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

[Skryll]

I daydream of how FSD AI uses the COPV to get out of impossible situations unscathed.

It kinda makes me wish all Teslas had emergency COPV haha

Kind of like an external airbag. Just about to be rear ended, blow it away.

 

[AudubonB]

Kind of like an external airbag. Just about to be rear ended, blow it away.

In that case, it sounds as though I’d have to call mine The Squid.

 

[Singuy]

People are getting a little antsy about FSD. I am seeing an increasing amount of posts from unhappy customers on reddit getting more and more upvotes criticizing FSD roll out. It has been 3 years since the Model 3 was released and people's leases are up, or have crashed their car, or wants to upgrade to a Y. Because FSD can't be transferred, these people are feeling they paid FSD and got nothing for it. This problem is compounded by all these arbitrary dates Elon have been giving on twitter and missing those deadlines like 3 times in a row.

 

[22522]

People are getting a little antsy about FSD. I am seeing an increasing amount of posts from unhappy customers on reddit getting more and more upvotes criticizing FSD roll out. It has been 3 years since the Model 3 was released and people's leases are up, or have crashed their car, or wants to upgrade to a Y. Because FSD can't be transferred, these people are feeling they paid FSD and got nothing for it. This problem is compounded by all these arbitrary dates Elon have been giving on twitter and missing those deadlines like 3 times in a row.

Yes, my warranty will expire before I am given the privilege of being a Beta tester for a piece of software functionality I paid thousands of dollars for.

Excluding the vast majority of customers who paid for the product, while giving others a sneak peak which may allow them to invest more judiciously provides a material information advantage to some customers over others. With as much as the stock price is swinging,..

I can see why anyone who has the FSD Beta would be subject to insider trading rules, if they have sold or bought any TSLA stock this year. FSD performance is insider information.

Early product knowledge is one reason I bought the car and that feature. I paid the same as they did.

The reasons I am not livid are:
1) HODL.
2) I won’t be spending any Martha Stewart time in prison.

So not knowing how good or bad FSD is is a blessing.

and so far, pure play “bread on the waters”.

I knew that. Others I know have traded for a Y and they expected they would use it, but were told that trade in value was higher because of it.

 

[CorneliusXX]

A factory in the UK could also make 4680 LFP cells for energy storage batteries.

In fact maybe they can use the same LFP cells in energy storage and Model 2/3.

Another consideration is Model 2/3 are the likely Robo-Taxis factories like Berlin and the UK may have 50% of their Model 2/3 production allocated to Robo-taxis. And finally the UK is RHD, Berlin does not need to bother with RHD Model 2/3.

The OK also ticks all of the boxes I think are needed for a car factory:-

• Local engineering talent
• Local workforce
• Significant local/nearby markets
• Local parts / raw materials supply.

In particular engineering talent is a valuable commodity, which might be a component of the decision making process.

The cost side is stamping/casting/body/shop/paint there is a certain size the factory would need to be large enough to justify these investments.

With casting, we know the body shop component is smaller. With local cell production, parts and raw materials there is a significant saving on shipping costs

The cell production focus has a lot of merit. The UK is a leader in wind energy (2/3 of UK power came from wind energy yesterday morning) and stationary storage seems like a natural fit to convert it into baseload energy. Although there is substantial opportunity for EVs too.

UK society is more environmentally focused that most countries (IMO). I've seen many protests here in London from the "Extinction Rebellion" group amongst others, although that stopped during the COVID lockdown. The government was one of the first to declare a climate emergency and has relatively ambitious target dates to end fossil fuel usage in vehicles. Tax benefits for EVs as company cars are also extremely supportive. Being a relatively small country, the number of people traveling long distances by car is also relatively small - favouring EVs.

London is also bringing in its Ultra Low Emissions Zone in October this year which will make it prohibitively expensive for most to drive through the center of town in an ICE vehicle - essentially providing a captive market for EVs.

 

[Artful Dodger]

How much did we go up when we had the 12 consecutive green days?

I need to reflect on that this week end to mentally prepare myself for the upcoming summer.

It's not about timing the market, it's about time IN the market. I bought in w TSLA at around $270 (pre-split) in Apr 2018, then sat on my hands while it visited $180 in Jun 2019: ($36 split-adjusted)

And half a dozen dips since. That's how MMs game the retail players: try to create a panick w. false narratives to shake out the weak hands. This latest dip is just about revisiting the 200-day moving average, because shortzes and wedgies know they can scoop some short-term (sic) profits before the next round of good news hits the Markets.

Best decision I ever made was HODL. As of today's totally depressed SP, my CAGR is 105.0%

In 2025 when Tesla becomes the world's most valuable company by Mkt Cap, today's SP will be a faint memory of regrets (for those who sold) and missed opportunity (for those who wanted more).

Cheers!

 

[Buckminster]

People are getting a little antsy about FSD. I am seeing an increasing amount of posts from unhappy customers on reddit getting more and more upvotes criticizing FSD roll out. It has been 3 years since the Model 3 was released and people's leases are up, or have crashed their car, or wants to upgrade to a Y. Because FSD can't be transferred, these people are feeling they paid FSD and got nothing for it. This problem is compounded by all these arbitrary dates Elon have been giving on twitter and missing those deadlines like 3 times in a row.

This is a magical time. When we get FSD we will be too rich to care about anything (Pajama rich). Embrace the pain whilst we have it.

Anyway, 3rd June is not so long away

 

[Artful Dodger]

(May 20 2021)Tesla Gigafactory 3 Shanghai 4K Video | Jason Yang

 

[Christine69420]

This tweet is much more interesting than the boring bitcoin schmittcoin drama:

https://twitter.com/x/status/1395020589354692616

So if they send castings from Austin to Fremont my guess would be that they do that since it would increase the production of cars there. And it would mean that Giga Texas has started to earn it's keep.
Edit: Or if they are stored locally to be used later Giga Texas still is casting money so to speak.

An update from a comment on Joe's latest video says:

Dale Richardson ​

UPDATE: More than 1/2 of the castings filmed by Joe this morning are now gone from the Robot storage yard. Noticed this on Jeff's 3:30 flyover that was just posted.

In the video Joe noted that there was more than 200 castings stored there. So about 100 castings moved where?

Here is the video with this comment:

 

[15Peter20]

Elon was pretty clear that he chose Austin and Berlin because the best engineers would be happy to live there - I think he learned a hard lesson from GF1.

If the UK gets a Tesla factory my guess is that it will be within commuting distance to London. That also happens to be where most of the F1 teams are headquartered.

Wow, that would be significant.

I can tell you from personal experience that engineers are draining out of ICE engineering, F1 and other racing engineering companies into the many EV startups that have appeared in and around the Midlands. Trying to hire decent engineering talent is very difficult as a consequence.

If Tesla were to set up in the Midlands it could suck the region dry. Not necessarily a bad thing long term but potentially destabilising in the short to medium term.

I would really like to see Tesla set up an engineering academy, bit like Dyson has down in the West Country. Tesla and SpaceX are to kids what Apollo was to the likes of many of us, inspiring them into science and engineering, but an actual Tesla UK educational presence with sponsorship etc would be an additional spur to anyone hesitating to commit to these subjects, in my opinion.

 

[ByeByeJohnny]

Do we know if the casting machines can reuse material on site or if it has to be shipped somewhere to be melted first? Not guesses but actual I've worked with these or at least read it on the IDRA website knowledge?

 

[15Peter20]

Research/high tech engineering more likely than a factory, closer to F1 strengths

Hopefully both. F1 powertrain manufacturing has a lot more in common with large scale production than it did 15 or so years ago.

Process and procedure, assembly tools that record turns and torques etc are the norm, whereas we relied more on talented engine builders prior to the early noughties.

 

[15Peter20]

I agree with the sentiment but I expect F1 to remain the pinnacle of tech in a number of areas. They have moved with the times and will likely switch to 100% battery in the next 5 years I would guesstimate. Hamilton is getting a run for his money this season.

I believe Formula E has long term rights to all-electric single seater racing. That’s not to say they are not for sale of course.

I think the F1 incumbent OEMs are going to start seriously rethinking their commitment soon, especially considering the optics of pumping hundreds of millions into F1 just as they start laying off staff as their ICE sales dwindle.

 

[22522]

An update from a comment on Joe's latest video says:



In the video Joe noted that there was more than 200 castings stored there. So about 100 castings moved where?

Here is the video with this comment:

This video was excellent!
I think the aluminum castings are waiting for the 2nd Giga press and the furnace to feed it. Will be used for proof runs on the next machine and the next and the next.

 

[Christine69420]

Do we know if the casting machines can reuse material on site or if it has to be shipped somewhere to be melted first? Not guesses but actual I've worked with these or at least read it on the IDRA website knowledge?

Each casting machine has it's own furnace melting aluminium bars. So I guess the question is how large items can it melt? Or how hard is it to cut the castings into smaller parts?

 

[15Peter20]

I was getting nauseated just looking at the Titles of articles on Yahoo Finance today, declaring the Ford Lightening to be this incredible achievement that trumps/threatens Tesla. Reminds me of when the Bolt was coming out, and all the morons in journalism were calling the Bolt a "Tesla Killer," because these people understand nothing about EVs. Those of us who drive EVs understand that the Ford is vastly inferior to the CT, and won't make a dent in Tesla sales. Unfortunately, we might have to endure these silly articles for a year until it becomes obvious to everyone. Hopefully the SP doesn't stay low too much longer as a result, however.

Elon. Build in the UK.

 

[CorneliusXX]

An update from a comment on Joe's latest video says:



In the video Joe noted that there was more than 200 castings stored there. So about 100 castings moved where?

Here is the video with this comment:

It seems a little strange to me that GigaBerlin has had its casting machines installed longer that GigaAustin, yet no castings have been made from what I can see. Is there a permitting problem stopping progress there?

I wonder if potentially GigaAustin and Fremont are producing extra cast parts for use at GigaBerlin. It doesn't make much sense for GigaAustin to be producing as many samples as it is when local production is still a while away and presumably they don't need that many for testing.

Nothing much to back up this theory, just trying to understand why there is so much cast part production at Fremont and Austin.

 

[Artful Dodger]

#320 Phase I and Phase II road test site parking lot / Tesla Shanghai | Wu Wa

 

[22522]

It seems a little strange to me that GigaBerlin has had its casting machines installed longer that GigaAustin, yet no castings have been made from what I can see. Is there a permitting problem stopping progress there?

I wonder if potentially GigaAustin and Fremont are producing extra cast parts for use at GigaBerlin. It doesn't make much sense for GigaAustin to be producing as many samples as it is when local production is still a while away and presumably they don't need that many for testing.

Nothing much to back up this theory, just trying to understand why there is so much cast part production at Fremont and Austin.

There are some heat transfer and cooling and cycle speed issues to work out. So just getting the operating parameters on the press just right can take a lot of shots. The entire casting has to have good material properties.

With plastics melt time in the barrel can change the properties of the material. If you run too small a part on too big a press the flame retardant separates out and the part cracks.

I don't know about aluminum, but what they are doing is non-trivial and just getting something that big up to operating temperatures, - every last corner can take a lot of shots.

 

[transpondster]

re Russia speculations.
I think it's only about openning few service centers / sales locations. Not sure about tax rules, but I suspect Shanghai made cars could get lower taxes than Fremont/Berlin so that could be one of reasons finally open in Russia.