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

[M3Rider]

Huh? Doesn't look anything like a Prius – completely different proportions.

It's basically a smaller MX with M3 body design cues. Exactly what we expected.

Shouldn't it have a higher ground clearance? Seems pretty low.

 

[TheTalkingMule]

Looks like a Prius to me. Nothing wrong with that, but the Subaru crowd wants something different IMO. My silhouette reaction is this overlaps with M3 demand a good bit

 

[RobStark]

It's possible. My Toyota Highlander was a 7 seater and it was 191". Model 3 is 185", so a 10% longer car might be able to squeeze in 7.

Highlander doesn't have such a sloping rear roof.

 

[Fact Checking]

We will soon see if these two photos are of the same car...

View attachment 386348

At least the doors of the prototype have a Volvo XC40 style:

And the designer of the Volvo XC40, Ian Kettle, has been working for Tesla since last August:

https://electrek.co/2018/08/11/tesla-hires-lead-designer-volvo-xc40-suv/​

But the timestamp of the Tesla prototype is May 2018, it comes from this Tesla video:

 

[Anstandswauwau]

Shouldn't it have a higher ground clearance? Seems pretty low.

Idk, looks fine to me? Just like any other "City SUV".

Also keep in mind that the wrap might make it look lower than it actually is.

 

[bdy0627]

The stock movement so far suggests pretty minimal expectations from the market regarding the Y reveal tonight. IMO, that's often a good time for a lotto. I see low risk for a big drop afterwards.

 

[Carl Raymond]

Certainly, they're close enough geographically. IMHO, it's not an issue of who's going to be making "orders" in time for delivery, but who's going to be making the highest-ASP orders that can be delivered in time.

Yes. Each production slot is effectively auctioned to the highest bidder. Model 3 SR ensures there is always an opening bid. Not sure if it’s the same in the US, but here we call that “sitting pretty”.

 

[Curt Renz]

CNBC just now teased that it will soon be discussing the meaning of tonight's Model Y event.

 

[Esme Es Mejor]

This whole SEC thing is farking stupid. 420? sure, that was a thing, but this? Best case it's some jerk obsessively sticking to a technicality.

The thing that kills me about the SEC’s action around the 420 tweet is that they pursued the wrong remedy.

If they believed Musk misled investors (I don’t, but it’s an understandable point of view), the correct remedy is to force him to purchase the shares at $420— essentially, everyone who bought shares following the 420 tweet would have the right to sell those shares to Musk for $420.

A completely inappropriate remedy is the one the SEC actually pursued— taking power out of the hands of shareholders by forcing new board members, a new chair, and a restrictive policy on the CEO’s ability to communicate with customers. As a believer in shareholder democracy, the SEC’s actions still outrage me all these months later.

Had the SEC pursued the correct remedy, shareholders would not have suffered billions in SEC-related damages, Musk would own a larger portion of the company, and a contempt motion wouldn’t be casting shade over the Model Y reveal.

 

[Nocturnal]

Highlander doesn't have such a sloping rear roof.

I thought of that also. I assumed the Y would be a 5 seater either way.

 

[SteveG3]

Are there any limitations on using the advertisements created by owners for the contest a while back? I would love to see those plastered all over social media. They were really well done.

Dan

Would really like to see that homemade ad effort by owners/enthusiasts restarted and run continuously. Particularly if this is restarted from the public itself (such as Tesla YouTubers calling for it), rather than Tesla calling for it. The original folk ad campaign was called "Project Loveday" and was supported by Tesla after a child reached out to Elon with the idea of a contest for the best such homemade Tesla/Tesla Mission ad.

1) Game playing through the media to protect established players was not invented with the appearance of Tesla, but, it is on Next Gen Steroids with Tesla's potential disruption of the fossil fuel economy. Putting word of mouth on steroids as well (via social media distribution of homemade commercials to clear up the FUD and educate re how well-done EVs are already superior for most consumers) seems the appropriate response.

2) Elon trying to refute FUD and educate the public runs into the massive misinfo campaign putting to use their many years long framing of Elon as an 'unhinged/fraudulent/desperate villain' (and by extension anything from Tesla). That is, such efforts by Elon will widely be hosed with attempts to dismiss them with those long planted framings in the public's mind. HOWEVER, "everyday people" who simply love their cars and Tesla's mission so much that they take their own time to share with the rest of us how outstanding the product and mission are (and to alert us all to the false narratives and gross distortions we've been flooded with), I think will have more credibility than corporate media channels.

 

[RobStark]

I thought of that also. I assumed the Y would be a 5 seater either way.

I was just thinking....

How about rear facing 3rd row a la early Model S?

 

[jhm]

Casual mocking does not rise to the Supremes' legal definition of "malice":

"it is not enough to show that it is false for the press to be liable for libel. Instead, the target of the statement must show that it was made with knowledge of or reckless disregard for its falsity."
​

New York Times v. Sullivan

I never said that it did, merely that careless tweeting can in some instances expose the state of mind of the careless tweeter. The difficulty in proving malice is in accessing the subjectivity of the defendant. Of course, there is more to proving defamation. Malicious intent is a necessary, but not sufficient. Journalist get off on this by saying, "Sure, I did a lousy job of getting my facts straight and didn't put any effort into checking my sources, but it was not my intent to do any harm, and you can't prove otherwise." So if that journalist had tweeted, "I hate Musk, but I have just the thing to make him pay, Bwahahaha." that might be awkward to explain away in court.

 

[Intl Professor]

Yes. In addition, even when highly analytic people (including Nobel Prize winners) do carefully model the probability of outcomes they often then ignore the boundary conditions of their models, fomenting disaster in a very sophisticated way. Prime example Long Term Asset Management
Long-Term Capital Management (LTCM)

Elon has made this error several times, including the PayPal case. Unlike those others, when Elon realizes his error he quickly corrects himself and admits the error. Despite the justified criticism of his impulsiveness, he learns from his own mistakes. That is very rare, and perhaps is crucial to his continuing astonishing success.

The downside: it takes a very strong and well-prepared person to argue Elon out of a bad impulse. Ms. Shotwell has spoken to that issue. In some areas Elon seems to have largely avoided big errors. IMHO these have had strong, confident and competent people to prove the cases. Pretty clearly these include JB and Jerome.

There have not been equal qualities in evidence in customer service, parts distribution, sales and, probably, legal. Of course several of the most critical components needing improvement are those traditionally least susceptible to highly analytic proofs.

“Traditionally” is the crucial point. Predictive analytics in behavioral science and ‘the transportation problem’ have been advancing even more quickly than has been widely perceived. Frankly, these logistics and behavioral issues are vastly less sexy than are vehicle autonomy, interplanetary navigation and a few other topics. Tesla has had great difficulty applying these techniques to seemingly mundane customer service, production and distribution problems.

Were Elon capable of playing nicely with Jeff Bezos he might find out how to solve these problems. Amazon is case study number one fir how to make the most boring topics both exciting and soluble. Frankly, I think a strong dose of Amazon-think would rapidly cure the vast majority of serious Tesla problems. Then Elon could concentrate on the areas in which he is so wildly successful; solving seemingly-impossible problems. Amazon-think would let him escape the prison of mundane problems, the ones he cannot ‘outsmart’.

Another utility to this lovely post is obvious. The problems addressed in many complaints here is cleverly reduced to one issue which is generic and thus less threatening to Musk and much more useful than our bit by bit complaints. If apprised, this is so well done it could have an impact on its subject and hence Tesla and more.

This management counsel is like Elon's ability to smash through to essence using physics first principles.

 

[Zaxxon]

Norway over 3k registrations this quarter so far. Starting to look highly likely that this Q will be the tops all-time, nearly tripling the required rate from here on our that it'd take to do so:

 

[lklundin]

Yea and obviously not now (they have several demand levers left to pull) but maybe in a year.

Could be a simple YouTube video ad 5-15 seconds that states something like: 310 miles of range, shows the supercharger map with locations, and shows the gigafactory and states made in America.

One such demand lever yet to be pulled is the Model 3 Ludicrous option.

I think that would make sense after a technical upgrade of Model S/X.

Then Tesla would get a whole new round of social media attention with the P3DL outracing all kinds of cars, all of it advertisement for free.

 

[KarenRei]

Norway over 3k registrations this quarter so far. Starting to look highly likely that this Q will be the tops all-time, nearly tripling the required rate from here on our that it'd take to do so:

View attachment 386356

It's not just looking likely that they're going to beat the record by the end of the month... they'll probably beat it in under a week. Maybe 5 days or so from now.

 

[Pezpunk]

Shouldn't it have a higher ground clearance?

what for?

 

[sundaymorning]

RE education on EV's: If I didn't hate bumper stickers, I'd make one that read:

I spend 5 seconds a day refueling my car. You?

Takes me about 5 seconds to plug in my car at home.

Don't forget adding "While going Zero miles out of my way"

Going out of your way would be having to keep a constant eye on your gas tank, think about when to refill, delaying the inevitable fill up because you’re too tired and the gas station is only around the corner (so you’ll pump gas in the morning instead), then you set an alarm to wake yourself up 15 minutes earlier than usual so you can do your favorite morning activity, which is to spend $50-60 on gas (let’s not forget about that $100 oil change that gets you exited every 3-4 months). When said alarm goes off in the morning you end up snoozing (waking up at your usual time), instead of being 15 minutes early you’re now running 5 minutes late because of a bad hair do, you pull over for a quick 5 minute gas fill up, the 5 minute fill up is now causing you to be 15 minutes late because of morning traffic. You spend your entire trip (45 minutes to work) cursing at yourself.

This is how many GAS heads wake up in the morning and drive to work. Ever wonder why roadrage happens? I suspect a lot of that rage is due to being forced to fill up the tank at the wrong time, usually when one is running late.

 

[SteveG3]

CNBC just now teased that it will soon be discussing the meaning of tonight's Model Y event.

According to the crystal ball just delivered to me from Amazon, the conclusion of this CNBC discussion will be, "don't own Tesla stock, and have deep distrust, even contempt, for anything Elon Musk says." I'm excitedly looking forward to reports on this CNBC segment and finding out if this crystal ball is trash or treasure.