Papafox's Daily TSLA Trading Charts

[Papafox]

Today the macros had a strong day, complete with a positive opening, and the hedge funds (worried about 260 and 265 call options they sold that expire on Friday) began TSLA trading with a flurry of selling to induce a mandatory morning dip. At 9:31am we saw 39K of selling and at 9:32am we saw 35K. This type of MMD on open is become standard procedure for days when the macros are strong and the manipulators wish to tell traders, "you're not going to make any money here today."

Nonetheless, by 10:15am TSLA was starting to poke its mischievous little head up into the green, which necessitated a game of whack-the-mole, which gradually subsided as TSLA climbed and flirted with 260. Unlike yesterday, however, today's trading had much lower volume (6.3M) and the stock price had reached a level which is more in line with expectations for leading into the 3Q ER next week. Thus, after several attempts at finding weakness in the afternoon, the hedge funds succeeded in pushing TSLA down in the final 10 minutes of trading, despite no negative news no negative macro moves.

Notice the extremely bumpy trading of TSLA today as each peak was met with an immediate selling scenario. I think the hedge funds were being very careful to keep TSLA below 260 so as to not suffer the same fate as when TSLA showed that it had vanquished 250 on Monday morning.

ARK was busy selling some TSLA today, which is part of its buy low, trim high strategy that keeps a single stock from becoming too much more than 10% of its holdings. ARK shareholders are apparently happy with such a policy and ARKK closed up 2.11% today.

A period of consolidation looks likely after TSLA's 7 days in a row green streak. Nonetheless, Model Y sightings continue to freak out the shorts and more covering is possible, which could of course help the stock price.

Both the Dow and NASDAQ climbed today, with the NASDAQ up 1.24% at day's end. A big macro day can often be somewhat neutralized by a strong mandatory morning dip and constant interventions, as needed.

Shorts were tagged with 56.5% of TSLA selling today, indicating a greater willingness to get involved and manipulate after yesterday's strong performance by the stock.

Looking at the tech chart, you can't see it, but the upper bollinger band is at 257.71, very close to today's closing price. While a stock can continue to push the upper limits of the bollinger band and bring it along in the climb (as we saw during the lead-in to the Q2 ER), more often we see the climb lessen to allow the upper bb to rise above it. Many institutional buyers hold off buying above the upper bb, and so TSLA is setting itself up for future climbing if news warrants, after the consolidation is complete.

I also like how the blue 100 day moving day moving average is tilting upward for a run toward the red 200 DMA. When the two cross again, the golden cross will be a welcome signal to tech traders that TSLA is healthy again, technically.

Conditions:
* Dow up 237 (0.89%)
* NASDAQ up 100 (1.24%)
* TSLA 257.89, up 0.93 (0.36%)
* TSLA volume 6.4M shares
* Oil 52.94
* Percent of TSLA selling tagged to shorts: 56.5%

 

[MP3Mike]

ARK shareholders are apparently happy with such a policy and ARKK closed up 2.11% today.

Do ARK shareholders really have any control over the share price? I thought it was more like an ETF in that the share price was determined based on the value of the holdings that make it up.

 

[Papafox]

Do ARK shareholders really have any control over the share price? I thought it was more like an ETF in that the share price was determined based on the value of the holdings that make it up.

My understanding is that an ETF like some of the ARK products will have a little market wiggle room between the NAV (Net Asset Value) and the price you pay/receive for the ETF. Here is what they say on the ARK website regarding their ETFs:

Shares of the ARK ETFs may be bought or sold throughout the day at their market price on the exchange on which they are listed. The market price of an ARK ETF's shares may be at, above or below the ARK ETF’s net asset value ("NAV") and will fluctuate with changes in the NAV as well as supply and demand in the market for the shares. The market price of ARK ETF shares may differ significantly from their NAV during periods of market volatility.

 

[Papafox]

Today, day 7 in a row of climbing, was an oddly strong day for TSLA. With TSLA underperforming the NASDAQ's by nearly 0.9% yesterday, I expected the hedge funds would finally succeed in pushing TSLA into the red for close today. It was not to be, however. If you look at the NASDAQ chart below, you can see that TSLA mostly followed the ups and downs of the NASDAQ, but in a greatly distorted fashion. Both maxed out today about 11am, and both slid downhill until 2pm before starting a bumpy recovery. What's fascinating, though is how much stronger TSLA performed until nearly 2pm, when a dip in the NASDAQ was exaggerated hugely, likely by short-selling.

At this point I thought the hedge funds were in control, but as soon as the NASDAQ began a weak climb, they lost control and the buying took over again. There's clearly a need for buying out there. Some can be linked to more short covering, as Dusaniwsky's chart suggests,but there's clearly more buying than that done by the shorts.

Note the big one minute trading of 113K shares at 9:38am (lots of buying pushing the SP higher), 42K at 10:04, and 46K of selling at 11:11am to initiate a dip.

I think we've seen enough pain endured by the manipulators in the past couple weeks that they may be running low on enthusiasm. While the afternoon pushdowns of the past several sessions have been profitable to the manipulators (assuming sell high and then buy lower), the higher volume efforts in the mornings with mandatory morning dips and with fighting the initial climbs have been money losers. In terms of volume of selling, I was surprised this afternoon after 2pm that the hedge funds were so weak in their response. If percent of selling by shorts keeps dropping, that will be confirmation that the manipulators are licking their wounds and backing out. It may not happen, though. Keep an eye on the apparent ferociousness of the manipulations as the days go on.

Part of the buying pressure could be coming from rumors of Model Y coming out in Q1 instead of in fall of 2020 and some sources suggesting that Q3 could be stronger than expected.They may be right or wrong, so please don't bet the farm nor watch from the sidelines.

The NASDAQ remained in the red all day and closed down 0.30%

Although I take Dusaniwskys charts with a grain of salt these days, the trend he's showing is that of continued short-seller covering.

Percent of selling by shorts decreased to 53% today, which is consistent with the lukewarm response that TSLA received as it started climbing after 2pm today.

If you look at the tech chart, you can compare the run up to the 2Q ER with that of the 3Q ER, both in terms of stock price and a steep enough climb slope that causes the upper bollinger band to be dragged along, rather than acting as a barrier to be bounced off.

TSLA is more than $4 above the 200 day moving average, now, and that red line will hopefully provide some support, if needed.

What happens Thursday and Friday? I can't say. One possibility Thursday is that TSLA succeeds in climbing above 262, which then signals that 260 has fallen and TSLA could have another big day just as we saw when 250 fell. Another possibility is a rise in the morning and then a slow descent into close, as is typical of the past several trading sessions. Another possibility is that the hedge funds defend 260 with a vengeance and with 260 secured push down for a dip.

I'll be looking for too quick a rise too early in the morning, with an immediate beat down, which doesn't typically turn out well. On the other hand, if the shorts are really giving a battle during the opening hour and then the stock price starts running higher, I'm more inclined to believe it will stick. What would give me confidence would be trading that suggests the manipulators are running low on energy, like we saw after 2pm today.

Conditions:
* Dow down 23 (0.08%)
* NASDAQ down 25 (0.30%)
* TSLA 259.75, up 1.86 (0.72%)
* TSLA volume 6.7M shares
* Oil 52.93
* Percent of TSLA selling tagged to shorts: 53%

 

[ggr]

I'll be looking for too quick a rise too early in the morning, with an immediate beat down, which doesn't typically turn out well. On the other hand, if the shorts are really giving a battle during the opening hour and then the stock price starts running higher, I'm more inclined to believe it will stick. What would give me confidence would be trading that suggests the manipulators are running low on energy, like we saw after 2pm today.

You got your wish.

 

[TrendTrader007]

$tsla stock price going up 9 days straight in a row on relatively low volume and closing over 200 dma 3 days in a row is a potentially very positive development for longs in that it shows stealth accumulation by strong hands-most likely institutional buying. i reviewed the entire trading history of $tsla sp daily trading since IPO in 2010 and this is the first time it has ever happened;
longest up day trading streak was 8 days in January 2013 and similarly in jan 2012 where it was 11 days except one day in the middle was negative
maybe minor pullback prior to next week ER followed by straight shot to $350 and even $400 +/- pullback is my best guess at this point
we will see

 

[Papafox]

TSLA really did it: 9 days in a row of climbing. It was a bumpy ride, too! TSLA surged to 264.5 just three minutes after opening. As I mentioned yesterday, beware of the steep climb right after opening and to no one's great surprise the price dipped minutes later. At 9:53am, TSLA quickly ran up to 263 momentarily and met a similar fate. There's simply too much on the line for hedge funds to allow the stock price to run away that quickly and easily. They have their eyes on Friday. Volume was low, only 4.8 million shares for the day.

As the NASDAQ dipped toward 12 noon, TSLA followed. As the NASDAQ climbed after noon, TSLA again followed but initially with great enthusiasm, and around 12:30pm or so I thought the stock had a chance at a breakout. Alas, even though the NASDAQ continued a slow climb until 3pm, the hedge funds reigned TSLA in and spent the rest of the day keeping the stock near or just under 262 for the most part.

Why 262? When TSLA climbed about 252 on Monday, the stock rallied and ran much higher. On the other hand, if the stock price could be kept at 262, it is within manipulating range for bringing down to 260 on Friday. I think that's the plan.

News today included word that U.S. wait times for SR+ and LR Model 3s is 6-10 weeks and for performance is 8-10 weeks. Demand looks particularly strong this quarter and Tesla is going to be able to sell every Model 3 it can manufacture and deliver to the customer. Perhaps that piece of news will gain some traction. Further, SR+ just gained some range and price has increased $500. Hmm, all the demand you could wish for plus a price increase.

The NASDAQ closed up 0.40% today.

Looking at a resized and modified max pain chart (I removed the enormous towers of expiring puts near 70 because they are irrelevant now) you can see that there are 8.6K of 260 calls expiring on Friday. The hedge funds definitely don't want to see them paid. Further, if you look at the puts (red) vs. calls (blue), you can see that the legitimate market makers enter a point of relative ambivalence between 257.50 and 252.50, but with puts so much lower than calls at 260, the market makers are likely to side with the hedge funds on Friday late afternoon for a pushdown to 260 if TSLA remains above that price getting close to market's final half hour. Thus, combined with the 8 day streak and the low volume, I think the downforces will likely rule tomorrow.

That said, the runs upwards to 264 and 263 this morning show just how touchy traders are to TSLA climbs, and if good news comes out then it's anyone's bet how high the stock could run. Notice how quickly the market dispatched that dip into the red during pre-market trading.

TSLA shorts were tagged with 56.5% of the selling today. That's an increase from yesterday and a suggestion that the hedge funds will find the resources to dip TSLA below 260 tomorrow.

The tech chart shows what an impressive run this has been so far. Notice the nice upward curve to the 100 day moving average. Notice that the upper bollinger band has now steeped sufficiently to be climbing with the stock price and TSLA is now within the bollinger bands. At some point between now and next Wednesday you will likely see a day or two of profit-taking as traders wish to cash in on the rally without taking any chances with the ER. This would be normal and similar to what we saw with the run up to the Q2 ER.

Conditions:
* Dow up 24 (0.09%)
* NASDAQ up 33 (0.40%)
* TSLA 261.97, up 2.22 (0.85%)
* TSLA volume 4.8M shares
* Oil 53.92
* Percent of TSLA selling tagged to shorts: 56.5%

 

[Papafox]

I expected TSLA to lose $2 today and close below 260 because after a 9 day rise and with volume tailing off, the hedge funds needed to protect their 260-strike expiring call options, and there was little question they could pull off the manipulation if they threw enough effort into it. What surprised me was the NASDAQ dip as the day progressed, which made possible a $5 loss today. Ho hum, such is the market.

Looking at the TSLA trading chart, I was surprised by the shape of the icicle dips throughout the day as short-selling was used to push the stock price down in bursts of volume. The reason I was surprised was that the hedge funds had previously been using algos with their short-selling and covering that produced much smoother curves. Instead, they resorted to the old-style icicles I think out of necessity. If a weatherman was studying the sky and it looked like TSLA's chart today, he would surely issue a tornado warning and then run for cover.

What's particularly interesting with the trading was how the manipulators succeeded with a sticky dip from about 1pm on as the NASDAQ recovered but TSLA stayed in the vicinity of 257.50. I think the hedge funds initially sought to get $260, when the NASDAQ started dropped they then shot for 255, but as the NAS recovered they realized 255 was not possible without extreme effort and went for 257.50.

Notice in the final half hour when the NASDAQ started another dip, TSLA did not follow. I think at this point we had buying pressure (more short covering plus longs acquiring for the possible Monday morning exuberance rally). We also saw a massive one minute volume of 86K at 3:30pm as the stock price rose slightly, suggesting that the short-selling that minute was more a response to a big buying spurt rather than the other way around. We saw a rise in the SP in the final few minutes and a substantial 147K shares traded in the closing minute.

Comparing TSLA's percentage loss today to other volatile tech-like stocks, TSLA lost approximately a similar amount, and yet that dip required very substantial manipulations and a 57.5% of selling by shorts just to get TSLA to dip as much as other similar stocks. Low volume and such a significant effort to pull TSLA down $5 today suggests that longs are overall confident and holding for the ER.

The NASDAQ closed down 0.83% on Friday, with the Dow down nearly 1%

Today's chart from Ihor Dusaniwsky shows accelerating covering by shorts in the past week as the ER approaches and as TSLA continues its climb. The crossing of the short index gold line with the stock price green line is a psychological crossing of a chasm for people who frequently refer to this chart.

TSLA shorts were tagged with a robust 57.5% of selling today, as they manipulated the "sugar" out of the stock in hopes of saving some sold calls from ending in the money this monthly expiration Friday.

Looking at the tech chart, the stock price remains above the 200 day moving average and has a fair amount of headroom for Monday's trading as the upper bollinger band continues to run higher.

For the week, TSLA closed at 256.95, up 9.06 from last Friday's 247.89. It's been another good week for TSLA. Enjoy your weekend.

Conditions:
* Dow down 256 (0.95%)
* NASDAQ down 67 (0.83%)
* TSLA 256.95, down 5.02 (1.92%)
* TSLA volume 5.8M shares
* Oil 53.87
* Percent of TSLA selling tagged to shorts: 57.5%

 

[Papafox]

Today was the third day in October when the macros soared and the manipulators hit TSLA hard to keep it from running higher with the NASDAQ. A mighty 63% of selling was tagged to shorts today.
* Last Tuesday, October 15, this Daily TSLA Trading Charts post explained the details of the manipulations when the NASDAQ gained 1.24% and TSLA gained only 0.36%.Notice the sizable jump up in % of selling by shorts that day (in the shorts chart below).
* On October 10, % of selling by shorts increased to 56% as I explained in this Daily TSLA Trading Charts post as manipulators pulled out the stops when the NASDAQ ran up 0.60% and their efforts kept TSLA's gains at a mere 0.09% that day.

TSLA threatened to retake 260 after opening as the usual Monday morning buying exuberance took place, but despite the high macros the shorts sold so furiously on a low volume day that they managed to nearly get TSLA down to 250 today before it bounced back. Notice the severe, near-vertical dips with no negative news. At 10:34am 23K shares were sold that minute in order to orchestrate the quick dip, and at 12:37pm another 23K shares traded hands in a minute's time as the second deep dip got underway.

Notice the apparent capping from about 2:36pm to close.

One early indicator that manipulators were shorting the "sugar" out of TSLA today was the enormous 555K shares traded in one minute at 4:00pm.

The purpose of these deep dips is to scare investors into selling ahead of the ER and to cause the stock to fall far enough so that hedge funds may stand to reap the benefits of calls sold that expire worthless on Friday.

The NASDAQ couldn't have been more positive and stable today, closing up 0.91%.

Here's what the expiring calls for Friday look like. At strike prices above 250, the calls are numerous and spread out this week (with 260 being the highest), making a very expensive situation for the option sellers if they haven't delta-hedged and if the stock runs higher after Wednesday's ER. I think the hedge funds are making a pro-active strike to unnerve the longs a bit before the ER. They will likely try the usual sell the news after the ER routine, but we really don't know if the news will be ambiguous enough to facilitate such manipulations, or if there will be a positive surprise that will defuse the efforts of the manipulators. Wishing I knew the answer!

TSLA shorts were tagged with 63% of TSLA selling today, a very high number that shows significant manipulations in an attempt to keep TSLA from rising with the macros. A mighty 555K shares traded hands at 4:00pm, giving a hint at the large quantity of day-shorting and covering underway.

Here's the tech chart I posed on the main TMC investors forum today, showing that the most recent 3 dips of TSLA were neutralized by climbingg in only 2-4 days. This is a big improvement over August, when the hedge funds really controlled TSLA and made a lot of money from their manipulations. My point? I think more investors are becoming aware of the possibility that even if a dip is manufactured after the ER, (the way the market overreacted to the relatively good 3Q P&D report), that dip may not be as deep or last as long as other ER dips because expectations of the investors are changing.

Mind you, the results of Wednesday's ER could justify a dip, and they might not, and we'll not know until the results come out because there are so many variables in how Tesla can handle the finances. For example, will we see the high amount of one-time charges show up in the ER as we have seen in some recent ERs, or has Tesla gotten these charges out of the way so that we can have a clean and positive ER this time? How positively has the increased M3 manufacturing in Q3 affected the cost side of the equation? What type of help will Tesla receive from credits sold to other manufacturers in Q3?

In after-hours trading today, we saw some rebound of the stock price. The hedge funds did not succeed in unnerving investors today, and so a positive day leading into the ER is still quite possible. Keep that seatbelt snugged, though, because anything is possible.

Conditions:
* Dow up 57 (0.21%)
* NASDAQ up 73 (0.91%)
* TSLA 253.50, down 3.45 (1.34%)
* TSLA volume 5.1M shares
* Oil 53.63
* Percent of TSLA selling tagged to shorts: 63%

 

[Right_Said_Fred]

Is it known which hedge funds are manipulating TSLA? Or are their names/identities shrouded in clouds?

 

[Papafox]

Is it known which hedge funds are manipulating TSLA? Or are their names/identities shrouded in clouds?

That's the question, Right_Said_Fred. The SEC could figure it out by analyzing who is doing the short-selling during deep mandatory morning dips and other blatant manipulations, but so far they are unwilling.

 

[Papafox]

Today the NASDAQ began the day in the green and so did TSLA, but of course TSLA soon plunged into a mandatory morning dip. Recovery was quick and then for most of the rest of the morning the hedge funds played whack-a-mole with TSLA and reacted any time it stuck its cute little head up into the green.

The NASDAQ had been descending most of the day but rose slightly at 11:40am and then did a second rise that topped out around 12:30pm. Tesla used these cues as rally points and shed the whack-a-mole in order to climb to nearly 258. As the NASDAQ began its descent again, TSLA followed, but at a noticeably higher trading level.

Did today's TSLA performance undo yesterday's manipulations?
NASDAQ Mon:+0.91% Tues:-0.72% Combined:+0.19
TSLA Mon:-1.34% Tues:+0.82% Combined: -0.52
The answer is no, when you consider TSLA's performance over the two days it still came in below the NASDAQ's. On the other hand, today's strength of TSLA is a reminder that sometimes the bulls are in charge and the hedge funds lose control.

Trading at 4:00pm was light, but we did see 68K shares trade at 4:29pm in a pre-arranged trade at exactly the closing price.

The NASDAQ lost 0.72% today

Tesla shorts were tagged with 57.5% of the stock's selling today

Looking at the tech chart, you can see that today's rise brought TSLA back above the 200 day moving average. The upper bollinger band is at 265.32, giving some nice headroom for tomorrow's after-hours trading if the call turns out to be positive.

Good luck to all on the ER tomorrow!

Conditions:
* Dow down 40 (0.15%)
* NASDAQ down 59 (0.72%)
* TSLA 255.58, up 2.08 (0.82%)
* TSLA volume 4.5M shares
* Oil 54.09
* Percent of TSLA selling tagged to shorts: 57.5%

 

[MABMAB]

Is it known which hedge funds are manipulating TSLA? Or are their names/identities shrouded in clouds?

And if the identity of such funds are not known, how is known to be manipulated?
The same question could be asked about "percent of selling tagged to shorts.

 

[Papafox]

Ever wonder what the chart of a really good earnings report looks like? Take a look above. Congratulations to all longs who have endured a nearly year-long sugarstorm with the stock and hung in there to enjoy this moment. We earned it! Glad to see TSLA back on the correct side of 300 again. As after-hours trading approached a close, TSLA stood at about 306. Not bad.

The 3Q ER shows:
GAAP profits: $150 million
Cash flow: Net increase of $376 million
Automotive Gross Margin: 22.8%, up from 18.9% last quarter

With 63.5% of selling tagged to shorts today, lots of manipulations took place to control the stock price during market hours. Once the ER was released, however, volume soared along with the stock price and manipulations just weren't possible. All the weeks and months of stealing a dollar here and there have now been at least temporarily remedied by the good ER steamroller.

TSLA shorts were tagged with 63.5% of selling today, a high number indicating lots of manipulations during market hours

What can we expect from here? On Thursday the shorts will try to push TSLA below 300 and hold it there, but volume and buying pressure will likely be too great for that plan to succeed. It'll be fun to watch them try and may give a momentary buying opportunity on open.

With a 50 point increase in price, there is a tremendous amount of delta-hedging that market makers and hedge funds will have to do on sold options. At any given time, there's the equivalent of 200 million shares of TSLA stock being traded in puts and calls. That delta-hedging is going to involve some serious upward pressure on the stock price. With TSLA above 300 now, some shorts are going to be getting margin calls and will be forced to cover. As for the hedge funds that have been so heavily manipulating TSLA instead of delta-hedging, they just got what they deserved today. Couldn't happen to a more deserving band of pirates.

Outlook for Q4 is good. Some negativity will be associated with the first quarter of beginning a new production line in Shanghai because it takes a while to get the labor working efficiently as a slow crawl of an assembly line slowly speeds up. On the other hand, in the CC Zack said that S and X production are increasing to meet increased demand, which is bullish, and we've already seen that wait times are fairly long for Model 3, also indicating lots of demand. Also, Elon says he's highly confident that Tesla will hit 360K deliveries for the year.

All the positive news about Q4 suggests there will be more upward pressure on the stock price. With approximately 34 million shares sold short, that's a lot of covering needed, and there's a chance we could see some type of a squeeze, slow or fast. Keep a close eye on TSLA these next couple of days. The fun is likely just beginning.

Conditions:
* Dow up 46 (0.17%)
* NASDAQ up 16 (0.19%)
* TSLA 254.68, down 0.90 (0.35%)
* TSLA volume 5.1M shares
* Oil 55.74
* Percent of TSLA selling tagged to shorts: 63.5%

 

[Speedr117]

I would guess that the Solar Roof V3 release tomorrow by Elon will help keep the price from dropping even if they try and suppress the stock price. Agree @Papafox? Also, thanks for doing this EVERYDAY!!!

 

[Papafox]

I would guess that the Solar Roof V3 release tomorrow by Elon will help keep the price from dropping even if they try and suppress the stock price. Agree @Papafox? Also, thanks for doing this EVERYDAY!!!

Certainly Solar Roof V3 is a positive, but the market hasn't given much recognition to Tesla Energy yet. Let's hope that solar roof V3 is a big success and starts Tesla Energy doing well enough to contribute to the value of Tesla in the minds of the analysts.

 

[UTMB]

Hoping for a squeeze, a big squeeze, a “blood from a turnip” squeeze.

 

[TrendTrader007]

007

@TrendTrader007
·
19s

$tsla interesting to see what my approximately 800 + call options are going to do tomorrow Thank you for Shorting $tsla

 

[Papafox]

007

@TrendTrader007
·
19s

$tsla interesting to see what my approximately 800 + call options are going to do tomorrow Thank you for Shorting $tsla

My intuition for some reason says your calls will be going up in value. Glad for you, TT007. My regards to Anne Boleyn and mini-007.

 

[Papafox]

We expected the hedge funds to cap TSLA at 300 for as long as possible today, but their ability to keep the cap intact through market close was a bit of a surprise. After all, the stock climbed to 308 and then settled at 306 during after-hours trading on Wednesday. Here's what I think transpired.

TSLA shorts were tagged with 55.5% of TSLA selling today, a remarkably high percentage of sales when you consider that nearly 30 million shares traded in one of the all time highest volume days of TSLA's history. I hope the computers running the algos for the hedge funds were liquid-cooled, because that's a tremendous amount of computations to do! Right at opening and then about 15 minutes later TSLA climbed above 300 and the algos had to go to work whacking that mole and keeping it below 300.

The volume for the first minute (9:30am) was over 1.3 million shares. The stock then shifting into trading at about 150K shares/min. The stakes were high and the hedge funds pulled it off for today. Much of the buying in the morning would logically be market makers buying to delta-hedge their options. These buyers had no incentive to boost the stock price any further and so we didn't see extreme fluctuations in volume. As afternoon approached, volume subsided. If TSLA had run through 308 and towards higher numbers, many shorts would have panicked, and many more would have been subjected to margin calls. Long traders would have jumped in to ride the stock up and an already bad situation for the hedge funds would have become much worse.

Starting about 9:45am, you can see the stock price being methodically worked downward to about 291, which was reached about 10:30am. This walkdown was a message from the hedge funds to the market that TSLA wouldn't be running anywhere today. The walkdown also set in motion selling by weak longs.

The type of weak longs who sold today were a more robust variety than your typical newbies in TSLA. Rather, they were of two main types: Those investors who were fatigued with the ups and downs of TSLA and wanted to part ways with the stock at break even or a small profit, and those who don't trust TSLA to hold its gains. This second variety will reenter TSLA at a later date if there's a substantial dip, but they don't have the confidence to hold and see what comes next.

And so with the 300 cap sending a message that TSLA isn't going higher today, large numbers of these weak longs sold and in turn we saw market makers doing their delta-hedging picking up the shares. Of course there was other types of buying and selling going on as well.

Thus, the market-makers managed to get their delta-hedging done (at least I think so, given the lower volume in the afternoon) and the weakest of the longs have left their positions. That leaves stronger longs but also lower volume for Friday with the hedging likely under control. My guess is that the vast majority of shorts are still in their positions, but most are trapped in a loss position at the moment. Yesterday, Dusaniwsky said the after-hours rally ate up 75% of the gains of the shorts.

The thing is that Tesla has shown incredible strength in this ER. We already knew that demand is strong and GF3 is coming online this month. The weakness of Tesla has been the margins in recent quarters, and now that weakness has been eliminated through good, old-fashioned cost-cutting and better manufacturing economics. Q4 is looking to be stronger than Q3, and so the knowledge that an even stronger quarter is coming will put upward pressure on the stock price.

TSLA pretty much disregarded the macros, even though the NASDAQ gained 0.81% today

Looking at the Opricot open interest of options volume charts, you can see that lots of calls will be expiring on Friday and they're spread out over a large price field, most of which will be unreachable even with a robust MMD. Further, the options volume chart shows call buying at 300 and above, and so the hedge funds have a great incentive to push down on Friday.

Working against the hedge funds will be additional analyst upgrades, I suspect. We also have the solar roof V3 demo scheduled for Friday afternoon, so Tesla is setting itself up to demonstrate that solar and storage are about to get much bigger than in the past. The biggest incentive for bringing in buyers, though, is the potential for S&P 500 inclusion as early as May, 2020. At some point, institutional investors will start jumping on board to prepare for this inclusion. This rosy future not too long in the distance will cause most of the current shareholders to maintain their positions. Thus, the manipulations which had been a serious deterrent to stock price appreciation will subside into noise at some point as Tesla's future clarifies in the eyes of investors and volume buying by larger institutions renders the manipulations of little value. Can't wait.

Bottom line, expect volatility in the short term but good things are in store in the medium to long term, so don't miss the show.

Shorts were tagged with selling 55.5% of a massive 29.4 million shares today.

Looking at the tech chart, please look way up there at the little black dot around the 300 price. That's where TSLA is today. The upper bollinger band is irrelevant after such massive good news and it will follow the stock price like a faithful puppy until the two are again united. Notice too the blue 100 day moving average as it arcs aggressively up towards the 200 day moving average. The golden cross will be another signal to technical traders that TSLA is once again a healthy stock.

Finally, our FUDster of the week award goes to the Wall Street Journal, with special gold stars awarded to Charley Grant for a truly memorable piece of FUD about falling sales at Tesla. The former owners of the WSJ must be beside themselves to see what a circus this once-lauded financial publication has become. Take a bow, Charley, you're a prime symptom of what is wrong with the new WSJ.

Conditions:
* Dow down 28 (0.11%)
* NASDAQ up 66 (0.81%)
* TSLA 299.68, up 45.00 (17.67%)
* TSLA volume 29.4M shares
* Oil 55.87
* Percent of TSLA selling tagged to shorts: 55.5%