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

[dhanson865]

Informative pic for the battery chemistry it represents. However, there are many different Li-ion chemistries, which can vary significantly...

The image claims it represents the type of battery used in 80% by kWh (not units) of the new plug in cars in 2020. It's separated in two qualifiers and one is pretty faint so you might have missed that qualifier.

Obviously that chemistry isn't as dominant now as it was 2-3 years ago. Iron Phosphate variants have gained popularity noticeably since then. With Lithium Manganese Iron Phosphate being the new hotness.

From a TSLA perspective you'd have to consider historical and current types of

NCA (with various ratios)
NMA (with various ratios)
NMC (with various ratios)
LiFePo4
LiMnFePO4

I honestly don't know how many major chemistries have been used in Tesla products. Between old types for cars and storage products and new types for cars and storage products it's a never ending list of minor and major changes.

But if the other players in the market aren't moving as fast that somewhat dated infographic gives an insight into market forces if nothing else.

 

[dhanson865]

Weekend read

Guy makes 1.5 mil on Tesla by investing 300k in 2020 and now went to zero because of FTX.

https://www.reddit.com/r/wallstreetbets/comments/yq6y5d

Is he using "C" to mean Crypto? Or is "C" a specific investment?

If he means Crypto in general, he just learned the old maxim, if you don't control the wallet the money isn't yours. This is often said as "Not your keys, not your coins".

I've personally lost $0 on crypto exchanges because I never send crypto anywhere that doesn't immediately give me cash or goods in return for that transaction.

 

[StealthP3D]

Informative pic for the battery chemistry it represents. However, there are many different Li-ion chemistries, whch can vary significantly...

Good point. Maybe someone who tracks the ratio of battery chemistries sold by Tesla more closely than I do can comment on how the percentage of cobalt free batteries has changed over time. My general impression was that nearly half of all cars sold by Tesla this year had zero cobalt in them. And the ones that DO have cobalt, have a low-cobalt chemistry with much less cobalt than the battery composition graphic in the post you are replying to suggests.

I'm focusing on cobalt because it looks like this "conflict" metal is the primary one the anti-EV forces have chosen to focus on when they make their lame attempts to position EV's as anti-environmental and anti-humanity. Of course they never mention that ICE crankshafts and camshafts typically use cobalt to harden the steel, the oil refining process uses cobalt to remove the sulfur and many engine machining bits, drill bits, etc. use cobalt to harden them and cell-phone and laptop batteries use this conflict metal. Cobalt is only bad when it's used in EV's. /s

 

[Max Plaid]

They never had the NACS connector in Europe. They used a modified Type 2 for Superchargers.

For a legacy S/X they need to purchase a CCS2 adapter to use the V3 stalls, if their car didn't come with it. (They stated including it with the cars at a certain point.)

S&X also needed a ranger update to the internal car wiring, well worth the €299 I paid for that

New MXP will have CCS I believe - it's not sleek like like the NACS, but it's not as cumbersome as it looks, the NCAS/CCS adapter looks quite unwieldy, the Tesla Type 2/CCS adapter is really compact

I guess the NCAS is really small next to even the Type 2, but never seen one over here, obviously

 

[scaesare]

The image claims it represents the type of battery used in 80% by kWh (not units) of the new plug in cars in 2020. It's separated in two qualifiers and one is pretty faint so you might have missed that qualifier.

Obviously that chemistry isn't as dominant now as it was 2-3 years ago. Iron Phosphate variants have gained popularity noticeably since then. With Lithium Manganese Iron Phosphate being the new hotness.

From a TSLA perspective you'd have to consider historical and current types of

NMA (with various ratios)
NMC (with various ratios)
LiFePo4
LiMnFePO4

I honestly don't know how many major chemistries have been used in Tesla products. Between old types for cars and storage products and new types for cars and storage products it's a never ending list of minor and major changes.

But if the other players in the market aren't moving as fast that somewhat dated infographic gives an insight into market forces if nothing else.

Yeah, however that qualifier tends to lump all the nickel cathode chemistries together.... good chart for the average as a whole. Here's additional breakdown:

Interestingly this year I think over half of the Tesla's mase are using iron-based chemistries...

On edit: @StealthP3D made similar observation

 

[MP3Mike]

and charge control board as shown at

S&X also needed a ranger update to the internal car wiring, well worth the €299 I paid for that

New MXP will have CCS I believe - it's not sleek like like the NACS, but it's not as cumbersome as it looks, the NCAS/CCS adapter looks quite unwieldy, the Tesla Type 2/CCS adapter is really compact

I guess the NCAS is really small next to even the Type 2, but never seen one over here, obviously

View attachment 874206

Only if you want to charge at third-party CCS stations. My understanding is that if you just want to use V3 Superchargers you only need the adapter.

 

[Discoducky]

How long will it be before another entity reliably lands orbital rockets?

Never. That is the power of first principles innovation.

They will need something that brings down the cost more than reusable rockets.

They'll need to out innovate Elon.

 

[StealthP3D]

Yes, because Musk seem to think so. He said eventually every EV will have good range and FSD and Tesla's advantage is in manufacturing. This is with him also talking about how NO ONE ELSE is even trying generalized FSD. He also built Dojo for the purpose of helping the rest solve FSD once they see Tesla have done it.

You add all those things together and pretty much Tesla is saying once it's solved, FSD will spread pretty rapidly and Tesla will be the one capitalizing on it.

FSD is hard
When DOJO helps Tesla solve FSD, others will want to follow the proven development path, and Tesla will have two choices:

1) License FSD to the others at a high price
2) Rent DOJO to the others at a high price so Elon can watch them struggle for years, like he did.

The revenue is fantastic either way, but Elon would rather watch the others struggle for years while renting DOJO to them at a high price.

On the other hand, he might just license FSD so he can use DOJO full time to make Optimus smarter and more amazing.

 

[navguy12]

You can always turn FSD Beta off, so I'd suggest you ask for it. That way, you can choose when to have it running and when not to (done this multiple times for my parents Model Y). Once you get the Beta, it doesn't seem to matter how often you use it.

I didn’t know that one could move back and forth, in and out of FSD beta.

My assumption was that once you sign up for it, you are locked into it…and my copilot has indicated that she will not join me on trips where FSD has control…

If I can use FSD beta only on trips where I am solo, but revert to manual control (in town), TACC (on two lane highways) or NOA (freeways) at whim, then I’ll press the button to accept it.

 

[navguy12]

Front page of today's NY Times. "Electric Vehicles Start To Enter the Car-Buying Mainstream". If I was new to this subject I would come away not knowing this was mostly due to Tesla. I also would be afraid of an unreliable and dangerous charging system.
From the article

Electric car buyers used words like “love” and “awesome” to describe their vehicles. Many said they would never buy a gasoline car again, but many others said they intended to keep at least one conventional vehicle, because traveling long distances by electric car can be inconvenient and sometimes impossible because of difficulties in finding charging stations.

The lack of fast and convenient places to charge electric cars on longer trips has been the main frustration. Chargers are few and far between outside coastal urban areas.

But she hadn’t considered that the battery would drain faster when the car was weighed down with her daughter’s possessions and her husband, Dave Daiber, who is 6 feet 4 inches tall.
Less than two hours into the trip, Ms. Milligan realized that the car was not going to make it to Toledo, Ohio, where she had planned to charge. Instead, they got off the highway in Findlay. Of the four chargers in town, one was behind a locked gate; another was at a Toyota dealership that would not let a Volkswagen use its charger; a third would charge only Teslas; and the fourth had been installed recently and was not yet working.

The family wound up spending the night at a hotel and making the rest of the trip in a rented van
A few electric car owners surveyed said the charging stations they stopped at sometimes lacked shelter and felt unsafe.

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/11/13/business/electric-vehicles-buyers-mainstream.html

So, another FUD piece. Did anyone quote any Tesla owners in the story?

 

[Singuy]

FSD is hard
When DOJO helps Tesla solve FSD, others will want to follow the proven development path, and Tesla will have two choices:

1) License FSD to the others at a high price
2) Rent DOJO to the others at a high price so Elon can watch them struggle for years, like he did.

The revenue is fantastic either way, but Elon would rather watch the others struggle for years while renting DOJO to them at a high price.

On the other hand, he might just license FSD so he can use DOJO full time to make Optimus smarter and more amazing.

Haha I honestly think Elon will encourage the plug and play route as every day a car doesn't have FSD will be a day with preventable death.

 

[Rammstein]

Read what I wrote. The industry will BUY from Tesla and it'll be a plug and play solution and bring them to Tesla parity overnight(well not overnight because they still have build the cars with Tesla fsd computers and the sensor suites).
Of course Tesla will charge a hefty fee and even profit sharing because Tesla probably mandates all Tesla hardware enabled fsd robotaxis must be on the Tesla network.

Or they can do their own thing and use Dojo which tesla will help them with training which will take years. Either way the winner of this race will dominate, but I don't buy the narrative that other car manufactures won't see FSD in their own cars for like another decade.

Ok fair enough. Your idea of catching up is other OEMs will use Tesla’s FSD technology after Tesla solves FSD.

This isn’t catching up imo. This is giving up.

 

[Singuy]

I agree that one day, all cars will be self-driving, but the time difference between when Tesla gets there and when the 2nd company gets there is going to be many, many years. For instance, how long until Cruise can scale to Austin? Then another city? How many rides will Cruise offer once Robotaxi starts in San Fran? What will their market share be? Then consider, how long would it take them to pivot and adopt Tesla FSD? I don't think that would be feasible, but will be the only way to stay in business.

It is interesting as I think I have the same information as you, but we have come to very different conclusions.

I look at it more simply as this:
Q: Is it possible to create a generalized FSD solution without enormous capital to iterate on an enormous amount of compute?
A: Hells no
Q: When will Tesla offer FSD/Dojo training as a service?
A: As soon as Tesla not only has enough engineering time to spend turning it into a platform, but also has enough spare compute that they can't better spend it on their own products.
Answer in years: 2035 (or whenever ICE cars cannot be sold anymore in a specific region/country)

Elon knows that only his companies will 'do the right thing' with Tesla technologies. Turning that over to another company does not inherently further the mission.

I believe once generalized FSD is solved, everything will be abandoned and no one dares to solve the same way Tesla has because it's not economic viable and it's redundant. Like why would anyone want to solve something challenging twice and arrive at the same answer? Usually people try adding on perks like how to use less power, increase performance, decrease time to destination, etc etc.

 

[Dutchie]

I'm of the mind that the competition is irrelevant.

So am I. I don’t think that anyone else. other then Tesla will solve FSD anytime soon. Not in 5 years, not in 10 years. Look at SpaceX. When did the first landing of the first stage happen? Has anyone caught up to that? I think the Chinese are now starting to think about it, but that is about it. Same thing will happen with FSD. It is too hard. Licensing is the only way to go.

 

[Artful Dodger]

You can always turn FSD Beta off, so I'd suggest you ask for it. That way, you can choose when to have it running and when not to (done this multiple times for my parents Model Y). Once you get the Beta, it doesn't seem to matter how often you use it.

I'm in Canada. The beta has not yet rolled out widely here, nor have I been offered it. That may change by Christmas with a wide-release beta v11 (which was my original expectation when I bought the Model Y in May). Still, our roads are often snow/ice covered, and FSD does not yet appear to alter it's driving habits for low-grip surfaces. It was -22C here at 5 am on Thursday morning as I drove to the Rec Centre, and I had to use my Winter driving skills to control the car at several corners and intersections.

I'll get the beta soon after its available, but I will remain the pilot in command at all times (including day-long periods of 'hand-flying'). I'm in this for the long-run, and expect FSD will soon drive like a newly-licenced teenager. 1 yr from now? Really good. 5 yrs from now? Amazing.

Cheers!

 

[Rarity]

Is he using "C" to mean Crypto? Or is "C" a specific investment?

If he means Crypto in general, he just learned the old maxim, if you don't control the wallet the money isn't yours. This is often said as "Not your keys, not your coins".

I've personally lost $0 on crypto exchanges because I never send crypto anywhere that doesn't immediately give me cash or goods in return for that transaction.

I assumed "C" means Celsius, which is under Chapter 11. Crypto lending. The Celsius token has declined 88% in the past year.

The Reddit post seems odd in that the poster's "number" is $1.5 million. That sounds awfully low to me, but I guess your mileage may vary.

 

[ElectricIAC]

I assumed "C" means Celsius, which is under Chapter 11. Crypto lending. The Celsius token has declined 88% in the past year.

The Reddit post seems odd in that the poster's "number" is $1.5 million. That sounds awfully low to me, but I guess your mileage may vary.

I believe it’s pronounced “Celesus”.

 

[wtlloyd]

After reading that all I can is this:


I sure am glad I didn't sell all of my TSLA and put it all into crypto!!!

I just don't understand how people can develop the conviction to hold TSLA by acquiring the knowledge and understanding of the core strengths Tesla has as a business, to then cash out and put it all into Crypto.

It is exactly like free-climbing El Capitan only to jump off once reaching the top, expecting Superman to fly by and save you.
SMH.

 

[jerry33]

I didn’t know that one could move back and forth, in and out of FSD beta.

My assumption was that once you sign up for it, you are locked into it…and my copilot has indicated that she will not join me on trips where FSD has control…

If I can use FSD beta only on trips where I am solo, but revert to manual control (in town), TACC (on two lane highways) or NOA (freeways) at whim, then I’ll press the button to accept it.

Any time you want FSD you need to activate it. FSD does not automatically engage.

 

[Zextraterrestrial]

You can always turn FSD Beta off, so I'd suggest you ask for it. That way, you can choose when to have it running and when not to (done this multiple times for my parents Model Y). Once you get the Beta, it doesn't seem to matter how often you use it.

Definitely! It makes general AP much better imo.

I didn’t know that one could move back and forth, in and out of FSD beta.

My assumption was that once you sign up for it, you are locked into it…and my copilot has indicated that she will not join me on trips where FSD has control…

If I can use FSD beta only on trips where I am solo, but revert to manual control (in town), TACC (on two lane highways) or NOA (freeways) at whim, then I’ll press the button to accept it.

just change driver profiles