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

[lklundin]

First, congrats!
Second, can you PM me the details on the Anhaengerkupplung (I assume that's what you are referring to?) - thanks!

Thanks.

There really was not much more information regarding the tow bar (Anhängerkupplung), except that I pressed for and got confirmation that the modification would go in the vehicle's registration papers (KFZ-Schein). The Tesla person reasonable assumed that a cutout would have to be made in the rear fender, but could not say if it would be made from behind or from below (like it was on my Audi), so he clearly had not seen specs on the tow bar. He did say it would be an easy modification to do.

 

[dc_h]

There was talk about Fremont potentially having a 10k/week capacity if they spent money on it:
Tesla, TSLA & the Investment World: the 2019 Investors' Roundtable
Has this changed? Would it cost too much right now?

Until Shanghai online I doubt any other big investments will be made. As soon as Shanghai is making 3000 a week, a lot of investment to get Y will happen fast and to get past 50GW production of cells in sparks.

 

[bdy0627]

Can u post your thoughts on the recent share price drop compared to other drops and provide some perspective as you have done so in the past in terms of %s

If we use the last local high of $296 on 4/3 then we are down 22% from there with the low of $231 hit on Friday. Historically, this has been a very rewarding place to add. Our last 2 climbs from the previous couple of dips before this one were modest by historical standards at around 16%. Those actually set new historical lows for climbs from dips of about 21%. We are due for a much larger climb.

The smallest climb historically after a drop of at least 22% is actually about 19%, and usually it is much greater. The longest it has taken historically to climb at least 19% from a dip of 22% or greater is 29 trading days from the bottom. We don't know where the bottom is yet. On average, for the dips that went deeper than 22%, it took about 5 trading days to the bottom, but as little as 1 day and as much as 15 days on the early 2016 dip that went all the way to -42%. If we use that historically worst case scenario, then it has taken as much as 44 trading days from where we are now to climb 19%. If we go lower, the climb should be quite a bit higher from the bottom, percentage-wise.

Here's a chart of the major dips and climbs since the high of $379 on 12/7/18. Note that none of the last 3 climbs even reached 20%. That hasn't happed before, at least tracking back to 2014. Historically, we have not had 4 consecutive climbs where 1 of them did not climb at least 50%. A climb of at least 50% from this level puts us up above $340. We have been setting some records that we don't want lately with the smaller climbs than we have seen historically from dips of about 21%. Let's hope we don't set a new one with the next climb once we find a bottom on this dip. If it follows the historical pattern, I think longs will be pretty pleased with adding or at least holding here.

 

[Freder Reeve]

OT: Audi e Troj is featured quite prominently in the new avengers movie. They even fake engine noise, it’s disgusting

pleasantly surprised to see Uma Thurman driving a model X in the new Netflix series "Chambers"

 

[mongo]

Until Shanghai online I doubt any other big investments will be made. As soon as Shanghai is making 3000 a week, a lot of investment to get Y will happen fast and to get past 50GW production of cells in sparks.

They already ordered the other Y equipment, I'd expect the required cell/ pack equipment is also in process. Tesla, Inc. (TSLA) Q1 2019 Earnings Call Transcript -- The Motley Fool

One other comment I made -- I'll make in case, since somebody asked this explicitly. For Model Y production, we are right now trying to decide whether Model Y vehicle production should be in California or Nevada. And we expect to make a final decision on that very soon. But in the meantime, we've ordered all of the tooling and equipment required for Model Y. So, we do not expect this to in anyway delay production of Model Y.

 

[UrsS]

Something to think about:
At hacking competition, team exposes Tesla bug - Reuters TV
The most important info I took away was that they were not able to hack into Tesla's self driving system (yet).

 

[Pras]

They already ordered the other Y equipment, I'd expect the required cell/ pack equipment is also in process. Tesla, Inc. (TSLA) Q1 2019 Earnings Call Transcript -- The Motley Fool

I expect most tooling will be about body frame, welding, glass, and seat frames (3rd row will be late anyway). Battery and motors can be same, and perhaps suspension will be different. If they indeed want to build in Fremont, they can build it much faster.

 

[Dan Detweiler]

Just wanted to inform everyone that my TMC profile now sports a referral code, due to this Model 3 order placed today:
LR AWD, in blue w. FSD.
I placed the order in the Munich Tesla store, where I was promised that Tesla will at a later stage offer to upgrade my car with a tow bar.
Delivery was promised to be in June.

Coincidentally, my local news paper writes today that on June 30 the local VW dealer will close due to poor sales and poor resale value of leased cars. In the neighboring town the Audi dealer closed last year.

That is my car exactly! You're going to love it!

Dan

 

[Zhelko Dimic]

So any old timer still in TSLA? How many did we lose on this round?

I've tapped my HLOC line for leverage couple of times in the past with good success, though it was hairy couple times.
I'm not tempted at all this time around.
I've actually sold few percents in the low 250s. Immaterial, just makes me feel better.

And that small tranche I did to sell 350 TSLA for 76 AMZN, and I was tempted to reconvert, and you commented was smart to leave it be? Great call, thanks; nowadays if I were to do the same, I could have bought only 42 AMZN shares instead of 76...
My 9% of non-TSLA (AMZN, FB, TCX, DIS) turned into 15% at the Friday's closing prices.

 

[Zero CO2]

Let's assume for the sake of discussion that Waymo and Cruise are approved first for some form of self driving (probably in a few cities). Optimistically let's assume they have a few tens of thousands of robotaxis on the road.

Then let's assume that six months later, the "laggard" Tesla flips a switch and has 500,000-1,000,000 Model 3s on the road that can be used as robotaxis on the Tesla Network, and is producing another 500,000-1,000,000 FSD enabled cars per year (mostly 3/Y). Those robotaxis last 1 million miles, and cost $50,000+ less per car to manufacture than the Waymo/Cruise-mobiles with expensive computers and LIDAR.

Who wins then?

This is a topic i would really like to understand better ... Telsa has been collecting machine learning data since = 2015?(i don't know)
They are growing their fleet at X % per year, hence learning from larger population on real cars driven by all types of drivers all around the globe... All integrated with Tesla HW seems to me they have the big data to blow these other guys away in a couple years(Waymo, Uber, Lyft, and whatever other overvalued competitors there are) ...In addition they are building an ASIC specifically design for FSD ....please tell what i am missing ... the advantage seems huge

I don't know who the real competition is here ... think Apple /Google in smart phones ... the incumbents were destroyed ... i think legacy automakers will share the same fate as Nokia, Motorola, Blackberry ... who will be the Google equivalent in this race ... it might be Google or Apple....

 

[TheMrX]

Thanks.

There really was not much more information regarding the tow bar (Anhängerkupplung), except that I pressed for and got confirmation that the modification would go in the vehicle's registration papers (KFZ-Schein). The Tesla person reasonable assumed that a cutout would have to be made in the rear fender, but could not say if it would be made from behind or from below (like it was on my Audi), so he clearly had not seen specs on the tow bar. He did say it would be an easy modification to do.

Wait what? Is this going to be an official Tesla tow bar?

 

[Artful Dodger]

Should I be diverting more cells to storage or was LR a greater % of vehicles produced?

In Q1 there were only 500 SR+ produced, those all after Feb 28. It's also not cear that ANY GF1 cell lines are dedicated to TE. Reports are conflicting. Elon said all GF1 lines were changed over to auto cell production, and that they are scrounging cells from other manufacturers for TE products. Carsonight has variously said 1 or 2 lines dedicated to TE, but we know at least some of his information is stale. Finally, the 24GWh/yr run rate was for Q1, but recent info indicates bottlenecks have been solved. So overall, not at all clear what current production is. Reality is, Tesla needs to keep production close to its vest because ALL information is spun for the worse regardless of its content.

 

[EVMeister]

Something to think about:
At hacking competition, team exposes Tesla bug - Reuters TV
The most important info I took away was that they were not able to hack into Tesla's self driving system (yet).

Did you watch the autonomy day presentation? The FSD system has various safeguards in place to prevent hacking. From what I remember, this included that instructions are only executed if they're signed and encrypted by Tesla. And that both of the "brains" (or both chips) agree to carry out a process. Nobody should ever call anything unhackable, of course. And I'm sure some very capable hackers will be trying to crack that nut when it's time. Hopefully in a Tesla-approved and rewarded way of course.

 

[T@oo]

Just wanted to inform everyone that my TMC profile now sports a referral code, due to this Model 3 order placed today:
LR AWD, in blue w. FSD.
I placed the order in the Munich Tesla store, where I was promised that Tesla will at a later stage offer to upgrade my car with a tow bar.
Delivery was promised to be in June.

Coincidentally, my local news paper writes today that on June 30 the local VW dealer will close due to poor sales and poor resale value of leased cars. In the neighboring town the Audi dealer closed last year.

Plan to place my order next month and now I have a referal code to use. Thanks! But one thing, if you win a roadster, you owe me a beer or two in a Munich Biergarten.

And great news about the tow hitch! Again, one great missed oportunity for Tesla on the demand site. Why not communicate this option openly so people know they can retrofit a tow hitch? SMH.

 

[T@oo]

He should reply, but I will clarify.
He referred to his town, which appears to be very near Munich because he bought his Tesla there. Munich may be a bit BMW-centric, but there are copious VW and Audi there and the larger dealers are surviving. All across Germany smaller dealers located very near larger ones are having a very hard time. For that matter even BMW and Mercedes Benz dealers who've depended on suburban higher-end models to make up for lower margin cheaper ones are also suffering. Some of the shift is a consequence of corporate purchases, that tend to concentrate disproportionately to larger dealers.

While I have some knowledge of this because of professional connections with German auto distribution I am by no means an expert. Thus, I welcome correction if necessary.

By their own admission both BMW and Daimler-Benz are very concerned about the encroaching Tesla threat. Only VAG has gone so far as to propose regulatory changes to hamper Tesla growth in Germany. Fairly clearly, there is some nervousness about PSA because their effectiveness in rehabilitating Opel seems to be emerging as a low priced competitor. Domestically in Germany there are some headwinds politically with VW due to success of Skoda and Seat at the expense of German-produced VW.

These are very interesting times for Germany. Further pressure comes because Italy, Switzerland and France are all playing with the Silk Road Initiative, while German auto industry and tech industry is suffering with China sales.

All these things are probably net positives for TSLA, but seriously professional FUD is surely coming with that success.

People who know more than I should weigh in, because germany is crucial for Tesla growth. Is locating GF-4 in Germany a good idea? Personally I think they'd be wise to produce in Germany with major components sourced from other EU countries (e.g. Chechia, Slovakia, Poland, Spain)

Confirmed.

 

[Causalien]

I've tapped my HLOC line for leverage couple of times in the past with good success, though it was hairy couple times.
I'm not tempted at all this time around.
I've actually sold few percents in the low 250s. Immaterial, just makes me feel better.

And that small tranche I did to sell 350 TSLA for 76 AMZN, and I was tempted to reconvert, and you commented was smart to leave it be? Great call, thanks; nowadays if I were to do the same, I could have bought only 42 AMZN shares instead of 76...
My 9% of non-TSLA (AMZN, FB, TCX, DIS) turned into 15% at the Friday's closing prices.

What can I say. I am the oracle who is 100% right 50% of the time.

 

[anthonyj]

Market isn't pricing in any future products. Tesla simply doesn't have the capital to produce Semi, Y, Pickup, Roadster with comfort. And that's okay. A capital raise will allow those future products to be priced into the SP, until then, more pain.

 

[EVMeister]

Market isn't pricing in any future products. Tesla simply doesn't have the capital to produce Semi, Y, Pickup, Roadster with comfort. And that's okay. A capital raise will allow those future products to be priced into the SP, until then, more pain.

I agree that Tesla will raise capital at some point in the not too distant future. I'm not sure how or when, but I think it would help with the market's assessment of the company. Do you see them doing this in the near future, or later in the year?

 

[JohnDinger]

Market isn't pricing in any future products. Tesla simply doesn't have the capital to produce Semi, Y, Pickup, Roadster with comfort. And that's okay. A capital raise will allow those future products to be priced into the SP, until then, more pain.

Musk has been promising a profitable Model 3 for years.

As recent as January this year, he said that Tesla would be profitable and cash flow positive every quarter going forward... And yet Q1 was a disaster, and Tesla is forecasting a loss for Q2 despite record deliveries.

I don't think the market is going to put any financial consideration behind future products until they see the Model 3 profits that were promised.

 

[anthonyj]

I agree that Tesla will raise capital at some point in the not too distant future. I'm not sure how or when, but I think it would help with the market's assessment of the company. Do you see them doing this in the near future, or later in the year?

This is me just guessing, but very soon. I track ARK Invest's TSLA purchases and I've never seen them make such large bulk buys of TSLA like they have this week. I am pretty sure they are close to their limit of how much TSLA they can buy, so they seem confident that it is bottoming out. Cathie and her team met with Elon in February and last Monday, and I think they know something that we don't.