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

[Discoducky]

Why would that be false? So far the market is showing it'll buy every good EV anybody makes.

Tesla continues to make a lot more than anyone else- but every other decent offering on the market appears, like Tesla, to be supply limited- not demand limited.... (embarrassingly supply limited in many cases).

Farleys problem isn't in thinking Ford could sell as many good EVs as Tesla if they made that many. They surely could. Demand for good EVs is very very high.

Farleys problem is the previous two CEOs thought investing in battery supply was a dumb idea, so now no matter how hard he wants to push into EVs (and he was only a few months into the job when he publicly recognized the previous CEOs were wrong and battery factories were vital)- he's still severely choked off on batteries for years to come because such supply doesn't ramp quickly.

After Diess, Farley seems the CEO-not-named-Elon most aware of what's actually the future of the industry, and serious about doing something about it- he just (unfortunately for Ford) came into a position to do something about it pretty late in the game.


Meanwhile, over at say Toyota, they keep finding answers to questions nobody is asking.

Toyota Patents Plans For EV With Manual Transmission And Clutch

The patent appears to show an EV that you can change gears in but you can also set it to a gearless mode too.

insideevs.com

What is the most funny/sad is that they absolutely know, but don't prioritize the work, so they act as if they don't know, but sure as *sugar* they know. Maybe not the full extent of signing multi-year critical element mining contracts, but they know what Tesla is doing and how much they'll be behind the eight ball if Tesla succeeds, which Tesla has, so now they deal with the gamble lost. And that is all that it is, a gamble lost, an arrogance cliff they are going to fall off. We are watching it play out in super slow motion...

 

[kbM3]

Breaking info on 4680 production

edit it’s from TMC

4680 batteries, what is the advantage?

Until the point they need to lower the price for competitive reasons. But if they can’t lower the price across the fleet (produced in Texas vs ca) then they will be their own competition. Yes, eventually once both assembly lines are converted they would have more price flexibility. But those...

teslamotorsclub.com

https://twitter.com/x/status/1492697226489040898

 

[Nocturnal]

1300 cars worth of batteries doesn't seem like all that much yet.

That's my take on Ford too, Farley does get it. Ford is hampered but so is everyone and that includes Tesla. SK innovation's factories won't really be keeping up with Ford's needs, thus Ford's new factories but then those won't be enough either. I actually think Ford as the organization is turning faster than VW.

Japan INC needs some kind of help or they expire and Japan is in deep dodo.

He seems to, but he is also a two faced slimeball. He plays the good cop while having his underlings troll Tesla owners on Twitter to create controversy and a fake war between Tesla and Ford.

 

[StealthP3D]

To be fair, Farley’s point (surely false) was that they have just as much demand as Tesla, not the nonsensical statement that headline (taken out of context) implies.

Isn't that kind of like saying:

To be fair, Pee Wee Herman's point (surely false) was that he could deadlift more than any other human, not the non-sensical headline that he had said he was the strongest person in the world.

 

[ChefBoyardee]

Good article about the US strategy regarding Ukraine. TLDR is we’re releasing more information than usual to intentionally create an international response and disrupt Russia’s strategy.

This makes me think that the impact to markets will be a very short-lived dip. Fear being created on purpose in order to avoid any material events.

Hopefully by Monday people will realize it’s not likely to happen or even better, some de-escalation happens.

U.S. Battles Putin by Disclosing His Next Possible Moves (Published 2022)

Declassified information is part of a campaign to complicate what officials say are Russia’s plans to invade Ukraine.

www.nytimes.com

 

[Buckminster]

BREAKING!

Buckminster of TMC updates TSLA 2030 target valuation to $375T - now includes Bot.

 

[Matias]

BREAKING!

Buckminster of TMC updates TSLA 2030 target valuation to $375T - now includes Bot.

So 136 times Apple’s current valuation or 15 times U.S. GDP or four times total world GDP?

 

[JustMe]

BREAKING!

Buckminster of TMC updates TSLA 2030 target valuation to $375T - now includes Bot.

I’m holding out for an even quad

No half measures!

 

[insaneoctane]

Why would that be false? So far the market is showing it'll buy every good EV anybody makes.

Tesla continues to make a lot more than anyone else- but every other decent offering on the market appears, like Tesla, to be supply limited- not demand limited.... (embarrassingly supply limited in many cases).

Farleys problem isn't in thinking Ford could sell as many good EVs as Tesla if they made that many. They surely could. Demand for good EVs is very very high.

Farleys problem is the previous two CEOs thought investing in battery supply was a dumb idea, so now no matter how hard he wants to push into EVs (and he was only a few months into the job when he publicly recognized the previous CEOs were wrong and battery factories were vital)- he's still severely choked off on batteries for years to come because such supply doesn't ramp quickly.

After Diess, Farley seems the CEO-not-named-Elon most aware of what's actually the future of the industry, and serious about doing something about it- he just (unfortunately for Ford) came into a position to do something about it pretty late in the game.


Meanwhile, over at say Toyota, they keep finding answers to questions nobody is asking.

Toyota Patents Plans For EV With Manual Transmission And Clutch

The patent appears to show an EV that you can change gears in but you can also set it to a gearless mode too.

insideevs.com

Unbelievable.

"The working principle for the system relies on a special controller that alters the torque of the electric motor in order to make it seem more gas car-like."

So they are going to nurf the amazing EV motor power output so it feels like ICE and feels like it needs to shift, thus actually making it slower. This is stupider than exhaust sounds!

Don't they have useful innovations to persue?

 

[Matias]

Unbelievable.

"The working principle for the system relies on a special controller that alters the torque of the electric motor in order to make it seem more gas car-like."

So they are going to nurf the amazing EV motor power output so it feels like ICE and feels like it needs to shift, thus actually making it slower. This is stupider than exhaust sounds!

Don't they have useful innovations to persue?

I offer this idea license free as a service to mankind.

 

[petit_bateau]

Breaking info on 4680 production

edit it’s from TMC

4680 batteries, what is the advantage?

Until the point they need to lower the price for competitive reasons. But if they can’t lower the price across the fleet (produced in Texas vs ca) then they will be their own competition. Yes, eventually once both assembly lines are converted they would have more price flexibility. But those...

teslamotorsclub.com

https://twitter.com/x/status/1492697226489040898

At this rate the Shanghai, Austin, and Berlin battery manufacturing plants will all be opening simultaneously.

 

[Buckminster]

So 136 times Apple’s current valuation or 15 times U.S. GDP or four times total world GDP?

GDP is for losers. Total asset value (and it's growth from thin air) is much more relevant when talking valuations.

 

[Cattledog]

Unbelievable.

"The working principle for the system relies on a special controller that alters the torque of the electric motor in order to make it seem more gas car-like."

So they are going to nurf the amazing EV motor power output so it feels like ICE and feels like it needs to shift, thus actually making it slower. This is stupider than exhaust sounds!

Don't they have useful innovations to persue?

Yes, they will likely also add a small gas engine to the rear of the car with the sole purpose of creating exhaust so it seems 'more gas car-like.'

 

[hobbes]

Unbelievable.

"The working principle for the system relies on a special controller that alters the torque of the electric motor in order to make it seem more gas car-like."

So they are going to nurf the amazing EV motor power output so it feels like ICE and feels like it needs to shift, thus actually making it slower. This is stupider than exhaust sounds!

Don't they have useful innovations to persue?

You can get the "good-old-stickhift" feeling in a Tesla, too ...
1) Get behind a manual transmission car
2) Engage Autopilot

 

[petit_bateau]

When you look at the cell suppliers through Tesla's eyes you can see why they've needed to bring on CATL. The new Shanghai CATL is supposedly 80 GWh and was operating at 60% capacity at end 2021. That suggests that Tesla will be taking ~50% of CATL's 2022 production of ~160 GWh. But will they all go into vehicles ?

Vice versa, looking at Tesla through a cell supplier's eye the cell suppliers know they are no longer king maker. The Tesla Kato Rd pilot plant is supposedly capable of 10 GWh/yr, so approx 125,000 cars per year (~350 cars/day) of 80kWh packs. Then Austin is supposedly aiming for 100 GWh/yr (1.25m vehicles) and presumably Berlin and Shanghai will be similar. Note that LG will be hurting doing the replacements of all the faulty prismatics from last year for GM, Kia, Renault, etc (and where will the duds get repurposed to ?) so their momentum won't be good in 2022. And BYD mostly sells to itself. And then every other bar on that chart knows they are sitting in a factory that is not at a scale which wil be competitive for more than another year.

The news at 4680 batteries, what is the advantage? suggests that Tesla has one million cells produced so far at Kato Rd and stockpiled. Someone has done the maths and reckons that is enough for ~1,200 model Ys but I don't know how many 4680s go into a Y, so I can't check their calcs (yes, I'm lazy). If so this doesn't seem like a great deal - at what point did they get to the ~95% yields we see from the non-training machine (i.e. excluding the right-hand machine in that graphic). Because if we believe they 'only' have a million cells stockpiled, then that implies they've 'only' been in full-ish production for less than a week at Kato Rd. Clearly one does not wish to press the 'go' button on mass manufacturing until yields are at an acceptable level that one does not get swamped by rejects. Does anyone have any insight into (say) Panasonic yields in Sparks ?

If (say) in 2022 the Kato Rd plant and the Berlin and Shanghai and Austin can all get to 5-10 GWh each for total 2022 production, then that would be ~30 GWh total, or enough for 375,000 cars. That ought to allow Semis to start ramping 2023. That would mean Tesla was taking in the following cell streams for 2022, assuming no further growth from LG or Panasonic:
- Panasonic = 36
- CATL = 80
- LG = 14
- Tesla internal 4680 = 30
- TOTAL = 160 GWh i.e. enough for 2,000,000 vehicles at 80 kWh each

Put a different way if Tesla doesn't make 2m vehicles in 2022, then the 4 GWh of storage that Tesla shipped in 2021 ought to be dramatically exceeded in 2022. Is it possible to scale storage production by 10x in one year, from 4 GWh to 40 GWh ?

 

[mongo]

The news at 4680 batteries, what is the advantage? suggests that Tesla has one million cells produced so far at Kato Rd and stockpiled. Someone has done the maths and reckons that is enough for ~1,200 model Ys but I don't know how many 4680s go into a Y, so I can't check their calcs (yes, I'm lazy). If so this doesn't seem like a great deal - at what point did they get to the ~95% yields we see from the non-training machine (i.e. excluding the right-hand machine in that graphic). Because if we believe they 'only' have a million cells stockpiled, then that implies they've 'only' been in full-ish production for less than a week at Kato Rd. Clearly one does not wish to press the 'go' button on mass manufacturing until yields are at an acceptable level that one does not get swamped by rejects. Does anyone have any insight into (say) Panasonic yields in Sparks ?

Regarding 'only':
One million cells tells us nothing about how many packs (Y, semi, CT, Roadster?) have already been produced. Kato has been functional for a while, with the hiccup being the larger calendering rolls.
At 5x energy per cell, a Y LR would need 880 cells or so (4,416 2170s currently ); so 1,200 is in the ballpark.

 

[Singuy]

Guidance

1. Over 50% growth in 2022
2. Battery supply is not an issue
3. Texas will use 4680s
4. Expect initial ramp similar to Shanghai

Reading the tea leaf using incomplete information from what someone's relative said gets you nowhere.

 

[petit_bateau]

Regarding 'only':
One million cells tells us nothing about how many packs (Y, semi, CT, Roadster?) have already been produced. Kato has been functional for a while, with the hiccup being the larger calendering rolls.
At 5x energy per cell, a Y LR would need 880 cells or so (4,416 2170s currently ); so 1,200 is in the ballpark.

Thanks for confirming the ~1200 and the 880 cells/Y, most helpful.

I really wish that poster had not shared that graphic. I sense someone may lose their job over that.

Yes, there is a big question mark about how much is in storage, and of what format. 4680 cells, 4680 packs, LFP .........

Have they gotten 3m calender rolls functioning now ? Or are they doing it with multiple rolls in parallel, arranged so that the edges line up in the trim zones ?

So many questions. It really is all about the cells.

 

[kbM3]

So 136 times Apple’s current valuation or 15 times U.S. GDP or four times total world GDP?

Please don’t compare GDP and market cap anymore.
GDP is ANNUAL
Market Cap is expected value of DECADES of cash flow.

‘’These are nowhere near comparable items.

 

[kbM3]

When you look at the cell suppliers through Tesla's eyes you can see why they've needed to bring on CATL. The new Shanghai CATL is supposedly 80 GWh and was operating at 60% capacity at end 2021. That suggests that Tesla will be taking ~50% of CATL's 2022 production of ~160 GWh. But will they all go into vehicles ?

Vice versa, looking at Tesla through a cell supplier's eye the cell suppliers know they are no longer king maker. The Tesla Kato Rd pilot plant is supposedly capable of 10 GWh/yr, so approx 125,000 cars per year (~350 cars/day) of 80kWh packs. Then Austin is supposedly aiming for 100 GWh/yr (1.25m vehicles) and presumably Berlin and Shanghai will be similar. Note that LG will be hurting doing the replacements of all the faulty prismatics from last year for GM, Kia, Renault, etc (and where will the duds get repurposed to ?) so their momentum won't be good in 2022. And BYD mostly sells to itself. And then every other bar on that chart knows they are sitting in a factory that is not at a scale which wil be competitive for more than another year.

The news at 4680 batteries, what is the advantage? suggests that Tesla has one million cells produced so far at Kato Rd and stockpiled. Someone has done the maths and reckons that is enough for ~1,200 model Ys but I don't know how many 4680s go into a Y, so I can't check their calcs (yes, I'm lazy). If so this doesn't seem like a great deal - at what point did they get to the ~95% yields we see from the non-training machine (i.e. excluding the right-hand machine in that graphic). Because if we believe they 'only' have a million cells stockpiled, then that implies they've 'only' been in full-ish production for less than a week at Kato Rd. Clearly one does not wish to press the 'go' button on mass manufacturing until yields are at an acceptable level that one does not get swamped by rejects. Does anyone have any insight into (say) Panasonic yields in Sparks ?

If (say) in 2022 the Kato Rd plant and the Berlin and Shanghai and Austin can all get to 5-10 GWh each for total 2022 production, then that would be ~30 GWh total, or enough for 375,000 cars. That ought to allow Semis to start ramping 2023. That would mean Tesla was taking in the following cell streams for 2022, assuming no further growth from LG or Panasonic:
- Panasonic = 36
- CATL = 80
- LG = 14
- Tesla internal 4680 = 30
- TOTAL = 160 GWh i.e. enough for 2,000,000 vehicles at 80 kWh each

Put a different way if Tesla doesn't make 2m vehicles in 2022, then the 4 GWh of storage that Tesla shipped in 2021 ought to be dramatically exceeded in 2022. Is it possible to scale storage production by 10x in one year, from 4 GWh to 40 GWh ?

View attachment 768421

Although your 30 GWh of internal 4680 production may turn out to be accurate, it would be woefully behind Tesla’s goal of 100 GWh, whilst hitting a rate of 200 GWh / year before the end of the year.