Short-Term TSLA Price Movements - 2015

[FredTMC]

Exactly!!! You cannot exclude these 1400 from Q4 and then try and say that they were already accounted for in Q4 when you talk about Q1. They must be accounted for somewhere and since they were excluded from the Q4 numbers, they must be in the Q1 numbers, both guided and actual.

I also agree that they likely have finally ended the quarter end rush to deliver every last car possible and have normalized operations to let a more even distribution of deliveries occur (ie allowing cars to slip to Q2 when before they would have made sure they were delivered in the previous quarter). It was a perfect time to do this given the 1400 left over from Q4.

If the bears want to falsely claim a miss, let them. They are going to face reality sometime this year with an unrelenting squeeze.

Da bears won't need to wait that long for a squeeze. They are going to feel some squeezing on Monday.

Yes, I agree, it's going to be unrelenting squeezing. I don't believe anyone at Tesla enjoys missing guidance and I don't think they plan to make a habit of it.

 

[hobbes]

It appears the 1400 you're talking about was part of the 9500 predicted. (Curt has it right, imo.) Which means it is not a decline, but rather an increase.

I am getting confused. Either the 1400 produced last year and delivered this year is part of the 9,500 deliveries they predicted AND part of the 10,030 delivered, or part of neither, because it wouldn´t make any sense to use two different measures for the two. Both ways, it is a beat by 530 cars: (10,300-1400)-(9500-1400) = 10,300-9500 = 530

Not?

 

[mrdoubleb]

I am getting confused. Either the 1400 produced last year and delivered this year is part of the 9,500 deliveries they predicted AND part of the 10,030 delivered, or part of neither, because it wouldn´t make any sense to use two different measures for the two. Both ways, it is a beat by 530 cars: (10,300-1400)-(9500-1400) = 10,300-9500 = 530

Not?

The 1400 is part of the 9500 they never said otherwise, in fact as we were reminded a few posts above they specifically said during the CC the 1400 should not be interpreted as bonus on top of the 9500.

So total of goods to be delivered in q1 was at least 1400 + 10,000 porduced (plan). So they either delivered 10,030 and 1370 was in the pipeline on 3/31, or they actually increased production above plan and even more were in containers. (likely as they said they planned to grow the number of cars in transit and 1370 sounds about average, not a major increase)

 

[InTheShadows]

Da bears won't need to wait that long for a squeeze. They are going to feel some squeezing on Monday.

Yes, I agree, it's going to be unrelenting squeezing. I don't believe anyone at Tesla enjoys missing guidance and I don't think they plan to make a habit of it.

So you think this will set off a squeeze? We have a lot of downward momentum to break.

 

[austinEV]

For what it is worth, I maintain my own channel analysis, based on a (somewhat outdated) DaveT model. It recently hit screaming buy levels:

 

[hockeythug]

So total of goods to be delivered in q1 was at least 1400 + 10,000 porduced (plan). So they either delivered 10,030 and 1370 was in the pipeline on 3/31, or they actually increased production above plan and even more were in containers. (likely as they said they planned to grow the number of cars in transit and 1370 sounds about average, not a major increase)

This makes sense. Wasn't thinking about production. Sorry for the trouble. I'm long btw.

 

[dmckinstry]

It appears the 1400 you're talking about was part of the 9500 predicted. (Curt has it right, imo.) Which means it is not a decline, but rather an increase.

Agreed. My original interpretation of the 9500 was that it included the 1400.

 

[ibcs]

For what it is worth, I maintain my own channel analysis, based on a (somewhat outdated) DaveT model. It recently hit screaming buy levels:

View attachment 76884

What are you basing the different lines from DaveT Model. If you refer me to the original article that's great.

 

[Johan]

I've been thinking of these "end of quarter" rushes we've seen Tesla pull now time and time again. They have been taking some heat for it, being criticized for playing in to the hands of a near sighted Wall Street etc. But that kind of criticism really holds if this quarter's beat comes at the cost of a miss next quarter (by "emptying the pipeline" so to speak). This we haven't seen any sign of previously. The only miss so far was when retooling took way longer than planned last year.

Anyway, my point is some may think: "what do a few hundred cars more or less in a quarter really matter, in the long run?". In my opinion it does matter because Tesla is still in an early stage of development. Imagine you were to plot the kind of exponential growth curve that fits with Elon's vision (500000 cars in 2020). Then imagine you put in one data point per quarter. Next imagine you could go in and manipulate the curve by dragging on the data points. Imagine dragging one of those data points early in the company's history, like now in early 2015, only a few hundred cars up - think of how much this would affect the curve looking 3 or 4 years ahead.

Another thought experiment: imagine in stead of one data point per quarter imagine one data point per for example 10k cumulative deliveries, 20k, 40k, 70k, 120k etc. now imagine drawing the say 70k cumulative deliveries data point just slightly to the left (i.e. This data point being reached slightly earlier, if only by 1 or 2 weeks). In the same way this would have a huge impact looking at the curve 3-4 years in to the future.

All of this of course is assuming a smooth curve without too many plateaus or bump (or breaks). But this smoothness is consistent with the historic data.

I wish I had some interactive tool of showing what I mean by this, but I think there are enough smart people here to get my point

 

[AlMc]

Yes. Announcing deliveries 3 days after the end of each quarter is the best long term part of this announcement. I also believe that TM did not appear to push as much near the end of this quarter as they realized they had a beat of the 9,500. This set up some other long and short term benefits. Lower burn out of both the production and delivery staff at the end of the quarter and a little 'cushion' moving forward with cars to delivery at the beginning of the quarter and filling the pipeline. Cutting burn out/lowering overtime expenses.....nice TM:wink:


EDIT: Johan types faster than I......So, like he said:biggrin:

 

[FredTMC]

So you think this will set off a squeeze? We have a lot of downward momentum to break.

We shall see next week. It certainly puts a lot of pressure on shorts to cover. I don't think there's many "long term" shorts in Tesla. Most of these shorts are just looking for a short-term trade. I think that's true of short mentality in general.

 

[McMuggets]

This:

When Elon says, "I'm going to sell 55,000 cars, starting with 9,500 in Q1", I take that to mean that he has a plan to do so. In fact, we mostly understand that plan, and so ought Karl Brauer. The plan is simple:
* Introduce the Model X
* Increase production capacity of the line
Both are on track. Why the glum headline?

It's because the bears like to make their case no matter what the facts are. I re-read the Q4 letter and yes indeed they did guide for 9500 deliveries taking into account the extra 1400 cars from Q4 2014. Therefore, this is indeed a GREAT BEAT. These "journalists" are either vested in seeing Tesla fail or want to get hits to their articles by having attention grabbing headlines. Also, very sorry for beating this dead horse about Tesla's beat. Lol.

 

[AlMc]

Sorry if someone has already posted this, but the WSJ actually gives us a positive review: Impossible! http://on.wsj.com/1BXdLz4

 

[jhm]

So what were those extra 530 deliveries worth. At $105,000 per car, $55,650,000 incremental revenue, non-GAAP. At 27% GM, $15,000,000 gross profit incremental. On 125M shares, $0.12 incremental EPS non-GAAP.

I took delivery of my Model S, aka Blueberry, on March 14 In Georgia. Since this was far enough in advance of quarter end, she was shipped by train. Trains are slower than trucks, but are cheaper and less likely to damage the vehicle. So one consequence of trying to squeeze too many deliveries in at quarter end is having to use more costly transport. This sort of issue would cut into GM if Tesla is trying to hard. What we want is a comfortable beat. Perhaps knowing they were on course for about a 500 car beat, they could pull back from more extreme, costly measures. This may also influence how they price CPO, marketing and service cars. A comfortable beat could mean holding out for better prices, which is more profitable longer term.

So a comfortable beat is alright by me.

 

[ZenMan]

Sorry if someone has already posted this, but the WSJ actually gives us a positive review: Impossible! http://on.wsj.com/1BXdLz4

Wow, it is a great writeup!

 

[uselesslogin]

So a comfortable beat is alright by me.

Reading delivery threads it seems like the factory really wasn't operating efficiently until late February at the earliest. I think it is running efficiently now. I wouldn't want to beat by too much this quarter because it won't translate into great GM. Next quarter with 3 efficient months of production is the one to set up for a massive beat with high gross margins as well. They still have a backlog to clear so at least for next Q there is no demand concern. What I am most excited about with today's release is knowing we will get the Q2 delivery numbers by July 3rd.

 

[Curt Renz]

This:

When Elon says, "I'm going to sell 55,000 cars, starting with 9,500 in Q1", I take that to mean that he has a plan to do so. In fact, we mostly understand that plan, and so ought Karl Brauer. The plan is simple:
* Introduce the Model X
* Increase production capacity of the line
Both are on track. Why the glum headline?

Karl Brauer writes for Kelley Blue Book which is almost completely dependent upon its relationships with auto dealerships and established manufacturers for its existence.

 

[anticitizen13.7]

More than 10k deliveries is fantastic news! This is going to put a damper on opposition efforts to depress the stock price ahead of the Q1 report.

I'm thinking that through the beginning of May, slight upward trend and possible bump up depending on the impact of the April 30 new product announcement.

 

[FredTMC]

Wow, it is a great writeup!

Yep. Glowing review. Nice to see

He will probably get fired or suffer a bad performance review as a result. His editor is in hot water too...

 

[ecarfan]

Sorry if someone has already posted this, but the WSJ actually gives us a positive review: Impossible! http://on.wsj.com/1BXdLz4

Remarkable review in the WSJ indeed. And for some reason it isn't behind the paywall.

The small number of reader comments at the article are interesting. One guy spouting nonsense about Elon and Tesla (with an extremely unflattering avatar) gets immediately slammed by a coup,e of more sensible readers.