General Discussion: 2018 Investor Roundtable

[ValueAnalyst]

We’ve been through this before. They may well have a small reshuffling of S/X sales (non-custom sales to rest of world can soak most of this up), but, we are talking about 3-5K not a big deal. Something around roughly 25K Canadian Model 3 deliveries, but, less if the ramp has anymore drag to it than current pace. 25K to Canada will only be challenging if dual motor is not ready.

What’s about the other points @Zaxxon made about pissing off US line-waiters who were supposed to get their cars in 2Q? What about the negative PR of Tesla gaming the system? PLUS there’s the strong possibility that the credit will be expanded anyway.

 

[Waiting4M3]

We have been through it before, and I still disagree. Diverting that many 3s to Canada is a huge broken promise to the folks to whom they've been promised in Q2. You can say it's worth it for the greater good, but that's a big disservice to those folks, and if the theory is true then Tesla is knowingly telling those folks falsely that they will receive them in Q2.

I've actually come around to SteveG3's side. I'm in the Apr-Jun group. Hopefully by end of June Tesla will be at 5k/wk rate. If Tesla let me configure in mid June for delivery in mid July, with 2 weeks worth of production, 10 k cars, shifted this way into Q3, thus allowing 60K people in the US to get full credit, I'd be OK with that.

 

[ValueAnalyst]

Why?

Just going off of the fact the most global automakers make a larger than proportionate share of their profits in the US, wouldn’t exporting nearly all cars cause a big hit to bottom-line? Can int’l markets even absorb significantly higher deliveries QoQ? Would Tesla need to cut price?

 

[Waiting4M3]

Just going off of the fact the most global automakers make a larger than proportionate share of their profits in the US, wouldn’t exporting nearly all cars cause a big hit to bottom-line? Can int’l markets even absorb significantly higher deliveries QoQ? Would Tesla need to cut price?

Canadian pricing for the $35KUSD version is 45.6K CAD, which comes out to $35,350 US. So no price cut. Automakers make more $ in US because US market size, and also higher priced model mixture, if I understand correctly. I think selling 20k M3 to Canada in Q2 won't be difficult at all to Tesla, so no need to reduce price or worry about demand issues. I think you're worrying over nothing.

 

[Curt Renz]

 

[SteveG3]

What’s about the other points @Zaxxon made about pissing off US line-waiters who were supposed to get their cars in 2Q? What about the negative PR of Tesla gaming the system? PLUS there’s the strong possibility that the credit will be expanded anyway.

Tesla already announced the Canadians leapfrogging US over a month ago.

I’ve already talked about the media likely to try to write pieces trying to talk Tesla down for this over a month ago. I explicitly wrote at the time we probably don’t want to draw to much attention to this before it’s just out there for this very reason. fwiw, maybe Elon figured he and Tesla are near constant targets for these kind of statements, may as well let 100,000+ customers benefit from the name calling Tesla gets anyway.

Net number of people pleased looks positive.

 

[Starno]

Lol ...

that's some kind of motivation to work hard

 

[sundaymorning]

Here’s the video that got Uber in trouble. Are they using cameras or lidar?

Tempe Police release in-car video from fatal self-driving Uber crash

Elon has eluded that lidar can’t “see” under certain conditions.

 

[schonelucht]

I didn't think it was going to happen, but it seems Tesla is going to delay 200k one quarter. Obviously Model 3 deliveries for Q1, now all but confirmed to come well below even the worst start of year estimates, made this possible. Can't shake the feeling that Tesla already knew this quarter was not going to brilliant once they updated the estimated for Canada to mid 2018 early this year, despite keeping a brave face on supposedly reaching 2500k / week.

Going into Q2 the logicial projection would be for max 10k Model 3 deliveries in the USA and some 15k in Canada. These numbers imply that all Canadian reservation holders will have a chance to get their car in Q2. Also, forget about going much beyond 2k/week early in the quarter.

 

[Waiting4M3]

Here’s the video that got Uber in trouble. Are they using cameras or lidar?

Tempe Police release in-car video from fatal self-driving Uber crash

Elon has eluded that lidar can’t “see” under certain conditions.

I see under 2 sec between when the woman's feet showed up in the headlights of the car, and when the car struck her, and probably under 1 sec starting from when she's clearly visible in the car's headlight. It doesn't seem easy to avoid the collision.

I think lidar can't see through fog very well, so this is not the case.

 

[Words of HABIT]

Going into Q2 the logicial projection would be for max 10k Model 3 deliveries in the USA and some 15k in Canada. These numbers imply that all Canadian reservation holders will have a chance to get their car in Q2. Also, forget about going much beyond 2k/week early in the quarter.

15k for Canada is a drop in the bucket. I would imagine Canadian M3 reservations would be 4X to 5X higher. Several of my friends have M3 reservations, and I'm not too popular.

 

[Zaxxon]

Tesla already announced the Canadians leapfrogging US over a month ago.

I’ve already talked about the media likely to try to write pieces trying to talk Tesla down for this over a month ago. I explicitly wrote at the time we probably don’t want to draw to much attention to this before it’s just out there for this very reason. fwiw, maybe Elon figured he and Tesla are near constant targets for these kind of statements, may as well let 100,000+ customers benefit from the name calling Tesla gets anyway.

Net number of people pleased looks positive.

I'm actually ok with the idea. I'm all-in on the electric future, and if stalling my delivery another couple of months means a bunch more people can afford a Model 3 / afford a better Model 3, sign me up.

As usual, though, it's Tesla's communication implementation that's the problem. As I type, Tesla tells me (and a very large contingent of non-invited line-waiters likely numbering in the tens of thousands) to expect delivery by May 31st. Opening up some Canadian orders doesn't change that. If Tesla is planning to send most Model 3s to Canada this coming quarter and therefore push many of us Mar-May people into July not because they gave it the old college try and just didn't quite get there but because they consciously decided to put us on hold, they need to tell us that.

Of course, they won't. Not until it's clear as day to those of us paying attention and articles start being written that generate a response from Tesla.

That's my issue. Not the idea but the implementation. And who knows; our reading of the tea leaves may not be correct, and this could be much ado about nothing.

 

[Waiting4M3]

Now back to Q1 production: 3 VIN assignments above 12K showed up in Model 3 Invites sheet today, out of 10 total so far

 

[SteveG3]

I didn't think it was going to happen, but it seems Tesla is going to delay 200k one quarter. Obviously Model 3 deliveries for Q1, now all but confirmed to come well below even the worst start of year estimates, made this possible. Can't shake the feeling that Tesla already knew this quarter was not going to brilliant once they updated the estimated for Canada to mid 2018 early this year, despite keeping a brave face on supposedly reaching 2500k / week.

Going into Q2 the logicial projection would be for max 10k Model 3 deliveries in the USA and some 15k in Canada. These numbers imply that all Canadian reservation holders will have a chance to get their car in Q2. Also, forget about going much beyond 2k/week early in the quarter.

Why shake the feeling... this is just what what was described on this thread at the time. That wasn’t despite anything. Tesla was looking to get to 2K per week possibly 2.5K by end of quarter at the time, and it’s probably right about where they are right now (though 2.5K is more of a stretch of course).

 

[sundaymorning]

Now back to Q1 production: 3 VIN assignments above 12K showed up in Model 3 Invites sheet today, out of 10 total so far

Let’s see if they issue a new badge of VINs next week.

 

[Waiting4M3]

I'm actually ok with the idea. I'm all-in on the electric future, and if stalling my delivery another couple of months means a bunch more people can afford a Model 3 / afford a better Model 3, sign me up.

As usual, though, it's Tesla's communication implementation that's the problem. As I type, Tesla tells me (and a very large contingent of non-invited line-waiters likely numbering in the tens of thousands) to expect delivery by May 31st. Opening up some Canadian orders doesn't change that. If Tesla is planning to send most Model 3s to Canada this coming quarter and therefore push many of us Mar-May people into July not because they gave it the old college try and just didn't quite get there but because they consciously decided to put us on hold, they need to tell us that.

Of course, they won't. Not until it's clear as day to those of us paying attention and articles start being written that generate a response from Tesla.

That's my issue. Not the idea but the implementation. And who knows; our reading of the tea leaves may not be correct, and this could be much ado about nothing.

I bet this question will come up in Q1ER in early May for sure. I hope it won't be necessary to push Mar-May people in order to implement this. I think there will be 20K US Apr-Jun (or even later window) people that Tesla can shift into July.

 

[SteveG3]

Just going off of the fact the most global automakers make a larger than proportionate share of their profits in the US, wouldn’t exporting nearly all cars cause a big hit to bottom-line? Can int’l markets even absorb significantly higher deliveries QoQ? Would Tesla need to cut price?

re Tesla, no, no problem. worst case something like 2-3K S/X sales get pushed from Q2 to second half. this size shuffling has happened in the past for Tesla for other reasons.

 

[SteveG3]

I'm actually ok with the idea. I'm all-in on the electric future, and if stalling my delivery another couple of months means a bunch more people can afford a Model 3 / afford a better Model 3, sign me up.

As usual, though, it's Tesla's communication implementation that's the problem. As I type, Tesla tells me (and a very large contingent of non-invited line-waiters likely numbering in the tens of thousands) to expect delivery by May 31st. Opening up some Canadian orders doesn't change that. If Tesla is planning to send most Model 3s to Canada this coming quarter and therefore push many of us Mar-May people into July not because they gave it the old college try and just didn't quite get there but because they consciously decided to put us on hold, they need to tell us that.

Of course, they won't. Not until it's clear as day to those of us paying attention and articles start being written that generate a response from Tesla.

That's my issue. Not the idea but the implementation. And who knows; our reading of the tea leaves may not be correct, and this could be much ado about nothing.

let’s not jump to conclusions, lols.

last time I got into the weeds on this, it looked like basically May and June production would be Canada, perhaps some of the end of April production too. Tesla may not have timed this perfectly, but, it looks like they’ve had this in mind for months, and they almost certainly tried to match the size of US invites YTD to the number of Model 3s they had in mind they could deliver in the US in the first half.

There may be some who wait an extra month, but it’s something Tesla almost certainly tried to minimize (among other goals they were balancing).

As to communications, as discussed in the past, Tesla had good reason not to announce this a month or two ago, especially as all the pieces might not have fallen into place to execute on this. Not saying Tesla communication is not due for some, uh, feedback, but, in this instance, I think their keeping their cards to themselves was a good call.

 

[SteveG3]

I bet this question will come up in Q1ER in early May for sure. I hope it won't be necessary to push Mar-May people in order to implement this. I think there will be 20K US Apr-Jun (or even later window) people that Tesla can shift into July.

as I just wrote in another post, I don’t think you have to worry about this. By my count, very few in the US who’ve already been invited to configure are likely to be pushed to July.

 

[SteveG3]

re Tesla, no, no problem. worst case something like 2-3K S/X sales get pushed from Q2 to second half. this size shuffling has happened in the past for Tesla for other reasons.

Zaxxon what are you disagreeing about?