Short-Term TSLA Price Movements - 2016

[dennis]

Do you have stats showing what percent of driving is within metro areas where people live & work, vs. long road trips?
The EV sales stats in US and elsewhere shows there is a large enough market for these. In US, less than 30% EV sales are long range EVs (Tesla S & X) YTD 2016. The percent is much less globally, as Europe and China.

Here are some rough figures. Average US commute (IIRC) is 40 miles round trip. Average monthly mileage is 1000 miles. So, more than 80% travel is just commuting, close to one's residence.

Congratulations on your circular argument: Since most of the EVs that are available are not long range EVs most of the EVs sold are not long range EVs.

Look at it another way. How many Model S/X owners here would have purchased if Tesla did not have the Supercharger network? My estimate is less than 20%. Sure you use your second car for the occasional road trip. Or you can rent a car. Or you can plot out the other charging options available and spend several hours planning your road trip in your EV and add many hours to the length of the actual trip. The problem is most people don't want to be inconvenienced. Without the Supercharger network Tesla would never have gotten past the early adopters.

Today's Chevy Bolt buyer faces the same questions. Without a robust DCFC network for the Bolt you buy it as a commute only car and use your other car/rental for road trips or take one inconvenient road trip in the Bolt because your family says "never again". It will be worse for the more expensive offerings that eventually get here from Audi and Mercedes unless they solve the DCFC issue before launch. Who wants to buy an Audi Q6 SUV and not be able to take it on a weekend ski trip to Lake Tahoe?

Another factory tour by members from this forum this week? Did anyone go on a tour in earlier parts of the quarter? Why are all the factpry tours crammed into the end of the quarter?

I was waiting for my kids to get home from college for Christmas break so they could join my wife and I on the tour.

Have you had a factory tour yet? It is really impressive. If you aren't an owner, maybe you know someone with a Tesla and they could take you as their guest.

 

[MitchJi]

Then why not ask the question somewhere relevant? Or ask Woz?

I apologize for the tone of my reply. Please look at the edited version.

It's just as relevant a question as everyone gushing about how there's no comparison between the Bolt and the M3. Paraphrasing "you'd need to be an idiot to choose the Bolt instead of an M3 ". Unless you think that this forum should be a bull echo chamber

I don't actually disagree with that statement but I think it's reasonable to try to find out why an intelligent man who is technically savvy thinks that the Bolt is superior to the MS.

 

[callmesam]

I rarely post in this thread since I only buy and I wasn't sure how I might contribute. I enjoy the sharp wits that are informing this discussion. I appreciate the banter and sometimes gentle sarcasm. (Well gentle may be overstating it.)

I appreciate how quickly news propagates in this thread when it comes to Tesla and anything tangentially related to Tesla. And I appreciate the rational self interest and desire to make the world better in measurable ways.

I have no advice when it comes to investing other than my own personal strategy: buy as much Tesla as you can possibly afford and don't sell a single share for as long as you can. You won't be disappointed. And neither will your grandchildren.

 

[Bgarret]

Not to distract from the Woz discussion, but is anyone surprised by the almost 3 million (Yahoo Financee) shares traded in the first 2 hours of trading? That would put us on track for an almost 10 million shares traded day, during the week of Christmas?? I will leave it to Papa and others who watch this more closely, but it seems that there is an expensive tug-of-war being waged right now over the next technical hurdle. Good luck deep pocketed longs.

 

[MitchJi]

Look at it another way. How many Model S/X owners here would have purchased if Tesla did not have the Supercharger network? My estimate is less than 20%. Sure you use your second car for the occasional road trip. Or you can rent a car. Or you can plot out the other charging options available and spend several hours planning your road trip in your EV and add many hours to the length of the actual trip. The problem is most people don't want to be inconvenienced. Without the Supercharger network Tesla would never have gotten past the early adopters.

I think that's about correct for Tesla owners that get a new EV, but probably high for the general population. It's also an easy barrier for ICE manufacturers to overcome. All they need to do, is pay Tesla a percentage of the the costs of the network.

 

[dc_h]

I apologize for the tone of my reply. Please look at the edited version.

It's just as relevant a question as everyone gushing about how there's no comparison between the Bolt and the M3. Paraphrasing "you'd need to be an idiot to choose the Bolt instead of an M3 ". Unless you think that this forum should be a bull echo chamber

I don't actually disagree with that statement but I think it's reasonable to try to find out why an intelligent man who is technically savvy thinks that the Bolt is superior to the MS.

It's a reasonable question. Gerardf got it right. He likes an every man solution, available to the masses. A computer for everyone. The bolt was looking to be a Swiss Army knife of a car, and Tesla a more elite product. Once he compared the whole product to Tesla the choice was clear.

 

[AcesDealt]

Finally to provide a fuller perspective.
Ultimately what matters is margins and profits. They are being designed to come from automation. We want AD to win (not necessarily model-3 start date).

It's a question of abstract vs. concrete thinking. From a distance, we want everything to work out. But if you have to propose tradeoffs I am in complete agreement that getting things right is more important than their deadline, and that gross margin optimization is more important than units shipped, and that brand quality protection is more important than units shipped (which actually adds mystique and desirability).

I might put a lower emphasis on the automation aspect though. Elon might want it, but so does every OEM that has ever existed. The idea that EVs are simpler and thus more prone for automated assembly is logical, but I'd like to see more specifics (e.g. the drivetrain hump gets in the way of the X, and that doesn't exist, so this can be done, which is automatable). I'm not really willing to ascribe much value to the dreadnought yet, but there's a lot of hand-waving because the simplicity of EVs is clearly a long-term advantage.

 

[dennis]

That's informative. This is referring to the very end of the process though. There were numerous reports here on TMC, from factory tours, when new bots arrived for Model X on to the factory premises. IIRC some reports referred to them while they are still in (clear plastic?) wraps... It would be great to look at the timeline from the arrival of the bots to the point which you are referring to - when they are done installing/programming them and are fine tuning... In any case, the first big signal we will see is the arrival of the bots is what I am thinking.

Add: Here it is, the bots for Model X arrived before Jan 15, 2015. Here is a relevant post.
Short-Term TSLA Price Movements - 2015

So more than 9 months from bot arrival to the first founder series.

Based on what Tesla's robot supplier said 4 months ago, I expect that timeframe for Model 3 to be compressed compared to Model X.

Tesla Model 3: Tesla’s robot supplier vows to do everything it can to bring up production line on time

 

[dirtyofries]

Hello new market

China opens the doors for Tesla and other foreign automakers to produce electric vehicles in the country

 

[Rarity]

I might put a lower emphasis on the automation aspect though. Elon might want it, but so does every OEM that has ever existed.

I don't know that this is true. From what I understand, the OEMs believe that extreme automation is prohibitively expensive -- that comparing the depreciation of all of the robots against the cost of hand labor often does not favor the robots.

If Musk can figure out a way to turn that equation on its head, that would of course create a large moat for Tesla.

 

[AcesDealt]

Hello new market

China opens the doors for Tesla and other foreign automakers to produce electric vehicles in the country

Did the sp just bounce on the publication of that. Is this a known thing that electrek leads sp? They should take advantage of that if true.

 

[dennis]

Everybody here likes to talk about the rewards of "alien dreadnaught" but nobody is willing to consider the cost of it. It seems like people want to think that AD 0.5 is essentially the same as the current assembly process with some minor automation. I seriously doubt that. Musk in many occasions mentioned that at volume he gets to custom design manufacturing equipment. I suspect that he is going to get some highly specialized bots and I suspect some of them will be installed in the general assembly line. All of this adds time-risk both on the bot-supplier side and bot-usage side.

I see just no way that Musk will produce some 30K or whatever number using the existing processes while he is still building out AD 0.5. Why would he do that? To accomplish what? Just say that they delivered on time? Those Sep 2015 Founders series deliveries didn't help with any thing did they? They in fact created a lot of controversy due to build quality and name calling "hand built" and created unnecassary anxiety for signature reservation holders.

I fundamentally disagree with you on this point and provided a timeline supporting my position here. Musk's epiphany on manufacturing efficiency occurred less than 2 months before pencils down on the Model 3. There just isn't enough time to do a completely new approach to final assembly without jeopardizing the M3 delivery schedule. That's why Musk said AD 1.0 would not happen until mid-2018.

But Model 3 will still be more efficiently manufactured than S/X, even at the initial AD 0.5 stage. Tesla has been talking about the Model 3 being designed for ease of manufacturing for more than a year. Musk is not stupid. He learned from the Model X. And he is not going to let himself screw up Tesla's #1 priority.

 

[esk8mw]

Did the sp just bounce on the publication of that. Is this a known thing that electrek leads sp? They should take advantage of that if true.

I love electrek and read it every day, but they aren't normally first to market with Tesla news (usually summarizing other articles) and therefore they do not control the SP. I'll also mention that they are not shy about posting negative Tesla news either, so it's not a one-way ratchet. They get a lot of criticism about being a Tesla cheerleading blog but in my view it's unfounded. If anything, the non-Fred authors go too far in attempting to appear even-handed and to promote the "same team" argument - again, just one man's opinion.

 

[dennis]

You posted the answer yourself. Woz said he didn't have a place to put his sunglasses in his Model S!

Someone should point him to the small shelf under the center display. Works great!

 

[dennis]

I apologize for the tone of my reply. Please look at the edited version.

It's just as relevant a question as everyone gushing about how there's no comparison between the Bolt and the M3. Paraphrasing "you'd need to be an idiot to choose the Bolt instead of an M3 ". Unless you think that this forum should be a bull echo chamber

I don't actually disagree with that statement but I think it's reasonable to try to find out why an intelligent man who is technically savvy thinks that the Bolt is superior to the MS.

Mitch I suggest that you resolve your dilemma by visiting your local Chevy dealer and sit inside their Bolt demo car. Then you can decide for yourself about the relevance of Woz's opinion vs. the opinions expressed in this bull echo chamber.

You might also want to spend some time checking out the DCFC charging options available for taking a Bolt on your favorite California road trips. I did both things last week and came away convinced that the Bolt is no way a competitive threat to Tesla, regardless of what Steve Wozniak says.

 

[Chop110]

We are seeing some serious volume today. 3.5M or 87% of the 10 day average. And we still have over three hours of trading left.

 

[dennis]

It's also an easy barrier for ICE manufacturers to overcome. All they need to do, is pay Tesla a percentage of the the costs of the network.

I believe that is referred to a capitulation. Very unlikely.

 

[Tslynk67]

China to allow EV makers to setup in the country. That's very good news for Tesla methinks:

China opens the doors for Tesla and other foreign automakers to produce electric vehicles in the country

 

[Green Pete]

China to allow EV makers to setup in the country. That's very good news for Tesla methinks:

China opens the doors for Tesla and other foreign automakers to produce electric vehicles in the country

I honestly would be concerned if Tesla set up shop in China. I get it, they have heavy import taxes If Gigafactory is a product unto itself, putting one in china is IP suicide.

 

[Green Pete]

I was on a factory tour today. It's one of the last two weeks of December and the factory was humming.

You dont get to say that and then not provide more details. Lol, its painful to see you have more info literally from the factory floor and you aren't sharing.