Welcome to Tesla Motors Club
Discuss Tesla's Model S, Model 3, Model X, Model Y, Cybertruck, Roadster and More.
Register

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

This site may earn commission on affiliate links.
Most people would pay minimum of 1.5 PEG (I hate this construction but it does generally give some idea) so 600B$ could be for instance 200B$ in revenue, 10% net margin, and 30x P/E (from at least 20% forward EPS growth and 1.5x). What are the odds Tesla fails to achieve these numbers?

I would mention the optimal way to approach this is to pick the 3 numbers (revenue, p/e, net margin) that have the highest joint probability of being surpassed. So if 200B$ revenue is lower probability than 30x P/E according to your subjective estimate then these can be adjusted suitable to taste (150B$ revenue and 40x P/E) so long as combined it remains 600B$. I often revert to using price:sales numbers for this kind of reason because P/S (say 3x) is equivalent to net profit (10%) * p/e (30x). Often in analysis these two numbers move in opposite directions, for instance a maturing company becomes more profitable and takes more profit but gives up by definition expectations of forward growth, so it can be easier to approximate their combined multiplied value more than their independent ones. Of course a conditional distribution for all of them is the best but that's harder to do.

All of these net to 600B but would have different probabilities assigned:
1) 100B revenue, 15% net margin, and 40x P/E.
2) 150B revenue, 12% net margin, 33x P/E.
3) 200B revenue, 10% net margin, 30x P/E.

In a lower revenue regime, one would expect Tesla is selling more of its premium priced models (higher margin) and fewer of its SR models, as an example.

The question is then which combo is the most persuasive to thinking observers as a bare minimum. As long as TSLA is scraping the bottom of a logical valuation it is obviously a good investment and only gets more challenging as it tilts to more speculative regimes. I often size my position with this logic (downside: minimal, upside: unknown but big, mathematical expectation: high return).
 
Given the, IMO, disaster that has been the S and X refresh, I seriously am in fear if Tesla EVER tries that for 3/Y.

There is a lot we don't know about what instigated this refresh and what the specific issues were. But S&X isn't critical to Tesla's cash flow so the decision making process is a whole different animal because there is so much less is at risk than if Tesla were to update it's two most important products (by far).

I don't think you can compare the two. A slow refresh on S&X does not indicate a high probability of a slow refresh on 3&Y. Different beasts that would be handled in different ways.
 

Embrace yourself, folks…TT007 has spoken…

/s
Thanks for sharing this video. On one hand it was great to hear contradictory opinions about Tesla and Elon… On the other hand that woman sure seems like a buzz kill. I see where she’s coming from on some stuff but sheesh; too much!
 
There is a lot we don't know about what instigated this refresh and what the specific issues were. But S&X isn't critical to Tesla's cash flow so the decision making process is a whole different animal because there is so much less is at risk than if Tesla were to update it's two most important products (by far).

I don't think you can compare the two. A slow refresh on S&X does not indicate a high probability of a slow refresh on 3&Y. Different beasts that would be handled in different ways.

The 3/Y have fewer single points of failure as well having now distributed supply lines and factories. I certainly think it is probable Tesla will continue to make errors 'on the scale of the S/X failure' but as you point out that's less significant.
 
Thanks for sharing this video. On one hand it was great to hear contradictory opinions about Tesla and Elon… On the other hand that woman sure seems like a buzz kill. I see where she’s coming from on some stuff but sheesh; too much!
She is smart but also took the logic a bit too far, she had some good points until she brought up bezos and zuckerberg as good ceo role models …. After I heard that, I was ready for Elon to go on Rogan again.
 
Well that puts an end to the great price fixing, bait and switching, illegal unethical pricing practice scandal of June 2021. Thank goodness!
Not quite yet.
Well that puts an end to the great price fixing, bait and switching, illegal unethical pricing practice scandal of June 2021. Thank goodness!
Not quite yet. My Motor Vehicle Order Agreement has the car price at $136,690 showing the $1,000 order fee. Under completed tasks price details the car price is $135,790 including the order fee of only $100 and a reduction of my $1,000 deposit for the amount due. I have no complaints if the latter happens. What I am worried about is the e-mail increasing the order fee to $1,000 I received after my order was accepted and Tesla decides to increase the amount due by $900. I just checked to order a Plaid now requires a $100 non-refundable fee. So I hope someone at Tesla just made a mistake but it should be corrected.
 
Anyone willing to share some viewpoints on TSLA and the market, in general, if we take the assumption that inflation is not transitory and we experience significant inflation in 2021 and 2022? How does that impact investing decisions?

I'm not looking for a debate as to whether it is or is not transitory, please. I'd like to read some input of the scenario that it is not transitory.

Thank you!
 
1624245770161.png


Courtesy @DKurac from Twitter
1624245795906.png
 
The 3/Y have fewer single points of failure as well having now distributed supply lines and factories. I certainly think it is probable Tesla will continue to make errors 'on the scale of the S/X failure' but as you point out that's less significant.

You missed my point then.

Because I'm saying the S&X rollout probably did not involve major blunders, more likely the timing of the roll-out was designed around some supply issues that turned out more serious than hoped. So, even if the refresh didn't happen until this fall, there probably still would have been a shortage of finish product to sell. From where I sit, it looks like Tesla tried to time the roll-out (which always impacts production somewhat) to a forced shutdown of the line due to a lack of critical parts. It's not necessarily a blunder to try to make the best of a bad situation by accelerating a planned refresh.

Decision making always appraises the magnitude of impact if things don't go your way. If the magnitude of impact is low enough you might take more chances. Just because it appears it didn't work out doesn't mean it was an error and the kind of chances that might be taken when little is at risk are not likely to be taken when much is at risk. It looks to me that Tesla has some limited supply problems. If so, it can be impossible to accurately predict when the replacements will arrive and in what quantity. So what we are seeing probably has more to do with supply issues that are mostly beyond their control than a botched roll-out. In fact, it looks like they still have a supply problem based on all those Model S sitting at the factory.

Logical risk taking has been a major driver of Tesla's performance to date. Without risk taking Tesla would be halfway to GM or Ford whose corporate culture is designed to make every little decision risk-adverse - even when it harms the quality of the products and reduces profits overall.
 
Last edited:
Thanks for sharing this video. On one hand it was great to hear contradictory opinions about Tesla and Elon… On the other hand that woman sure seems like a buzz kill. I see where she’s coming from on some stuff but sheesh; too much!

She seems out of touch if she expects every Tesla delivered in 2021 will have a ribbon and bowtie tied around it and a little delivery party just like she experienced back when Tesla was a boutique brand and cost more for a product that was inferior to anything they sell today at a lower price.

It sounds like her real issue is they are traders/speculators on a company with a CEO who doesn't like traders/speculators. Elon doesn't care if he burns traders, speculators or short-sellers, as long as he delivers the best possible value to long-term shareholders. That's where his focus is and she doesn't like that because they lost a lot of money. Cry me a river. It's not like Elon didn't warn her type by saying "If you don't like volatility, don't buy our stock".
 
Is this an inside joke based on his 6 month old videos?
Sorry to TT if you are looking, but I think he’s been here long enough to be offended in anyway.

The inside joke is, tt has always been bullish and sometimes can be overly optimistic, especially during 2018-2019, to the point I almost consider his bullishness voice as contrary signal.
 
So much talk about the Texas grid and fossil fuels for obvious reasons, but sufficient installations of Solar, Wind, and storage on the West Coast grid to displace Pacific NW hydro can’t happen soon enough IMO as well. Your west coast heat map is the catalyst for this comment - thanks for sharing it!

The 8 federal hydro dams on the Columbia and Snake Rivers and the ~16 dam projects upstream on the Snake River all the way to the Tetons have replaced an ice cold snow run off river system with a steady titration of warmer water through the 24 pools into the ocean - so warm that another dam in Idaho (Dworshak Dam) is spilled from the 4th of July through September in an effort to bring water temps down below 70 degrees to get the adult salmon to be willing to return on those systems. More than 250,000 cfs of warmer than historical water flowing 24/7 helping to heat the oceans......but it’s green energy, right? More like ‘red’ energy like the west coast temp map. Throw the Yangtze and the forthcoming Mekong River projects on top of that and the Pacific is a warming bathtub. Even more so when a trickle from the steaming hot Colorado River is allowed to reach salt water on rare occasion. Hopefully we will never see Alaska’s proposed Susitna River hydro projects adding more warm water to the mix.

Fortunately the Levelized Cost of Energy for that hydro is around twice the current cost of renewables plus storage, so the curtain is already coming down for hydro being competitive on the same grid. Tony Seba and crew have done an excellent job portraying this in recent videos. What they haven’t discussed is thermal pollution from those projects. There is still a huge debate around the value of transportation and of irrigation as a result of the dams, which will extend the debate for some time to come regarding dam removal. But fortunately Kimball and Elon are diligently working to improve feeding the world and more sustainable transportation, as well as accelerating the transition to renewables plus storage. There is a fascinating project underway now that will include multiple Tesla Megapacks and over 2 million solar panels in Idaho that when completed will generate and store sufficient energy to be able to fully replace the energy created by the 4 Lower Snake River Dams. And every new solar project in California, Arizona, and Nevada only accelerates that effort on the same grid.

(Note - I am a proponent of lake fed hydro projects such as Snettisham near Juneau, Alaska and the many I have worked on and operated in remote Alaska locations, as they have negligible effects on water temps. But I think it is time we start talking more openly about the impacts of some hydro projects as the oceans continue to warm).