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

[jw934]

For one example I read Tesla is installing MYLR rear brakes on MYP rears.

2022Q4 call
Andrew Baglino -- Senior Vice President, Powertrain and Energy Engineering
“
I was going to say, we're also -- our fleet is starting to mature, the 3, Y fleet. And we're gathering a lot of data out of that fleet to understand how we can sort of bring some margin that we didn't know we had out of the product. So over the course of 2023, on the powertrain side, we're actually going to go after sort of some materials where we're paying for more performance than we need or we have more content than we need without impacting reliability at all. And that will actually add up to a pretty significant cost reduction on the powertrain side over the course of 2023.

So we're not just sort of relying on supply.”

For brakes, reducing the material cost will apply to production as well as replacement repairs and insurance cost.

 

[Hiline]

I somewhat agree and took some profits again yesterday. Hopefully I'll never get the chance to buy them back at a lower price.

There’s a huge amount of cash in investors’ hands that is sitting on the sideline waiting for the first positive sign of the economy to pour back into the market. And honest the numbers are quite good. While money supply has been cut by around $600B, unemployment rate has remained steady. Laid off tech workers have found new jobs for the most part. Corporate earnings have also been stable. Price to earnings has gone back to reasonable levels. This is a very healthy market. The only unknown is the direction of inflation. If inflation continues the downward trend, you’re going to see S&P set a new all time high in short order.

I’ve recently put my money back in the stock market. It’s only a question of TSLA vs other stocks - certainly not any other car company!

 

[LiveLong&Profit]

Acc. to Joe T's best guestimate/speculation, DIE is an acronym meaning 'Dynamic Ion Exchange'
Timestamp 09:00

 

[Gigapress]

I think he didn't have too much power in his mind when he said "performance". Rather that some parts are built sturdier than needed. Overdimemensioned gears, suspension and the like. Potentially resulting weight reduction, which in turn increases performance of the entire car, is an added bonus.

Here's what Drew said per Motley Fool's transcript:

Right, and Drew and Elon had made similar comments on a previous earnings call.

Drew Baglino: Getting to the optimal design, right? Like, you always start with some excess. Some people might call it fat, but that's not really what you think it is initially. It's that you don't know how lean you can get it until you've done it a couple of times.
Elon Musk
Yes. I mean there's some platonic ideal of the perfect product where the atoms -- you have exactly the right atoms and they're in exactly the right position, and you asymptotically approach this platonic ideal. But it takes a lot of effort over time to figure out actually what is the platonic ideal and then actually gradually approach that.

Drew Baglino … Like we're not just evaluating the pack in isolation either. It's the pack plus the body, the integration, do we have mass in the right places, we have the cost in the right places and only just the right amount. And I think we've gone through one iteration. We're going to do another one with Cybertruck.

 

[phoggy123]

There’s a huge amount of cash in investors’ hands that is sitting on the sideline waiting for the first positive sign of the economy to pour back into the market. And honest the numbers are quite good. While money supply has been cut by around $600B, unemployment rate has remained steady. Laid off tech workers have found new jobs for the most part. Corporate earnings have also been stable. Price to earnings has gone back to reasonable levels. This is a very healthy market. The only unknown is the direction of inflation. If inflation continues the downward trend, you’re going to see S&P set a new all time high in short order.

I’ve recently put my money back in the stock market. It’s only a question of TSLA vs other stocks - certainly not any other car company!

Taking Tesla and TSLA out of this, I think the idea that we are going to go back into a full bull market is a little hopium
1. Consumer savings and credit usage are in the tanks. (low savings, high credit usage) for the most part any covid savings is almost depleted
2. Home affordability is at the least affordable since the early 80's, which has caused the housing market to dry up which has knock on effects everywhere.
3. The fed is in uncharted waters raising interest rates, letting QE roll off their books, being the primary REPO lender, while having the treasury draw down their account at the fed because of the debt ceiling. All of this is suggesting we haven't seen the real liquidity crunch yet. Just because the S+P crossed an imaginary line signaling a bull market, doesnt mean that it's anything more than a bear market rally that ends in tears. Money will be made like this week in the short term but I also would not be surprised to see the S+P at 3K by June or July.

If you take those two and then look at the Fed I dont see how we have a "soft" landing. The fed either needs a consumer led recession which then crushes EPS, and the market tanks along with inflation and creates unemployment but price stability, or inflation rages and they accept higher inflation, but easier money.

Powell has stated he is willing to keep rates higher for longer and risk that then prematurely pausing or lowering rates and keeping inflation simmering. I think It will be .5% next week with a stark warning they are serious about this and asset prices are secondary to consumer prices and employment.

 

[Hiline]

Taking Tesla and TSLA out of this, I think the idea that we are going to go back into a full bull market is a little hopium
1. Consumer savings and credit usage are in the tanks. (low savings, high credit usage) for the most part any covid savings is almost depleted
2. Home affordability is at the least affordable since the early 80's, which has caused the housing market to dry up which has knock on effects everywhere.
3. The fed is in uncharted waters raising interest rates, letting QE roll off their books, being the primary REPO lender, while having the treasury draw down their account at the fed because of the debt ceiling. All of this is suggesting we haven't seen the real liquidity crunch yet. Just because the S+P crossed an imaginary line signaling a bull market, doesnt mean that it's anything more than a bear market rally that ends in tears. Money will be made like this week in the short term but I also would not be surprised to see the S+P at 3K by June or July.

If you take those two and then look at the Fed I dont see how we have a "soft" landing. The fed either needs a consumer led recession which then crushes EPS, and the market tanks along with inflation and creates unemployment but price stability, or inflation rages and they accept higher inflation, but easier money.

Powell has stated he is willing to keep rates higher for longer and risk that then prematurely pausing or lowering rates and keeping inflation simmering. I think It will be .5% next week with a stark warning they are serious about this and asset prices are secondary to consumer prices and employment.

I agree with your points. That said, most money in the economy is concentrated in the wealthy who are little affected by common things like credit debt, interest rate, and home affordability. The average American doesn’t have much outstanding cash to put into or pull out of the stock market.

Interest rates for sure are going to stay high, but as long as inflation is tamed and unemployment stays low, investor sentiment will turn positive and the stock marker will rally back.

 

[jw934]

. . . pile of EV startups which follow Tesla’s price everywhere ... They followed Tesla down, now they follow Tesla up.

I just don’t see large numbers of EV startup individual investors putting more money into their pick on Tesla Q4 results and the subsequent stock price rise.

My guess is at least part of this correlation is driven by inflows and outflows of some kind of EV or Green ETF holding a basket of EV stocks that buys and sells everything in the basket irrespective of fundamentals. Could also be hedge funds moving money in and out of their ”EV” portfolio of stocks when $TSLA makes a big move.

 

[geometro]

Its like a horoscope. So vague it could mean anything.

What other low value companies are riding along?

Are we talking about the junk basket that is the pile of EV startups which follow Tesla’s price everywhere like little dogs? That’s not exactly surprising, dogs are pack animals who always follow the alpha. Tesla is the alpha. They followed Tesla down, now they follow Tesla up.

They are only really independent from Tesla when their earnings come out and their basis gets reset.

I think there quite a few… Carvana, Teladoc, Microstrategy,…

 

[larmor]

Regarding the projected timeline for 20 million cars-- is Tesla "making the machine that makes the machines?" Did not hear that on the recent conference call. Wondering if Tesla is partially manufacturing the robots for car and battery production, vs outsourcing the equipment.

 

[Cosmacelf]

Right, and Drew and Elon had made similar comments on a previous earnings call.

Reading that Baglino quote where he talks about taking extra time to shave costs out of the Cybertruck design, I do wonder if they expect to be back to a cell constrained situation in 2023 looking at the growth they have in front of them for their existing line up. Ie. No sense rushing Cybertruck volume production if they don’t have cells. Once again on this latest CC Elon said the reason for historic new product introduction delay was cell supply.

 

[FSDtester#1]

Anecdotal, but we're having a slightly painful delivery process with my wife's new MYLR, going very slow. I was at Tesla yesterday (for getting winter wheels fitted to my MXP) and I spoke to the sales guy. He said they're totally overwhelmed with interest and orders since the price-cuts

I wish I could say I am sorry for this delay. Unfortunately your post made me very happy after I read it. I hope that was your intention!

 

[y_naught]

I heard that and it makes me pretty curious about what changes they will end up making. Maybe slightly smaller motors and acceleration? My MYLR has more power than I really need, if they could shave $200 - 500 off the price and ship the same vehicle slightly slower they should, particularly if they could noodle a couple more miles of range out of it.

Would you still get the Acceleration Boost? /s

 

[Olle]

Now that I re-read the quote, Drew might not have been talking about vehicle power, but instead saying they could build the same powertrain with cheaper components.

Correct, that‘s what he meant. “We’re paying for more performance than we need” as opposed to more performance than you need.

 

[mongo]

Reading that Baglino quote where he talks about taking extra time to shave costs out of the Cybertruck design, I do wonder if they expect to be back to a cell constrained situation in 2023 looking at the growth they have in front of them for their existing line up. Ie. No sense rushing Cybertruck volume production if they don’t have cells. Once again on this latest CC Elon said the reason for historic new product introduction delay was cell supply.

Yeah, they did say they are working to getting 4680 ramped in time to support Cybertruck. So the schedules of both are linked, but no reason to purposely slow things. Also no reason to pay to expedite if the other dependency is still in process.
Nice methodical progression toward volume production in 2024.

Thanks Martin, first I just want to say congrats and thanks to the Tesla 4680 team for achieving 1K a week and Q4 I was no small feat. Definitely a result of, you know, more than a couple years of hard work. As far as where we stand in Texas, one of four lines are in production with the remaining three in stages of commissioning and install. Really our 2023 goal as a 4680 team is to deliver a cost-effective ramp of 4680s well ahead of cyber truck. Focus areas are dialing in and improving the quality of the high volume supplied mechanical parts and driving factory processed yields up as much as possible. Between the two of those things, if we achieve those those key goals, we'll be well set up to for a major 4680 year in 2024.

 

[traxila]

EM is no longer a loose cannon who destroys everything he doesn’t lie about.

Now he is a smooth operator.

Musk Breezes Through Washington as Smooth CEO, Not Twitter Troll

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finance.yahoo.com

 

[S3XY]

Exactly. That's why the comment about 4680's in stationary storage makes me so ebullient.

I was expecting cheap third-party LFPs to be used in Tesla storage products for a very long time. But the idea that 4680's will go into storage in the next few years says that we are probably looking at LFP 4680 and that Tesla thinks they will be in abundant supply. Otherwise, they would be putting all the 4680's into vehicles.

In order to take advantage of the IRA credits, as well as to take control of their own future battery supply, Tesla needs to onshore production of LFP batteries which currently are a stronghold of China.

 

[insaneoctane]

I was trying to figure out how much of the IRA $7500 Tesla was giving back for the 3 so I configured a 3 Sr+, 3p, Y and YP all for $60,990 (using various options to get to the same total), and with identical lease options, the monthly amounts were $598, $748, $711 and $735. I imagine there are some different residual calculations based on model and options, but assuming they are roughly equal, it looks like Tesla is applying ~$3500 to the 3sr+ model price.

Less than half to the consumer and the rest in Tesla's pocket...

 

[jerry33]

Less than half to the consumer and the rest in Tesla's pocket...

If it forwards the mission, I don't have a problem with that.

 

[insaneoctane]

OK last update, time for bed.

Rank	Weekly Gain (M-F)	M Open	F Close	% Gain	+1 Week % Gain	-1 Week % Gain
1	Mon 5/6/13 to Fri 5/10/13	$3.76​	$5.12​	36.1%​	13.1%​	5.4%
2	Mon 1/23/23 to Fri 1/27/23	$135.87​	$177.90​	30.9%​	??	14.5%
3	Mon 4/13/20 to Fri 4/17/20	$39.34​	$50.26​	27.7%​	-1.0%​	12.5%
4	Mon 10/21/19 to Fri 10/25/19	$17.22​	$21.88​	27.0%​	-4.3%​	3.7%
5	Mon 10/22/18 to Fri 10/26/18	$17.38​	$22.06​	26.9%​	2.6%​	0.4%

Seems like the last 2 weeks combined might be a record?

 

[insaneoctane]

View attachment 900507
So Farley thinks that dealer network is an asset and not a burden!!

Hmmmm....My personal experience :

Buying experience without the dealer? BETTER. Service experience without the "for BIG profits" dealer? BETTER. Not sharing profits of my favorite company with dealer? BETTER....