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Papafox's Daily TSLA Trading Charts

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Aug31.JPG

The broader markets continued their rally today and TSLA ran up with them, but not with the conviction of yesterday. Tesla is not known for running up simply because the broader markets are doing so. The after-market trading showed some reduced prices, perhaps in response to a report that the National Labor Relations Board has filed a complaint alleging illegal practices. In other news, some Tesla employees are reporting that expected date for deliveries of their Model 3s have been moved up, so we're likely seeing Tesla get much closer to large-scale production of the car. When Model 3s start shipping in large numbers the stock price will respond quite favorably. If Model 3 is as good a car as most of us think it is, the collateral damage the shorts will encounter upon the car's widespread release will be severe.

For tomorrow? The wires have already picked up the NLRB story, so it's possible we might have some tough sledding in the morning. If word of earlier Model 3 deliveries spread, then that could become the dominant story, with positive results. It'll be fun to see.

Conditions:
* Dow up 55 (0.25%)
* NASDAQ up 60 (0.95%)
* TSLA 355.90, up 2.72 (0.77%)
* TSLA volume 4.1M shares
* Oil 46.93, down 0.3 (0.64%)
 
Sep01.JPG

While the technicals look exciting, the fundamentals for TSLA are a "wait for news" situation at the moment, with all eyes on the rate at which Tesla can ramp up its Model 3 production. Although many of us here at TMC deduce positive information from some employee delivery dates being moved up this past week, that news has not penetrated the major news outlets. The lack of significant news plus extremely-low volume largely explains the lackluster performance of TSLA on Friday. Broader markets were up again, with only a slight increase in the NASDAQ, which should be a pretty good environment for TSLA positive trading, but the past two days the stock had run up largely on broader market run ups, and that catalyst had become stale, as indicated on Thursday by the small increase in SP, the descent into closing, further small erosion of the SP after-hours, and the negative news of a NLRB investigation (which some members interpret as a form of FUD, due to the questionable validity of the evidence that investigation is based upon).

For the week, TSLA closed at 355.40, up 7.35 from last Friday's 348.05. TSLA had been pushed down into the 330s by a combination of negative macros and manipulations, but the stock shows that it will recover when the pressure is relieved. Again, I think TSLA is at a very healthy price now for waiting out the next positive catalyst, which will likely be news of a substantial increase in production numbers of Model 3.
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Looking at the technical chart, you can see the 50DMA has descended a bit, which gives TSLA a comfortable margin above it. Notice, too, how the upper and lower bollinger bands have squeezed closer together, suggesting the time is growing nearer for a breakout one way or the other.

A three-day weekend is upon us. Normally, the amateur hour following a three-day weekend can be a significantly positive event, but with a lackluster performance of TSLA on Friday, we'll likely need news over the weekend to spark a big buying event on Tuesday morning. The good news is we'll likely see increased volumes once Labor Day is over and the financial community is back at work after summer vacations. Enjoy the weekend!

Conditions:
* Dow up 39 (0.18%)
* NASDAQ up 7 (0.10%)
* TSLA 355.40, down 0.50 (0.14%)
* TSLA volume 3.0M shares
* Oil 47.29, up 0.06 (0.13%)
 
A side note: this week's trading once again suggests that even though there's no obvious cut-off point for TSLA following the broader markets down when they make big moves in that direction, TSLA is limited in following the broader markets up when they're heading in that direction. Bottom line: we can't depend upon a broader market rally to take TSLA up. To get TSLA climbing, the catalyst has to primarily be news of successful execution that will justify that this company will meet and exceed the net worth suggested by the present stock price within a reasonable time frame.
 
Thanks again for these; they're fun. It's not the sort of analysis I'd normally do. I've learned a lot from your specialist analysis of TSLA's short term movement patterns. Not sure it will ever be *useful*, but it's been fascinating.

I have found the info in this thread very useful for buying on dips and at the right time of day (mandatory morning dip is your friend!). I still haven't figured out when to sell but I think there is a reason for that.;)
 
Thanks again for these; they're fun. It's not the sort of analysis I'd normally do. I've learned a lot from your specialist analysis of TSLA's short term movement patterns. Not sure it will ever be *useful*, but it's been fascinating.

Papafox's analysis is a bit different than the usual TA nonsense of shapes and imaginary lines. I've found his psychological analysis to be helpful.
 
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The beauty of @Papafox's analysis is that he knows the stock (and company).

IMHO, a lot of TA is intentionally lazy. Running TA analysis allows me to pump through a bunch of stocks and get a sense of how they are doing and what potential moves the stock will have in the short/semi-long term. I could care less about their 10Q, 8K, etc... with one caveat, as long as I don't enter too close to earnings, I'm ok. I have even found my null hypothesis TA stock play, to my chagrine, is truly confirming the value of TA to me.

Papafox's analysis and understanding of SP moves is spot on--truly a specialist--with a specialist's gut instincts a lot of time: knows what is right, but may not be able to fully explain why.
 
Everyone here has said something truthful. My techniques are unproven outside of TSLA and time-tested for only a short period here at TSLA, so one needs to take them with a grain of salt. On the other hand, due to the uniqueness of TSLA the stock, experience with other stocks might in many instances be a disadvantage and specializing in a single stock might indeed offer advantages. Only time will tell.
 
Sep05.JPG

No big surprises today... the North Korea fears over the extended weekend led to a decline in the macros this morning but as they started recovering mid-day TSLA rose with them.Notice the relatively low volume today.

A bigger question, though, is whether we're likely to see any military action involving North Korea in the next year. On the one hand, people like Neroden believe that China will ultimately topple Kim for their own reasons. Then you have Trump threatening to cut off trade with anyone who continues to trade with North Korea, which would of course cause a significant trade war with China if the action materialized.This is an interesting move in the chess game because some theorize that China is using North Korea's threat to delay the U.S. from moving forward with renegotiating the U.S.-China trade deal (we need China more for North Korea than we need to fix the trade rules). I suspect one way or the other, if the North Korea regime falls, it will be to the hands of China and will transpire fairly quickly. Whatever crash the market goes through would be met with a relief rally in due time. I don't believe that Trump is the loose cannon militarily that many make him out to be. He didn't become a billionaire by acting irrationally.Rather, I suspect he will continue to put more and more pressure on China and North Korea so that Kim's regime falls without the risk of the U.S. getting involved in a nuclear war. There's evidence to believe that North Korea wants to use nuclear blackmail to eventually see U.S. troops removed from South Korea and for North Korea to take over the south through nuclear threat. For this reason, as North Korea continues to increase its missile and nuclear arsenal, I don't think Kim's regime can remain in power for many more years before a superpower orchestrates a regime change.

Conditions:
* Dow down 234 (1.07%)
* NASDAQ down 60 (0.93%)
* TSLA 349.59, down 5.81 (1.63%)
* TSLA volume 3.8M shares
* Oil 48.61, down 0.05 (0.1%)
 
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To clarify my belief, I am not at all sure China will topple Kim's regime. At this point I am only sure that they want Kim out and that they are preparing a military option. But since Kim can nuke a number of very large cities in China well before any missile defense could respond... China is in a very tough position.
 
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Hmm, the broader markets were up today, TSLA wanted to climb in the pre-market trading, but it had another day very similar to yesterday with a deep mid-morning dip. Take a look at that 11:10am volume spike of nearly 40,000 shares sold in a minute (likely to see if some stop-losses could be triggered). In news, the real news was positive, with Morgan Stanley's Adam Jonas talking about how consequential the Tesla semi could be to the trucking industry. Once again, he low-balls production figures, which suggests that he wants to move the market when he decides to give more realistic numbers. I am told the FUD today has been heavy, so what's going on? I suspect the shorts are very aware of technicals and the triangle that has formed with highs getting lower and lows getting higher. If the shorts wait for the semi-reveal, they will likely lose the game and TSLA will break upwards. Instead, they're throwing resources at TSLA to engineer what looks like a weakness and get it to break downward? Will they succeed? Only if a fat man in North Korea with a bad haircut assists them. Otherwise, TSLA will likely break upward. They might also seek some help from a Category 5 hurricane moving towards Florida. The damage something like this can do is immense. So, the drama plays out. Again, TSLA volume was light today, suggesting this is a small move which will likely be met with an up move to counter it if macros don't interfere.

Conditions:
* Dow up 54 (0.25%)
* NASDAQ up 18 (0.28%)
* TSLA 344.53, down 5.06 (1.45%)
* TSLA volume 4.1M shares
* Oil 4916, up 0.5 (1.03%)
 
To clarify my belief, I am not at all sure China will topple Kim's regime. At this point I am only sure that they want Kim out and that they are preparing a military option. But since Kim can nuke a number of very large cities in China well before any missile defense could respond... China is in a very tough position.

Thanks for the clarification. When you consider how badly a war with North Korea could turn out, I suspect there's lots of reasons for leaders to show discretion at this time. The leaders of North Korea's military are also aware of how badly things will go if their leader starts a conflict with either the U.S. or China.When I alluded to things happening quickly with China, I did not mean something would happen soon. I meant that if a conflict arose, it would be resolved quickly. In the meantime, I think Wall Street is expecting posturing but not armed conflict.
 
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Today was really a fascinating day for TSLA trading. Last night while looking at the technical chart, I saw that the shorts would likely be tempted to push the stock price lower in order to claim the 50 day moving average, descend below the lowest recent daily trading point of 338.75 (and thereby break out of the narrowing triangle on the downside), and break through the lower bollinger band. My theory was that the shorts weren't likely to be successful with this venture because the longs did not have a sense of underlying dread which would lead to protective selling. For these reasons, and because we had reached the point in the narrowing triangle where the stock price could be expected to reverse, I suggested that if the traditional tools of the shorts (mandatory morning dip, capping, and descent into close) were defeated, then the stock price would likely be on track for a 2-3 day upward movement. We saw the MMD seriously defeated, the capping was a mixed bag because 352 was indeed successfully capped but 350 was not, and the slow descent into close was foiled by a robust rally during the final hour of trading.

I also pointed out in my TSLA market action post that the red-green-red-green trading of July has morphed into 2-3 days of red, the 2-3 days of green, then back again. So far, the stock continues to trade within an ever-tightening triangle with lower daily highs and higher daily lows at each extreme of the 2-3 day periods, and so the expectations of remaining within the triangle are probably more constraining on the top end than the upper bb at present. If the last high was 358.44, then we would expect the high of the next day or 2 to be below that level before the stock price reverses yet again. At some point, TSLA is going to break up or down. Let's hope the leader of NK and Hurricane Irma don't foil TSLA's eventual breakout on the upside of the triangle. I'm also wondering if we stay within this narrowing triangle of trading much longer, we may see changes from red to green and back again in streaks of less than 2-3 days.

Sep07chart.JPG


Conditions:
* Dow down 23 (0.10%)
* NASDAQ up 5 (0.07%)
* TSLA 350.61, up 6.08 (1.76%)
* TSLA volume 4.2M shares
* Oil 49.13, down 0.03 (0.06%)
 
I closed a short-term play today because of concerns about Hurricane Irma's effect on the market early next week. This hurricane has twice the wind speed as a typical hurricane, which translates into 4X the destructive power, and Irma looks on track to hit major portions of Florida. I think the market is underestimating Irma's potential impact at present.
 
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Today's trading was all about Hurricane Irma. Forget the red-green-red patterns and the squeezing triangle for a few days, the market is pre-occupied with the drama unfolding in Florida. The devastation could indeed be significant, due to the unusually high winds and a path that might take the storm right up the Florida peninsula. Monday's trading will reflect whether the full fury of the storm hits Florida or whether a change in path or strength takes place. For reference sake, Nvidia was down 1.73% and Apple down 1.63% today. Tesla typically falls more than the other two on bad NASDAQ days because of the unusually large number of short sellers in TSLA who tend to magnify descents. The DOW was up slightly, due to stocks like Lowe's and Home Depot that benefit from such destruction. The bright spot is that if lots of vehicles are lost to the storm, demand for new vehicles could bode well for quick sales of Tesla's current inventory cars.

For the week, TSLA closed at 343.40, down $12 from last Friday's 355.40. The decrease has more to do with the up and down nature of TSLA working within its consolidation triangle and today's losses due to the hurricane than to any actual weakness in the stock. TSLA remains poised for a great 2017, but as I advised on another thread, this is not a good week for short-term plays until the broader markets have bottomed out.

Conditions:
* Dow up 13 (0.06%)
* NASDAQ down 38 (0.59%)
* TSLA 343.40, down 7.21 (2.06%)
* TSLA volume 3.3M shares
* Oil 47.48, down 1.61 (3.28%)
 
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Congratulations longs for an epic day. In early pre-market trading, TSLA regained Friday's losses, which resulted from fears of Hurricane Irma doing record-setting destruction. Fortunately, Irma didn't live up to her potential, and broader markets came back big on Monday. News over the weekend that China was looking at banning internal combustion vehicles at a future date ignited the fuse and TSLA took off in early morning trading. TSLA met resistance in the 356-357 range (capping?), which would correspond with the top of the narrowing consolidation triangle, and then continued climbing for the remainder of the day. What particularly impressed me was the trading after a big selling event at 3:33 pm, when 69,000+ shares were sold within a minute. Normally a selling event of this magnitude would begin a descent into closing, but despite the dip, TSLA recovered immediately and climbed strongly into the close.


Sep11chart.JPG

With TSLA breaking out of the tightening consolidation triangle at last, where does it go from here? Running up along the upper bollinger band and then following it up is one possibility. It's not uncommon to see TSLA run above the upper bb for a day or two before it ducks back under. The upper bb was at 366.20 today, but it will surely start climbing from here at a good pace. The catalyst for a new all time high is likely going to be confirmation that Model 3 ramp is progressing well, and so we may need that news before reaching a new high. Time will tell.

Conditions:
* Dow up 260 (1.19%)
* NASDAQ up 72 (1.13%)
* TSLA 363.69, up 20.29 (5.91%)
* TSLA volume 7.6M shares
* Oil 48.11, up 0.63 (1.33%)
 
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The day after a 20 point climb is a day for either continuing that climb or for profit-taking. What we saw was actually something a bit different. At opening, the SP ran uphill, which is not surprising, and then we saw a mandatory morning dip, which was also not surprising considering that shorts such as Chamos are still in TSLA. Then the stock climbed to about 367 and leveled off there. Capping? In this case, I think not. Rather, if you look at the technical chart below you will see that 367.04 was the upper bollinger band value at the time of the screenshot, mid-day. Big buyers often get cold feet about buying above the upper bb unless there's a really good reason for it (knockout ER, Model 3 ramping up ahead of schedule, etc.). So, there we were when the new iphone was released, Apple took a dive, the NASDAQ joined Apple in the post-2 pm dip, and TSLA went along, in exaggerated fashion, of course. We get the exaggerations because short-sellers see the NASDAQ weakness as TSLA weakness and jump aboard with selling at such times.

The good news is that nobody is really down on TSLA. Rather this is a knee-jerk reaction to any dive in the NASDAQ. Also, take a look at the news coming our way lately. China is looking at following France and Britain in mandatory drop dead dates for selling internal-combustion vehicles. VW is talking about spending billions to gear up its EV offerings. The world is acknowledging that ICE vehicles are on their way out and EVs are the replacement. California is talking about big initiatives for EVs. The ability to find sufficient battery supplies will limit how quickly other manufacturers can jump aboard the EV train, and Tesla is way ahead of them with its research and on the production side with its Nevada gigafactory. Additionally, the supercharger expansion announced yesterday suggests that Tesla is both confident of the need for a massive increase in superchargers and its ability to justify the cost of that expansion. The timing of this information release is telling. Tesla looks extremely well-positioned to maintain its substantial lead in the EV world, where demand will be expanding dramatically with these new developments.

sep12prechart.JPG


Conditions:
* Dow up 61 (0.28%)
* NASDAQ up 22 (0.34%)
* TSLA 362.75, down 0.94 (0.26%)
* TSLA volume 6.0M shares
* Oil 48.31, up 0.08 (0.17%)
 
Sep13.JPG

Today was a good trading environment for TSLA as both the Dow and NASDAQ were up slightly. We began the day with a mandatory morning dip, followed by a recovery to the daily high, before retreating to the 366 vicinity. Looking below at the technical chart, you can see that 366 is right about even with the upper bollinger band. If the upper bb is constraining upward growth when there's positive sentiment but not blockbuster news, how soon will the upper bb climb and allow TSLA to climb with it? The technical chart below shows 20 days of trading and the bollinger band (middle band) is affected by the previous 20 trading sessions (as I understand it). As we remove some of the low days at the far left side of the 20 day window the middle bb will be ready to rise at a better clip. Also, the upper and lower bb move quite differently than the middle bb sometimes. Perhaps one of our more technicals-savy members can give us a better reading of what to expect in the next week or so of the upper bb if TSLA continues to rise at a conservative clip.

Noteworthy trading today included what to me looked like a big effort to cause an afternoon descent at 3:45pm with a large selling order in 1 minute, but TSLA recovered nicely, which shows strength. Also, 119,000 shares traded in the final minute.

In other news, the CEO of Jaguar acknowledged that EVs are the future. Further, Tesla is sending out invitations for the celebration of successful creation of the South Australia 100mw powerpack installation. The spring is tightening even as TSLA slowly rises.

sep13chart.JPG


Conditions:
* Dow up 39 (0.18%)
* NASDAQ up 6 (0.09%)
* TSLA 366.23, up 3.48 (0.96%)
* TSLA volume 4.2M shares
* Oil 49.3, up 1.07 (2.22%)
 
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* Middle Band = 20-day simple moving average (SMA)
* Upper Band = 20-day SMA + (20-day standard deviation of price x 2)
* Lower Band = 20-day SMA - (20-day standard deviation of price x 2)

So the lower and upper bands is driven by more than just the 20 days in the chart. There's actually some influence going 40 days back.