General Discussion: 2018 Investor Roundtable

[22522]

FYI.

The Christine Todd Whitman op-ed in CNBC is on twitter. Please like and retweet.
CNBC intl
CNBC International on Twitter

Phil lebeau
Phil LeBeau on Twitter

For a lot of people, her voice matters a lot.

 

[Unpilot]

GM has other problems than keeping up with the EV transition and they did it to themselves:

General Motors warns Trump: tariffs could lead to 'smaller GM' and fewer jobs

Everyone remember this photo?

Yeah that hostage picture ....speaks volumes to look at the faces.

 

[avoigt]

This is hilarious!

Look at the mimic from Gordon Johnson when Trip spoke at the second half of the recording......

How much room is left to run in Tesla?

 

[Unpilot]

This is hilarious!

Look at the mimic from Gordon Johnson when Trip spoke at the second half of the recording......

How much room is left to run in Tesla?

These kind of talking past one another clips are kinda depressing. One person refuses to acknowledge the other's facts.

:edit to say: The negative guy brings up all the "new" ev's coming like it's a wave rather than a trickle. And no mention that even if they were pumping then out like crazy they are just city cars! Absolutely no way to travel anywhere right now,today.

 

[avoigt]

I just watched a more recent video by the same guy:

He lets the bears have their say so to speak and then debunks it fairly well, though he didn't respond to the comment by one guy that the rich people buying Model Ss are doing so to brag at the country club and when their buddy pulls up in an electric long range Mercedes it will be all over.

First off, my absolute last consideration in car buying is what anyone else thinks. I caught flak for 24 years over my last car purchase, which was an "old man car" bought in my 20s. And I've never set foot on a country club.

Anything Daimler is making is just academic interest to me. If I won a Mercedes I'd sell it as quickly as I could.

But that aside, I think this was a well crafted anit-bear argument.

Great video Thanks for posting.

Jon brings a to me new but very valid point up which is the Google search results for Tesla against all other Auto companies who revealed EVs or promised to do so. That chard is telling and has a high correlation to the units sold chard for EVs already today and even more so IMHO going forward.

IOW at the end of the day the consumer will decide with his money who will be ahead and with by a large margin more people searching for Tesla in google, it is a fair prediction that those are either the reservation holders from today as well as the buyers from tomorrow.

 

[ruralectric]

A NY Times feature piece on Tesla today. Includes a number of pics we haven't seen before.

Can Elon Musk and Tesla Reinvent the Way Cars Are Made?

 

[NicoV]

This is hilarious!

Look at the mimic from Gordon Johnson when Trip spoke at the second half of the recording......

How much room is left to run in Tesla?

This is a very good example of the ‘true believers’ versus the shorts. Both parties clearly (look at their body language!) think the other side is a moron.

 

[Mader Levap]

This whole "all hands on deck" thing has, unfortunately, one serious consequence: if they pull off 5k/week, it will be obviously unsustainable one-time burst and it will be rightly criticized as such.

Any guess to when they will achieve honest-to-god 5k/week normal production without any strings or shenanigans? I think end of q3/beginning of q4.

 

[Unpilot]

Th

A NY Times feature piece on Tesla today. Includes a number of pics we haven't seen before.

Can Elon Musk and Tesla Reinvent the Way Cars Are Made?

Thanks for the link. That was a interesting article.

My take away quote is this one “I’ve never heard anything like this, ever,” said Ron Harbour, an expert on auto plants.

That sums up most "analyst's" take on Tesla

 

[Sancho]

I’m assuming that Musk believes production numbers alone will cause an “explosive” rise in the SP, but if he has another trick up his sleeve there are lots of options. My favorite would be the sale of the utility TE business.

The consumer TE business (Powewalls and solar roofing) makes some sense to be part of Tesla to leverage auto customer base, but sales of big TE projects to major utilities is a completely separate business. Why not sell that to a utility? It would inject billions into the balance sheet overnight, without reducing enterprise value since that business isn’t being factored into the SP value currently.

A multi-billion cash infusion without dilution or repayment obligations, coupled with imminent cash flow positive operations, would indeed cause the short burn of the century.

 

[Krugerrand]

This whole "all hands on deck" thing has, unfortunately, one serious consequence: if they pull off 5k/week, it will be obviously unsustainable one-time burst and it will be rightly criticized as such.

Any guess to when they will achieve honest-to-god 5k/week normal production without any strings or shenanigans? I think end of q3/beginning of q4.

Obviously you don’t know what you’re talking about as this has not been the first time Elon has called for all hands on deck nor is there any indication what’s going on right now is simply a burst rate.

Next.

 

[Lessmog]

I’m assuming that Musk believes production numbers alone will cause an “explosive” rise in the SP, but if he has another trick up his sleeve there are lots of options. My favorite would be the sale of the utility TE business.

The consumer TE business (Powewalls and solar roofing) makes some sense to be part of Tesla to leverage auto customer base, but sales of big TE projects to major utilities is a completely separate business. Why not sell that to a utility? It would inject billions into the balance sheet overnight, without reducing enterprise value since that business isn’t being factored into the SP value currently.

A multi-billion cash infusion without dilution or repayment obligations, coupled with imminent cash flow positive operations, would indeed cause the short burn of the century.

No no no. TE is of strategic importance to Tesla's future undertakings. Not only PW & PP & Solar, but to have all that in-house is vital for the expansion of SuC for autos and semis, for example. Elon will certainly have other uses in mind too, like Boring (off the top of my hat).

 

[Krugerrand]

I’m assuming that Musk believes production numbers alone will cause an “explosive” rise in the SP, but if he has another trick up his sleeve there are lots of options. My favorite would be the sale of the utility TE business.

The consumer TE business (Powewalls and solar roofing) makes some sense to be part of Tesla to leverage auto customer base, but sales of big TE projects to major utilities is a completely separate business. Why not sell that to a utility? It would inject billions into the balance sheet overnight, without reducing enterprise value since that business isn’t being factored into the SP value currently.

A multi-billion cash infusion without dilution or repayment obligations, coupled with imminent cash flow positive operations, would indeed cause the short burn of the century.

No. Just no.

Your argument that it’s a separate business doesn’t stand up just due to the simple fact Tesla Ecosystem; Tesla Motors, Tesla Solar, Tesla Network, Tesla Energy, Tesla Fueling Network, Tesla Vision, Tesla AI...

 

[ruralectric]

Th

Thanks for the link. That was a interesting article.

My take away quote is this one “I’ve never heard anything like this, ever,” said Ron Harbour, an expert on auto plants.

That sums up most "analyst's" take on Tesla

Although there is still the relentless characterization of Tesla and Elon as "desperate":

"Its purpose is as notable as its hasty construction. The semi-permanent structure houses a third assembly line — part of a desperate effort to speed up production of the Model 3, the car that Elon Musk, Tesla’s chief executive, has said is critical to the company’s financial health and immediate future."

Still, an interesting piece.

 

[22522]

This whole "all hands on deck" thing has, unfortunately, one serious consequence: if they pull off 5k/week, it will be obviously unsustainable one-time burst and it will be rightly criticized as such.

Any guess to when they will achieve honest-to-god 5k/week normal production without any strings or shenanigans? I think end of q3/beginning of q4.

The "all hands on deck" increases the ratio of product to salary (salary is a relative constant) improving short term profitability.

 

[Mader Levap]

Obviously you don’t know what you’re talking about as this has not been the first time Elon has called for all hands on deck nor is there any indication what’s going on right now is simply a burst rate.

Clasping hands on ears and going "LALA I CAN'T HEAR YOU" does not impress me. If you are in denial, thinking all hands on desk and taking people from other jobs to production line (someone would think those "other jobs" are needed for something) can produce sustainable not-burst rate, I can't help you.

The "all hands on deck" increases the ratio of product to salary (salary is a relative constant) improving short term profitability.

And decerasing quality, most likely. It is just done to make good on "5k/week" promise. Actual non-burst 5k/week will happen some weeks later.

 

[Esme Es Mejor]

This whole "all hands on deck" thing has, unfortunately, one serious consequence: if they pull off 5k/week, it will be obviously unsustainable one-time burst and it will be rightly criticized as such.

Any guess to when they will achieve honest-to-god 5k/week normal production without any strings or shenanigans? I think end of q3/beginning of q4.

Tesla achieved a burst rate of 797/week at the end of 2017, and averaged 814/week in Q1 (9766/12 weeks).

They achieved a rate of 2020/week at the end of Q1, and even the lowest estimates of Q2 production have them averaging higher than that.

Whatever rate they achieve at the end of Q2 (today), I trust they will average higher than that for Q3.

 

[anticitizen13.7]

Th

Thanks for the link. That was a interesting article.

My take away quote is this one “I’ve never heard anything like this, ever,” said Ron Harbour, an expert on auto plants.

That sums up most "analyst's" take on Tesla

Many people have been mercilessly mocking the Tesla Tent on Reddit, but I think that could be a big mistake.

If Tesla can demonstrate that inexpensive, rapidly deployable General Assembly lines are viable, they may be able to scale up faster than analysts are expecting.

We know that some of Tesla’s automated assembly, like frame welding, works, and works quickly. High throughput on early, easily automated steps, which feeds large numbers of parallel assembly lines, may be the game here. It’s like a CPU with a very fast front end decoder and a lot of parallel execution units that process the uOPs from the decoder. Actually, a GPU might be a better analogy.

 

[Paracelsus]

Apologies if this was already posted. It was a long travel week for work in the Columbia River Basin. Surprised to see this on CNBC. Is this the beginning of media rushing in to blame others for the Tesla FUD campaign as that house of cards falls?

Oil industry is 'peddling misinformation' about electric vehicles

When technological innovation threatens to upend the status quo, the status quo fights back. Every time. I try to keep that in mind when observing oil industry-backed efforts to discredit electric vehicles (EVs) and dismantle progress on transportation electrification by peddling misinformation through industry-funded studies.

To give you a sense of the absurdity of these efforts, imagine Bell Communication publishing a report suggesting cell phones are less convenient than landlines. Or Blockbusters paying for an analysis showing Netflix makes watching movies more difficult.

.........."Here’s the bottom line: transportation electrification is a really good idea, and electric vehicles are a superior product. That’s why they will replace the internal combustion engine."

Christine Todd Whitman: Oil industry is 'peddling misinformation' about electric vehicles

 

[Krugerrand]

Clasping hands on ears and going "LALA I CAN'T HEAR YOU" does not impress me. If you are in denial, thinking all hands on desk and taking people from other jobs to production line (someone would thought those "other jobs" are needed for something) can produce sustainable not-burst rate, I can't help you.

Yeah, didn’t actually clasp my hands on ears etc... I just know you don’t know what you’re talking about.

And decerasing quality, most likely. It is just done to make good on "5k/week" promise. Actual non-burst 5k/week will happen some weeks later.

Right, because there’s been zero evidence of improved quality as Tesla ramped S, X and now 3. Like no threads on this board from actually owners remarking on that. And zero evidence of significant increased production and delivery numbers.

I’ll be right here waiting for the retraction.