EinSV]

...Is that Cramer capitulating?

Isn't he the other big name trustworthy short other than Left, who left a few weeks ago?

Unless I missed something, Chanos is still short TSLA. He has been uncharacteristically quiet on Tesla for quite a while now.

Guess making such a lousy bet is not something he wants to keep in the spotlight.

 

[dirtyofries]

Unless I missed something, Chanos is still short TSLA. He has been uncharacteristically quiet on Tesla for quite a while now.

Guess making such a lousy bet is not something he wants to keep in the spotlight.

We should all do our best to 'remind' him via as much discussion of it on here and Twitter as possible.

 

[erthquake]

Unless I missed something, Chanos is still short TSLA. He has been uncharacteristically quiet on Tesla for quite a while now.

Guess making such a lousy bet is not something he wants to keep in the spotlight.

He might be unwinding, leaving his poor suckers followers holding the bag when he announces he's (fully) out.

 

[SunCatcher]

We should all do our best to 'remind' him via as much discussion of it on here and Twitter as possible.

Hey Chanos, listen up. Someone's talking to YOU.

"The Tesla bear story is concluded. If you were in it, if you were shorting it, because you thought they were going to run out of money? That's over. You'd better come up with another reason." Jim Cramer

 

[Mike Smith]

Unless I missed something, Chanos is still short TSLA. He has been uncharacteristically quiet on Tesla for quite a while now.

Guess making such a lousy bet is not something he wants to keep in the spotlight.

I highly doubt Chanos is still short. He's a very smart guy. I think it's fairly safe to say that most intelligent shorts have been replaced by dumb, volatile, 'TSLA always goes back to 180' smaller shorts by now. Quite the dangerous situation for them to be in.