2017 Investor Roundtable: TSLA Market Action

[DragonWatch]

15k ex-founders deposits are almost a certainty. Think about the 250k people who bought Model S/X so far and the buzz R2 generated.

Check this out: Tesla’s next-gen Roadster stole the show from the electric truck, data shows

$1B in R2 deposits is in the bag. The question is, "how much cash the Semi will bring in?" I think another $1B in the next 12 months.

VA based on my limited accounting experience, now restricted to watching and tracking happy face days and sadly unhappy face days on Excel; I assume there must be a line or two on the quarterly fillings that reflect the reservations. If true, then we can extrapolate (close anyway ~ plus or minus ten founders Roadsters) how well the reveal actually went. Therefore, unless Elon tweets the number of reservations per category, we should be able to come up with a best guess scenario.

My assumptions are that 70% of founders Roadster went to the dyed-in-the-wool Tesla fanboys/girls while the remaining 30% went to converts from other brands wanting the speed their drugs no longer offer. The base price reservations again are converts and a few guys/gals like me that back in 2010 assumed they would never be able to afford such a car. The Roadster will pay for the assembly line itself, and probably not much demand on superchargers since all the driver and friends will need are fresh underwear along with the long range capability. Oh, and a shaving kit or toiletries. So, no new stock offering or loan for the assembly line ~ my best/hopeful guess.

Early Roadster numbers, reservations, will pay for the Roadster assembly line; even if it is old school manual intensive. Though I doubt it will be manual. Early Semi reservations will be much slower, and will build exponentially based on word of mouth and reduced maintenance. The biggest resistance is the in-UR-face autonomous/humanless driving capability or reality check on jobs to be lost. Going driverless is super fantastic for old folks like me still enjoying the independence a car provides, but not so much for Uber and taxi drivers. I would like the opinion of a Master Sergeant I once knew; he was hell bent on getting into Delta Force and buying his own long hauler as an independent trucker.

I also view the hell period like Operation Plans, our go to war plans in the army. We spent hours, days, months preparing these documents, not to mention tons of paper so that we all pulled out the gate at the designated time, loaded with ammo and MRE (meals rejected by Ethiopians). We all knew after that the OPs went out the door/window because from that point on it was war/battlefield dependent. As I have said, and we began to read that yesterday, we have begun merging beyond the “hell period” and are going into what I call “all hell breaking loose.” The Tesla OP stated a nice convenient ramp up; however, once out the gate or the rubber met the road everything changed or reality set in, and they had to adapt. Once through that vortex, things will relax and the jump to light speed will amaze all of us. I still have not seen the white flag the bears have been yelling about. They probably are color blind and confuse red with white Again unless Elon tweets M3 numbers at the end of November we can get a glimps from US deliveries through InsideEVs.

VA I have rambled here, okay a lot, but back to the basic question, can we get a glimpse of the reveal in dollars and cents without tweet numbers? Yes, I would rather get an excited tweet from Elon, but the next best thing will make my day ~ even if it is a wild a$$ guess Yes, you or someone may have covered this once, twice or a dozen times before, so please have mercy on me

Everyone have a good family day tomorrow

 

[ValueAnalyst]

VA based on my limited accounting experience, now restricted to watching and tracking happy face days and sadly unhappy face days on Excel; I assume there must be a line or two on the quarterly fillings that reflect the reservations. If true, then we can extrapolate (close anyway ~ plus or minus ten founders Roadsters) how well the reveal actually went. Therefore, unless Elon tweets the number of reservations per category, we should be able to come up with a best guess scenario.

My assumptions are that 70% of founders Roadster went to the dyed-in-the-wool Tesla fanboys/girls while the remaining 30% went to converts from other brands wanting the speed their drugs no longer offer. The base price reservations again are converts and a few guys/gals like me that back in 2010 assumed they would never be able to afford such a car. The Roadster will pay for the assembly line itself, and probably not much demand on superchargers since all the driver and friends will need are fresh underwear along with the long range capability. Oh, and a shaving kit or toiletries. So, no new stock offering or loan for the assembly line ~ my best/hopeful guess.

Early Roadster numbers, reservations, will pay for the Roadster assembly line; even if it is old school manual intensive. Though I doubt it will be manual. Early Semi reservations will be much slower, and will build exponentially based on word of mouth and reduced maintenance. The biggest resistance is the in-UR-face autonomous/humanless driving capability or reality check on jobs to be lost. Going driverless is super fantastic for old folks like me still enjoying the independence a car provides, but not so much for Uber and taxi drivers. I would like the opinion of a Master Sergeant I once knew; he was hell bent on getting into Delta Force and buying his own long hauler as an independent trucker.

I also view the hell period like Operation Plans, our go to war plans in the army. We spent hours, days, months preparing these documents, not to mention tons of paper so that we all pulled out the gate at the designated time, loaded with ammo and MRE (meals rejected by Ethiopians). We all knew after that the OPs went out the door/window because from that point on it was war/battlefield dependent. As I have said, and we began to read that yesterday, we have begun merging beyond the “hell period” and are going into what I call “all hell breaking loose.” The Tesla OP stated a nice convenient ramp up; however, once out the gate or the rubber met the road everything changed or reality set in, and they had to adapt. Once through that vortex, things will relax and the jump to light speed will amaze all of us. I still have not seen the white flag the bears have been yelling about. They probably are color blind and confuse red with white Again unless Elon tweets M3 numbers at the end of November we can get a glimps from US deliveries through InsideEVs.

VA I have rambled here, okay a lot, but back to the basic question, can we get a glimpse of the reveal in dollars and cents without tweet numbers? Yes, I would rather get an excited tweet from Elon, but the next best thing will make my day ~ even if it is a wild a$$ guess Yes, you or someone may have covered this once, twice or a dozen times before, so please have mercy on me

Everyone have a good family day tomorrow

Yes - it will be reflected in the Customer Deposits number. I expect $500M of R2 deposits to hit in 4Q17, net M3 deposits will also increase in 4Q17, and Model S/X order backlog has been running hot, so we should see a surge in Customer Deposits at December 31, 2017, which will be released in early February. Semi deposits, however, will come in as Tesla executes on milestones; commercial customers will want to test the product first and see execution before placing larger orders, and they will.

 

[Drax7]

Here's the first of the Roadster "killers" Startup unveils new electric hypercar prototype, claims specs competing with Tesla’s new Roadster

Battery cooling system is interesting, but I don't like the vehicle styling, and the $1 million price tag does not excite.

Is it a 3 wheeler ?
Most don't like three wheelers .

 

[mongo]

Is it a 3 wheeler ?
Most don't like three wheelers .

Click the link to find out.
tl;dr; 4 wheels

 

[Remus]

Anyone who thinks TSLA got a double top is clueless. This stock keeps washing out the weak hands, shorts are so sure they got it right... I used to think short squeeze can't happen again with TSLA, now I think we could get an epic short squeeze again. The setup is perfect.

I don't invest based on the possibility of a short squeeze. Tesla will turn into a trillion dollar company even if there is no squeeze. For all the potential investors, don't get fooled by the shorts and institutional traders. Hold tight make sure you still have your shares when this stock pass $10,000 a share. If Apple can buyback nearly half of their float, I have no doubt Tesla will buy back more when they have the cash in a few years. By the time Tesla becomes a trillion dollar company, it's float will be way less than 100 million shares.

I stock buybacks are for losers who don’t know how to spend capital for expansion and growth.

 

[Remus]

I was not saying Tesla will buy back shares next week or next year, or even next 3 years. I was saying when Tesla have a lot of money...it will happen. Like what Apple did in recent years. Google did stock buyback too.

Study what happened to Apple's float in the past 14 years, you will know what I was talking about. At one pointed Warren Buffett suggested to Steve Jobs to consider share buyback, he didn't. If he acted at that time, Apple's float would have reduced 80% by now. If Apple can buy back 40%, I have no doubt Tesla can buy back 60%. Just watch it unfold. It will be a long ride.

Even for Apple buybacks are signaling the slowdown of growth. Apple lost a huge opportunity in cloud and service till today they can not compete with google amazon, yet they had a head start and a decisive competitive advantage. Other areas Apple could expanded to include material science for screens and other components.

 

[TradingInvest]

I stock buybacks are for losers who don’t know how to spend capital for expansion and growth.

That's true for lots of buybacks. It's not true for other cases. It's all relative. Great management usually give growth higher priority than buyback. If you know your company's future earning will be $100 per share per year, and your share price is only $120, then buyback is a no brainer.

If you look at Google, Apple, Berkshire Hathaway's buybacks in recent years, the main reason was they think their shares were undervalued. Not because they run out of ways to expand.

 

[Skryll]

Even for Apple buybacks are signaling the slowdown of growth. Apple lost a huge opportunity in cloud and service till today they can not compete with google amazon, yet they had a head start and a decisive competitive advantage. Other areas Apple could expanded to include material science for screens and other components.

Apple holds a significant amount of money outside of the US because they don't want to pay taxes on them, what if their irish subsidiary spends it on buying apple stock, would that circumvent the taxable event? Just curious how this stuff works. Not that tesla has that problem now, nor that it affects market action

 

[Reciprocity]

Tesla may continue to buy batteries (non gigafactory) as a way to leverage other peoples capital. Continually trying to talk Panasonic into making adequate capital investment is probably getting tiresome.

Why, Panasonic record record revenue and profit and projected more are gf1 and 2 ramped. Doesn't sound very tiresome to me. Hadn't you heard, you have to spend money to make money and Tesla is driving astronomical demand and companies like Panasonic can't spend money fast enough to keep up. I have noticed and interesting trend to your posts. I like to call it, low key fud. Very, very subtle but pretty much every post is negative but not overtly.

 

[Drax7]

I stock buybacks are for losers who don’t know how to spend capital for expansion and growth.

Mature businesses that generate huge free cash flow , and can purchase their stock
Below intrinsic value, should give buying their stock back a thought.

 

[electracity]

I have noticed and interesting trend to your posts. I like to call it, low key fud. Very, very subtle but pretty much every post is negative but not overtly.

Mom? Is that you?

 

[electracity]

I stock buybacks are for losers who don’t know how to spend capital for expansion and growth.

I agree. If anyone can spend every bit of positive cash flow it is Musk. And I mean that mean that in mostly a good way.

Tesla won't even generate enough cash in the car line to support the car line growth Musk wants. To that add the cash needs for new businesses. Musk's ideal Tesla is the largest consumer of capital the world has ever seen.

 

[Remus]

That's true for lots of buybacks. It's not true for other cases. It's all relative. Great management usually give growth higher priority than buyback. If you know your company's future earning will be $100 per share per year, and your share price is only $120, then buyback is a no brainer.

If you look at Google, Apple, Berkshire Hathaway's buybacks in recent years, the main reason was they think their shares were undervalued. Not because they run out of ways to expand.

I don’t know about Berkshire. In both google and Apple’ case, buybacks happen because they run out of “sure fire” growth ideas and the management thirst for short term gain. The visionary in both companies are either dead or lost in political fights to effectively deploy capital.

 

[NicoV]

I couldn't possibly begin to guess the annual sales for such a car other than that I intend to get one once the kids have left home.

Count me in. Our Model S will be much too big when the kids have left home, a roadster would be much better size-wise

 

[Richgoogol]

Damn that TT007 did it again..every time he comes here to gloat with all the charts, it just drops the next day..I have yet to find a better indicator than that

 

[ATHiker]

Damn that TT007 did it again..every time he comes here to gloat with all the charts, it just drops the next day..I have yet to find a better indicator than that

Keep in mind that today and Friday are very low volume days in the market. It doesn't take much capital to push the stock price around. With the Bloomberg piece touting the cash burn today, I'm expecting a small bear raid on Friday. Hopefully I'm wrong. In any case, the open on Monday will be a better indication of where we're headed.

 

[Esme Es Mejor]

I haven't looked but I suspect the 620 mile range is greater than many comparable ICE's.

Of course, there are no comparable ICE cars. But I looked up the LaFerrari, which has 12/16 mpg & a 22.7 gallon tank. So even under the most generous (16) mpg assumptions, it has 363.2 miles of range.

 

[TradingInvest]

Keep in mind that today and Friday are very low volume days in the market. It doesn't take much capital to push the stock price around. With the Bloomberg piece touting the cash burn today, I'm expecting a small bear raid on Friday. Hopefully I'm wrong. In any case, the open on Monday will be a better indication of where we're headed.

It seems there is a coordinator on the short side. Right now their main topic is cash burn, articles are everywhere talking about cash burn. They probably realized they can't do much damage if they keep debating Tesla Semi and Roadster.

The cash burn is heavy before Model 3 ramp, because of all the spending on parts, robots, production lines, workers, R&D, infrastructure for delivery and charging...... Tesla is accepting a few thousand sets of parts per week, and these parts are not turned into cars, that alone should "burn" $1B each quarter. We should know the money is not really gone. Shorts will never talk about this difference. As soon as the production ramps up, suddenly we get a huge positive cash flow. I think shorts are trying to fool the longs, like they did before the Model S ramp up.

 

[avoigt]

bunch of investors around a M3....

Instagram post by Denzel Williams • Nov 22, 2017 at 7:54pm UTC

 

[MitchJi]

What's the expected range of roadster production? 25,000 units? 35,000?

What was the exected production of the MS? Whatever it is the demand will exceed the expectations.