Longest delays are for those in CA where they tend to wait to end of quarter to facilitate production start. Run your review on this data with (CA,OR,WA) in mind. Also, a bunch of inventory just came on on ev-cpo.com for both MS and MX which would have been built early and mid-quarter. Seen that before - I mentioned in a point higher up in the thread.
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Q1 2017 Delivery Estimates
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It is very strange that Jose's data was Model S only in 2016, and Model X only in 2017. He's estimating 624 Model X's in China for January, and then 50 for February. Model S averaged ~625/month in 2016.
Reading through Bertel Schmitt's writing is painful... for someone with so much experience reporting on the automotive industry, he takes quite a few liberties with his conclusions. In any case, he's been reportin on Tesla and China: Here Is What We Know About Tesla's Big China Bonanza
He now admits that his data from JL Warren/JATO Dynamics is "not entirely correct." But what really is the problem is that he doesn't seem to understand the production and delivery rhythms. In any case, his data said that Tesla imported 2,680 vehicles in December and "sold" 3,144.
From his article:
Of course, 1,067 imported for a first month of a quarter is pretty good, higher than any first month of a quarter in 2016 (179, 247, 363, 605). So the normal expected overhang is likely in the 400-700 range. Let's just use the 605 number from Sept, 2016. So that's 1,440 overhang from December that wasn't registered, and then add to it 461 (1067-605) and that's 1,901. Given Musk's story from the January 4th Gigafactory investor's tour of about 2,000 vehicles that just missed delivery, that seems to check out. Normally, it is between the 2nd and early 3rd months of a quarter that should receive the bulk of shipments. Note in August, where 1,729 were imported, and 1,747 delivered the next month. Note that in Q4, 2,322 and then 2,680 in the last two months imported, and deliveries didn't quite flush it through.
Add to it that Hong Kong is expected to have a high quarter due to the expiration of FRT and slightly elevated early month numbers in Europe and U.S., and we have likely a draw down in the overhang.
dennis
Model S Plaid
I did as instructed and the average for those states is 46 days. Tesla is waiting 1-2 weeks longer to start production because the transportation takes 1-2 weeks less. It still doesn't explain how Tesla has a 5-6 week backlog if they are "demand constrained" as you keep claiming.
And I responded to you point up thread. Tesla is building inventory cars because there is demand for inventory cars. They aren't pushing custom orders out to the next quarter and then flooding the sales locations with inventory cars that aren't going to be sold.
So far your arguments about padding the ABL and building inventory cars that aren't needed don't hold water. There is NO indication from the data we have that Tesla is anything but production limited. The 5 1/2 week average lag from confirmed order to production start shows it.
You can criticize Tesla for not figuring out how to increase production for S/X, but that is a completely different discussion.
dennis
Model S Plaid
The shutdown was planned so any production delays were baked into the promised delivery dates. The only issue this quarter is the EPA delay with the 100D.
Some interesting developments...
China deliveries appear quite healthy for Jan and Feb
Here's Much Better Tesla News Than Tencent
Norway deliveries are also looking great. I was originally predicting somewhere between 5 and 600 for March. Looks like it should be around 750 by end of tomorrow.
China deliveries appear quite healthy for Jan and Feb
Here's Much Better Tesla News Than Tencent
Norway deliveries are also looking great. I was originally predicting somewhere between 5 and 600 for March. Looks like it should be around 750 by end of tomorrow.
You must realize that Norway has decreased since 2014. Norway looks good because of Model X.
Unit sales
Jan Feb March Q1
132 431 1493 2,056 --2014
71 321 1140 1,532 -- 2015
105 113 487 705 -- 2016
129 56 289 474 -- 2017 MS only
367 100 727 1194 -- 2017 combined S+X
Currently, from the eyes of someone doing accounting, Norway is better than 2016 but is beaten by 2014 and 2015.
If you look at MS only, it has declined every year since 2014, 2017 is the "worst march" of the four years. Since MX has not sold any units in a Q1 until this one, how many are from the historic 2012-2016 order period and how many are new-buyers? Numbers are numbers and if you remove emotion of "looking good" views of the numbers, in terms of sales revenues, I would say that they could have done better.
Norway registrations do not equate equally to sold cars. Registrations can come before a sale and may just be registration of some "cars in transit".
Unit sales
Jan Feb March Q1
132 431 1493 2,056 --2014
71 321 1140 1,532 -- 2015
105 113 487 705 -- 2016
129 56 289 474 -- 2017 MS only
367 100 727 1194 -- 2017 combined S+X
Currently, from the eyes of someone doing accounting, Norway is better than 2016 but is beaten by 2014 and 2015.
If you look at MS only, it has declined every year since 2014, 2017 is the "worst march" of the four years. Since MX has not sold any units in a Q1 until this one, how many are from the historic 2012-2016 order period and how many are new-buyers? Numbers are numbers and if you remove emotion of "looking good" views of the numbers, in terms of sales revenues, I would say that they could have done better.
Norway registrations do not equate equally to sold cars. Registrations can come before a sale and may just be registration of some "cars in transit".
Fremont makes the cars. Tilburg fulfills the import "assembly" steps to allow for certain taxation avoidance. The car is built in Fremont, partly disassembled for shipping and then popped back together again in Tilburg.
Conversely, at the moment, the street cares more about overall number of units rather than per model. The comparison is fraught with issues because the Model X didn't exist before. So someone looking to buy a long distance BEV could not choose a Model X in 2014 or 2015. How do you know how the break down would have fared if both models were in existence? Therefore, you are slicing and dicing with emotion to try to find an angle on the numbers. Since Tesla is still production constrained, people order up what they want, an S or an X and Tesla makes them on the same production line - the primary bottlenecks in the factory can either make an X or an S, not both at the same time. As a result, most people care about the total, not the break down at this juncture. One day, if there are lots more inventory sitting on the lots and we can see seasonality and the like in a more traditional automotive sales scenario, then the per model breakdown makes sense.
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If Tesla is production constrained, why is their weekly vin # issuance (ie. how many given out per week) lately have a topping pattern that started in late 2016? I can show you via PM but don't want to post such data here until the sales #s come out. In terms of rolling into Q2, you would expect they would at least give out a combined 2000/wk (which is below what they wanted to exit 2016 in production). And recent batches of 1000 Vins include some sizable inventory builds. And inventory #s are low as they can go back and build through those Vin #s over time. I see 20% MS inventory and 12% and more for MX vins, for example:
Examples:
Inv. # Vin k end End on date
267 189999 3/5/2017
190 190999 3/15/2017 (10 days)
133 43999 3/3/2017
121 44999 3/15/2017 (12 days)
Production constrained is a misnomer. I doubt the street is doing this level of research. How can a fund manager dig into data on 500 of their holdings without a crack staff of data scientists working over all their fund holdings? Many invest in the same type of emotion. I'm presenting numbers - they are without emotion and they tell the story.
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First of all, as I have said before, the data is very noisy. And overall, I expect a topping pattern to start to appear especially since Tesla is production constrained. They have a limit to the production capacity of their factory, one that they are "burning cash" to alleviate. If Q2 doesn't have the shutdown of Q1, then Q2's overall production rate will increase, but only by a little bit. I suspect that Q1's overall production rate is pretty close to Q4's. But the sales numbers and the production numbers can vary by enough that the overall financial picture looks very different. Flush through 2,500 vehicles from the inter-quarter delivery overhang and Tesla shows significant cash flow from operations. Basically, Tesla is managed to be operationally cash flow break even these days. If they have a hold back in deliveries due to logistics, the financial picture looks worse. If that overhang drops, they look much better.
And at this production rate, Model S/X will show YoY gain of about 30%... well enough to carry the company through Model 3 launch which is what really, really matters.
Bonaire, I guarantee if Tesla gave delivery numbers broken down by paint color, you would be patiently explaining how the decline of blue cars was damning. Someone would say "that's dumb, the total is what matters". You would say, hey I am just showing un emotional numbers. Blue sales are way down. Just sayin' Be careful out there. Maybe sell all your shares. Just concerned for yall. 
I think in hindsight we will recognize that Tesla was comfortable at about this run rate of S/X. I think we are seeing low investment in that line. But that is fine... they are focusing on the model 3 which is where their growth will come from now.
"comfortable at about this run rate". Well, imagine if they had no access to the bond and stock market to get further funds from and how being comfortable at the run rate would have worked out. They can be comfortable because they can continue to get funding. Otherwise, something more drastic to turn sales would have been needed, including expense management tactics and even advertising and other measures.
It is not a scandal that there is a ceiling for S/X demand. I got a copy of their secret master plan and it said they planned to make a high volume 35k car instead of trying to expand the S/X volume forever. The equity market also understands this.
jesselivenomore
Member
It's a good thing TSLA is being valued based on totals sales then, rather than a specific model. Before long, it's growth will only "look good" because of the Model 3. And then Model Y. And then Truck. And then...
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