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

[Buddyroe]

No need to be rude. I added few shares in $5-10 steps in the last few days. $251 is a lot better than my asp $350, so not much to regret. Hindsight and all that.

Sorry. I meant to add a smiley face. I added a significant amount to my position at $300 just before the last ER. So, I know how it is. None of us have a crystal ball. We just make the best decisions we can.

 

[MarcusMaximus]

So Elon won his argument.

• production numbers or sales or delivery numbers (whether actual, forecasted, or projected) that have not been previously published via pre-approved written communications issued by the Company (“Official Company Guidance”) or deviate from previously published Official Company Guidance;

This must really chap the SEC and baloon Elon’s head.

Who “won” doesn’t really matter, but this isn’t exactly as much of a slam dunk as you seem to think. This would just move the violation from the tweet to the original earnings call, since it was an offhand remark in reply to an analyst question(and that call is explicitly listed as one form of communication covered by the agreement).

All this said, yes, good news. Terms are now much more explicit and Elon isn’t a moron so should follow them. And no punishment of any kind.

 

[anon]

I like this settlement - Musk can continue tweeting as much as he wants about new products in existing categories, e.g. new car models. In their previous court filings, the SEC listed numerous examples of harmless tweets about Tesla products that they thought should have been pre-approved. They have just conceded that those tweets were ok after all. In fact, even tweets that could be material (e.g. major new vehicle product announcement, such as the pickup) are now definitively ok because they are not restricted in the settlement.

 

[powertoold]

Nope, we should be seeing this as the SEC lost, Elon won. No fine, no contempt, no punishment. SEC forced to clarify their initial agreement. Elon can still tweet pretty much whatever he wants.

 

[anon]

he did get a punishment. More scrutiny on his communications. Not exactly great for someone who basically says whatever comes to his mind on twitter.

That's not my take on it - to me, it seems like a reduction in scrutiny compared to the original settlement. Before, the SEC imposed scrutiny on any material communications, defined broadly. They have now restricted that scrutiny to only a precisely-defined list of items, and have now allowed material tweets without scrutiny on other matters, e.g. new products in existing categories, like new vehicles.

 

[M3Rider]

Um, the SEC lost.

You mean the fines? They still got $40m last from the last time.
Elon is really tied up

I don't think he won exactly. Elon's argument was that his numbers were covered in a conference call which isn't exactly a written communication.

Doesn't really matter who won. At least there is zero ambiguity now and both parties can move on.

Yeah, so these rules did not exist in the past and even though what he said was not written, it does not seem like there will be fines.

Overall, seems like Elon is pretty much in a straightjacket from now on as far as Twitting goes.

"Move on" is the best case scenario. I really hope he can find it in himself to comply. Next time he tweets something he's not supposed to, SP will start an immediate tail spin...Do I get this right?
So, this is still a huge risk factor for all of us.

 

[TradingInvest]

Huge short squeeze and min 10% rally if Elon announced he's quitting twitter...then on to 300s.

Every time someone shouts huge squeeze coming, some people buy short term calls or use full margin, then they get crushed. Manipulators happily take the money.

Work hard, save more cash, only invest the cash you actually own, you decide what to do with your cash (not being forced to sell at the worst time upon margin calls), you decide how many years you can hold onto each position, don't play the wall street game. It's a rigged game at every level.

I always assume there is a decent chance to see lower levels. I just keep saving more cash. I say Tesla's downside is safe, but I have seen 1 out of 1 trillion odds happen in my life. So assume anything is possible. Invest, don't gamble.

This is not advice, although I said "you should...". This is the lesson I learned and posted a few times in the past, it worked for me. I love TSLA for the long term.

 

[Boomer19]

You were wrong here.

he doesn’t really have magic 8 ball

 

[powertoold]

Also, the agreement doesn’t say that each individual instance requires preapproval. Elon can just ask his lawyer to pre-approve everything and then if he gets in trouble again, he can just say his lawyer preapproved it. Cause screw the SEC in this case

 

[lklundin]

I've been margin called 4 times today. I'm not gonna try the 5th so yeah.. this should be the bottom

Also due to your avater, I have to ask:

Are you for real?

 

[Bunky]

You mean the fines? They still got $40m last from the last time.
Elon is really tied up

Yeah, so these rules did not exist in the past and even though what he said was not written, it does not seem like there will be fines.

Overall, seems like Elon is pretty much in a straightjacket from now on as far as Twitting goes.

"Move on" is the best case scenario. I really hope he can find it in himself to comply. Next time he tweets something he's not supposed to, SP will start an immediate tail spin...Do I get this right?
So, this is still a huge risk factor for all of us.

Not in a straight jacket, just needs “pre-review” of certain content. Not much to give up, should keep him in check and is obvs a lot better than being found in contempt.

 

[JRP3]

he did get a punishment. More scrutiny on his communications. Not exactly great for someone who basically says whatever comes to his mind on twitter.

That's nothing compared to what the SEC was looking for. His communications were already being scrutinized.

 

[Cloxxki]

Yep, the gauntlet has been thrown down. Musk clearly needs to come through on his guidance of a minimum of 90k cars delivered for Q2. He has to hit that. That actually seems pretty high to me, well above my estimates, but it is what Musk has told the market to expect as a minimum.

With Elon indicating that April is showing a record number of deliveries for the first month of any quarter, that means it would beat October 2018, which had 20,325 total deliveries, according to the InsideEVs scorecard. There were 10,600 cars in transit from Q1 plus about 16k in total car inventory as we exited Q1. Beating 20,325 for April looks very doable actually. I could see the 3 months looking something like this: 25k, 30k, 35k. They actually did 25,250 model 3 alone in December 2018. However, it seems to me it will be difficult to hit 90k for Q2 while at the same time shifting to continuous global sales. If they do that then we would not expect the big surge near the end of the quarter, so they would need to have relatively higher numbers for the first couple of months.
Monthly Plug-In EV Sales Scorecard

It shouldn't be so hard to hit 90k. Those 10k in transit are nice buffer make it like an 85k and that would already allow for a good departure from the heavy wave paradigm. Sending fewer boats simply by using an earlier cut-off date already should do the trick. All but say 5,000 would get into Q2 still, all 10k in transit would be sold and delivered which for 98-99% should happen.
For May and June, we should see a decent tick back up for S/X demand thanks to that half-fresh an the return of (a better) Standard Range. Keeping these largely for US/CA would be prudent to find a mix of less wave and more deliveries.
If indeed something was done about GF1 cell supply (overnight after the Elon exposure of it), in combination with an SR+ heavy version mix, the numbers could be quite decent. Let's say 6 GWh for Q2, 5 GWh for Model 3. Average battery down to 70 kWh makes for 71k Model 3s already. Let's say 65k in the end produced. 20k S/X then only an overal inventory/in-transit reduction of 5k is needed. Which seems doable after end Q1 count.

The infamous "make 500,0000 cars in 2019" number Elonism looks to be much harder to realize as it can't lean on botched delivery scheduling in the period preceding it. Nearly 10,000 over a week is what this would mean after 24 bit decoding. And we've not seen them get much past 2k for S+X, right? Might the partial Q1 shut down have also have helped maximum throughput? I want to believe it, but don't expect it.

 

[Pras]

It felt so bad today. Today’s stock movement felt like someone attacked me, I felt pushed, I am bruised, and I am full of anger and revenge.

Just a terrible feeling. On top I imagine all the TSLAQs must be celebrating today for have brought down the hope we had in TSLA. Feels like the stupid Uber ( who has no great impact on humanity is valued twice as Tesla) or Ford who sell gas guzzling vehicles are winning and Tesla keep getting pushed.

I know Tesla will strike back but that is for future. Today felt like *sugar*!!

 

[Causalien]

he doesn’t really have magic 8 ball

Some impostor pretending to be me?

 

[Zhelko Dimic]

It just asserts further how unreasonable (and selfish) Musk is.
What does it (truly) cost him to yield "yeah, I'll have every tweet Tesla related reviewed"?
We're all prisoners of his ego.

But then, I knew that, so I don't really have right to complain.

Oh, look, they settled and Musk clearly won.
It's not that every Tesla tweet has to be reviewed.
No, he can still tweet freely about employees morale, and... Must be some other stuff too...

But to wrap up, this was a grown up thing of Musk to do.

@Fact Checking, nice answer earlier. I would think answering my personal message from Wed (to hash out our differences) would've been better form, but, of course, where is the glory in that?

 

[TradingInvest]

Also, the agreement doesn’t say that each individual instance requires preapproval. Elon can just ask his lawyer to pre-approve everything and then if he gets in trouble again, he can just say his lawyer preapproved it. Cause screw the SEC in this case

I hope Elon focus on important work, forget about screwing SEC. Every tweet automatically goes through realtime check so his brain is not burdened by that stupid bullet list.

Tesla, SpaceX, Boring, Neuralink... there are a lot of stuff need to be done quickly.

 

[GaryW]

Lightly edited Thomas Paine:

THESE are the times that try people’s souls. The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of their planet; but they that stand by it now, deserve the love and thanks of man and woman.

I ask you to remember why we are in this fight. Have a great weekend.

 

[HG Wells]

It felt so bad today. Today’s stock movement felt like someone attacked me, I felt pushed, I am bruised, and I am full of anger and revenge.

Just a terrible feeling. On top I imagine all the TSLAQs must be celebrating today for have brought down the hope we had in TSLA. Feels like the stupid Uber ( who has no great impact on humanity is valued twice as Tesla) or Ford who sell gas guzzling vehicles are winning and Tesla keep getting pushed.

I know Tesla will strike back but that is for future. Today felt like *sugar*!!

Just short a few shares of Ford. It will make you feel much better.

Personally I prefer shorting Lyft.

 

[Cloxxki]

Softbank bought into GM's Cruise Automation at a valuation of 14.6B. All of Tesla is valued at only 42B. How does this make any sense

What should profitable car markers with stellar reputation be valued at if Tesla gets 2x annual revenue rarely posting profits?
"But, but, startup, production limited!". Sort of, yes. But let's first see them equal 18Q4, then think of growth again.