Tesla, TSLA & the Investment World: the Perpetual Investors' Roundtable

[M|S|M MYP]

Gordon Johnson on CNBC this morning, repeating the same old talking points. Nice to see the host calling on it. Of course, they keep giving him the platform, so... Looking forward to Q4 results.

Gordo again...when will CNBS ever stop having this clown on? Oh yeah...when big oil stops paying them It's always groundhogs day when Gordo speaks "Competition, Demand in Europe and China, Regulatory credits....blah, blah, blah." At least he stopped using the word 'essentially'.

 

[SOULPEDL]

Gordo again...when will CNBS ever stop having this clown on? Oh yeah...when big oil stops paying them It's always groundhogs day when Gordo speaks "Competition, Demand in Europe and China, Regulatory credits....blah, blah, blah." At least he stopped using the word 'essentially'.

And he really puts his money where his mouth is. This on TSLA.

 

[M|S|M MYP]

And he really puts his money where his mouth is. This on TSLA.

View attachment 619736

Yeah...seriously...i really do not think he has ever had any $$ shorted in TSLA nor does he manage actual real $. GLJ research is just a front for big oil. I remember reading Ross Gerber saying his company is not listed or licensed with the SEC and he is committing fraud by offering financial advice.

 

[Singuy]

So I think legacy auto not utilizing the Tesla charging network is absolutely the right call. You don't want to support and rely on your competitors charging stations as that will cause Tesla to build more. As they build more, it pushes independent parties out. Pretty soon the competitor that is beating you in EV sales now hold all the power. They can't trust Tesla to say one day start banning or playing with pricing shenanigans as they monopolize the entire infrastructure. Can you imagine if Toyota owns all the gas stations? But that's okay since gas stations are mechanical, in which they can't physically lock a car out. Tesla supercharger can remotely disable or change prices at any time. Knowing that Tesla can triple their network in a year with so much cash on hand, it's scary to give the competitor all the cards while universal charges from the government or 3rd party disappear.

So its the right call for legacy to wait for a free charging network that is government or 3rd party sponsored.

 

[TheTalkingMule]

To be fair the 4-digit-SP spike many predicted here and elsewhere didn't happen either.

Who here was predicting a 4 digit spike? A lot of us put sell orders in for a few(some a lot) shares at 4 digits, but that was just in case it happened. My prediction, and I think a lot of folks, was that we'd be around $650 rolling into Friday morning and spike somewhere north of $750 up toward $850. 4 digits was literally a fantasy.

I'm interested in seeing how today and tomorrow shake out now that all the front-runners and weak longs have sold. Most shareholders are now indexers or semi-passive institutions and much stronger conviction longs. Do MM's have to deleverage all that SP pushdown from Friday? Do the more determined shorts need to cover now there was no spike and crash? Are more benchmark funds going to blink and buy prior to year-end?

A run up from $408 to $658 is 61% and nothing to sneeze at, especially at already elevated levels, but something still smells fishy too me considering the conviction of TSLA holders. Liquidity should be ultra-tight right now and it would only take one of the above uncertainties to push us back near or over the inclusion price.

Certainly glad I sold 1/3 of my 12/24 $700's @ $37 last week, because they're at $4.50 today. I think MM's would love to keep us below $650 this week and $700 should be no problem, however a couple $700's bought today @ $4 might look pretty good by Wednesday if MM's lose their grasp on $650 and have to retreat and protect $700. Greater than 25% chance of that IMO.

That being said I know next to nothing, something just feels off.

 

[TheTalkingMule]

Gordon Johnson on CNBC this morning, repeating the same old talking points. Nice to see the host calling on it. Of course, they keep giving him the platform, so... Looking forward to Q4 results.

They don't give him a platform, he's paying for it.

 

[Knightshade]

Do these options prices look ridiculous? I was looking to buy a put, but geez. I put in an order to sell one. Am I crazy? This has to be cut in half in 6mo to lose money. Am I right on that?

SP being cut in half (as of this post) would take it all the way back to where the share price was... just over 2 weeks ago.

Huge price changes lead to high IV.

 

[TheTalkingMule]

Do these options prices look ridiculous? I was looking to buy a put, but geez. I put in an order to sell one. Am I crazy? This has to be cut in half in 6mo to lose money. Am I right on that? I know OT, but the QS thread is a bit slow.

QS is about the #1 short target right now in the same style of SCTY and early TSLA days. There's legit logic behind it, but likely also some of the cash behind the old SCTY/TSLA short efforts. Lot of people would rather not see battery tech develop further.

I missed the peak, but glad to be out of QS to avoid the looming headaches. Set some super-low alerts and buy a bit when the shorts inevitably drive it down.

 

[Bet TSLA]

It's not inconsistent at all, you're simply ignoring the 60 minutes quote.

Elon is telling you ignore him when he's giving you a timeframe for finishing something he's never done before and is not actually done yet.

He's admitting he's guessing.

It's an informed guess, but always a very very very optimistic one, and very often a wrong one.

Which explains all the missed FSD deadlines (and various other ones the first time he tries to do something).

That doesn't mean ignore everything he says- just the bit about when it'll be finished (or how hard it'll be to get there).

Sorry, now you're demanding that we treat Elon's words as gospel, except when you say otherwise. He very clearly said that autonomous driving was a solved problem in 2016. Now you're claiming there was some sort of timeline on that and that it's not solved even now. You can't have this both ways.

Elon's an engineer. Actual implementation matters, not just theory. And he's an experienced software engineer, so you can't claim he doesn't understand what it means to go from imagining a solution to deploying it in software. So no, you're trying to twist things around to make yourself right. No matter how many times you say "Just listen to Elon's words and believe them." you don't actually mean that. Because you don't accept all his words yourself, just the ones you like.

 

[jerry33]

The net gain in energy doesn't offset the competition getting a free charging network unless Tesla works in a surcharge which they should. Pay double if your car is not a Tesla. Make them feel like second class citizens.

I believe Elon always said that to participate they would have to pony up for some Superchargers to help expand the network.

 

[Knightshade]

Who here was predicting a 4 digit spike?

I mean you'd have to scroll back and look, but there were certainly a number of em.... ditto on TSLA twitter.

Multiple folks here (and there) kept making VW short squeeze comparisons, insisting "real" float was much lower than needed, etc.


None of it ever made much sense, but no shortage of folks claiming it anyway.

Certainly there were plenty a lot more reasonable and on the mark too (especially here).

Certainly glad I sold 1/3 of my 12/24 $700's @ $37 last week, because they're at $4.50 today. I think MM's would love to keep us below $650 this week and $700 should be no problem, however a couple $700's bought today @ $4 might look pretty good by Wednesday if MM's lose their grasp on $650 and have to retreat and protect $700. Greater than 25% chance of that IMO.

That being said I know next to nothing, something just feels off.

I guess I don't see the catalyist for 700 being in play this week... benchmark funds might be happy to support the price in the mid 600s we have now as they buy to beat the index funds... but who is looking to pay more than the index funds did this week?

 

[SOULPEDL]

So it's the right call for legacy to wait for a free charging network that is government or 3rd party sponsored.

Maybe if the gov't offers an incentive for gas stations to convert a pump or two for charging. It is a revenue stream, but only after the initial purchase of the infrastructure which is the big pill. If they don't convert some, eventually they will have "Excess Gas" capacity, and that is a personal problem for stations that cuts into Soda revenue.

 

[Bet TSLA]

The net gain in energy doesn't offset the competition getting a free charging network unless Tesla works in a surcharge which they should. Pay double if your car is not a Tesla. Make them feel like second class citizens.

Because being vindictive is more important than the mission. Right.

 

[Krugerrand]

Who here was predicting a 4 digit spike? A lot of us put sell orders in for a few(some a lot) shares at 4 digits, but that was just in case it happened. My prediction, and I think a lot of folks, was that we'd be around $650 rolling into Friday morning and spike somewhere north of $750 up toward $850. 4 digits was literally a fantasy.

I'm interested in seeing how today and tomorrow shake out now that all the front-runners and weak longs have sold. Most shareholders are now indexers or semi-passive institutions and much stronger conviction longs. Do MM's have to deleverage all that SP pushdown from Friday? Do the more determined shorts need to cover now there was no spike and crash? Are more benchmark funds going to blink and buy prior to year-end?

A run up from $408 to $658 is 61% and nothing to sneeze at, especially at already elevated levels, but something still smells fishy too me considering the conviction of TSLA holders. Liquidity should be ultra-tight right now and it would only take one of the above uncertainties to push us back near or over the inclusion price.

Certainly glad I sold 1/3 of my 12/24 $700's @ $37 last week, because they're at $4.50 today. I think MM's would love to keep us below $650 this week and $700 should be no problem, however a couple $700's bought today @ $4 might look pretty good by Wednesday if MM's lose their grasp on $650 and have to retreat and protect $700. Greater than 25% chance of that IMO.

That being said I know next to nothing, something just feels off.

I’ve seen that said before; run from $408. Except at $408 the SP had been driven and held down. The SP really should have been about $500-$550 at that point following the finish of the split. But it got shoved all over the place and even well below $400.

So yes, a run up because of the inclusion, but not as much as you’re saying. There wouldn’t be these run ups if they stopped messing around with the SP and just let it grow organically.

 

[Knightshade]

Sorry, now you're demanding that we treat Elon's words as gospel, except when you say otherwise.

Nope, you keep either misunderstanding what I said, or making up stuff I didn't.

He very clearly said that autonomous driving was a solved problem in 2016.

Now you're claiming there was some sort of timeline on that

Because he literally included a timeline in the quote you are only citing half of

You seem to want to ignore the second half of his statement which specifically gave a timeline.

“I really consider autonomous driving a solved problem, I think we are probably less than two years away.

Obviously he phrased it pretty crap- it's clearly not a solved problem if it's "less than 2 years away"

But if you actually read both halves of the sentence that's pretty obvious he's saying he thinks it's GOING to be a solved problem in less than 2 years.


And, as is usually the case, his timeline was wrong, and it was more than 2 years away.

it's still not here yet in fact.

And they've had to semi-start-over multiple times since then as cited previously.

He still "considers" that it's coming soon of course- he's very very much an optimist.

That's why he tells you to not believe him when he includes a timeline.

Like he did here, despite your claiming it's "me" thinking there was some sort of timeline- rather than the timeline being in the actual Elon quote.

 

[TheTalkingMule]

So I think legacy auto not utilizing the Tesla charging network is absolutely the right call. You don't want to support and rely on your competitors charging stations as that will cause Tesla to build more. As they build more, it pushes independent parties out. Pretty soon the competitor that is beating you in EV sales now hold all the power. They can't trust Tesla to say one day start banning or playing with pricing shenanigans as they monopolize the entire infrastructure. Can you imagine if Toyota owns all the gas stations? But that's okay since gas stations are mechanical, in which they can't physically lock a car out. Tesla supercharger can remotely disable or change prices at any time. Knowing that Tesla can triple their network in a year with so much cash on hand, it's scary to give the competitor all the cards while universal charges from the government or 3rd party disappear.

So its the right call for legacy to wait for a free charging network that is government or 3rd party sponsored.

I agree on all of this, also don't think charging will be that big of a deal 2026-onward. There's gonna be so much intermittent decentralized renewable energy production and storage out there, plenty of entities will be overjoyed to blast your battery full at $.20/kWh. Hell, you might see me doing it out in front of my house.

Elon moved to monetize charging/supercharging a couple/few years back and I remember people on here throwing a fit for various reasons. The natural reaction is to try and maintain control, but the decentralized world of energy is gonna be so efficient, it's not worth the effort when so many other things needs Tesla's focus.

Gov't charging in the style that's being described by Biden is a terrible idea, but my assumption is they'll figure out the market can do it far better and cheaper. Hopefully this is implemented via simple mandates and simple regulation rather than actual gov't owned infrastructure.

Just like EV manufacture itself, I'm starting to think legacy is right to hold off on charging. Let the gov't(or more likely market) take on the early cost and effort. Make simple EVs cheaply and try to survive until things shake out. Legacy carmakers clearly = Android at this point, no longer room for another Apple.

 

[EnzoXYZ]

Gordon Johnson on CNBC this morning, repeating the same old talking points. Nice to see the host calling on it. Of course, they keep giving him the platform, so... Looking forward to Q4 results.

Yes correct CNBS is the problem and not GJ. As long as there isn’t any outrage on the lack of standards or integrity CNBS is for sale to the highest bidder. How can you bat 0% and consistently get call to hit the game winner?

 

[Krugerrand]

Nope, you keep either misunderstanding what I said, or making up stuff I didn't.

I’ve lost count how many different posters you’ve said those words - misunderstanding me/making up stuff I didn’t say - to, but now I think I’ll start keeping better records.

Either there’s a lot of people here who lack English comprehension skills (though no one before you in the last 8 years ever characterized so many posters in such a way as you) or you’re the one with the problem.

 

[TheTalkingMule]

I guess I don't see the catalyist for 700 being in play this week... benchmark funds might be happy to support the price in the mid 600s we have now as they buy to beat the index funds... but who is looking to pay more than the index funds did this week?

It would need to be involuntary of course, that was the point of my post.
Short covering from folks betting on a post-inclusion drop to $550?
Covering from MM's pushing down SP last Thurs/Fri? Certainly we've seen that happen on our fair share of Monday/Tuesdays.
Do ALL index funds really have ALL their shares? Certainly there are funds with -/+3 and -/+7 day mandates, there is a plus sign there.

Today's price/volume action feels very wait-and-see. I just saying the inclusion cigar might have 1 or 2 good puffs left in it.

 

[Bet TSLA]

Nope, you keep either misunderstanding what I said, or making up stuff I didn't.



Because he literally included a timeline in the quote you are only citing half of

You seem to want to ignore the second half of his statement which specifically gave a timeline.




Obviously he phrased it pretty crap- it's clearly not a solved problem if it's "less than 2 years away"

But if you actually read both halves of the sentence that's pretty obvious he's saying he thinks it's GOING to be a solved problem in less than 2 years.


And, as is usually the case, his timeline was wrong, and it was more than 2 years away.

it's still not here yet in fact.

And they've had to semi-start-over multiple times since then as cited previously.

He still "considers" that it's coming soon of course- he's very very much an optimist.

That's why he tells you to not believe him when he includes a timeline.

Like he did here, despite your claiming it's "me" thinking there was some sort of timeline- rather than the timeline being in the actual Elon quote.

No, you're twisting his meaning. He very clearly said it was a solved problem. As in the past. And the two years was for when customers would see it in their cars doing its autonomy thing. He makes that more than clear in later quotes when he talks about how it will be in use a little bit down the road. That time was obviously for debugging and QA and such, because it was already a solved problem, not a will be solved problem.

Just give it a rest. Elon's not just overoptimistic at times, sometimes he's just plain wrong. It's not just timelines. That's how the engineering of complex things works. Whenever anybody says they're done with something, they mean until they find all the things about it that really ought to be better to be considered done.