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

[Aieukl378]

But we ALL know Elon will not comply and will continue to push SECs buttons regarding his stupid Twitter usage. This is another reason institutional investors are bailing(they know there will be more SEC/Twitter drama ahead.) God it's just so f...ing ridiculous.

Just gonna say I got tons of disagrees when I said TSLA would hit the 240s soon when we were still near 300. We gotta wake up people.

 

[Aieukl378]

He will comply just as he has been since the original agreement. He will push buttons, but that’s not the same as non-compliance.

Yes but institutional investors don't want a CEO who is ****ing with the SEC! And what's troubling is nobody at the executive level seems to understand that.

 

[EVDRVN]

Musk alluded to this, that they would be providing data to the insurance provider as part of the deal. I don't think I would be interested in such insurance for the same reason I don't install one of the monitoring devices that are out there now. One of the biggest joys of owning a Tesla is the launch which would instantly flag you based on the acceleration limit these devices use for a threshold of an unsafe event.

So it's great for old school hyper milers. I't a catch 22, people that buy the cars for the performance and use it safely will be penalized and likely drop out. I see this as more of a long term ploy to adopt very safe drivers and insure autonomy down the road while tightly managing the risk.

 

[EVNow]

I disagree: There are both risks and upsides.

I think that the big question is for Institutional Investors: "Can you invest in the company knowing that the CEO is luring Millennials and Gen Z customers like a magnet with his communication style and an extremely fast paced decision making process? Negatives: Bad image with conservative investors/customers and more errors than your average enterprise. Positives: Future generations love spontaneity and being valued; quick error making drives companies to quick-error fixing if you they have right people and attitude." -> Their call.

The fact is 99% of EM's tweets are fine. Its just that 1% that needs to be caught. There are easy technical solutions to this - without having to assume there are only 2 options - tweet or no tweet at all. This can keep all the upside and greatly reduce the downside.

 

[EVNow]

Yes but institutional investors don't want a CEO who is ****ing with the SEC! And what's troubling is nobody at the executive level seems to understand that.

Yes, that privilege is reserved for Wall St bankers and hedge fund managers. So looking forward to a president who is not in the pocket of Wall St.

 

[Aieukl378]

I’m all for Elon having a free hand on Twitter but I agree with you that he needs to be monitored in some fashion. If something he says affects the stock, it gets doubly amplified by the media. And the media only reports the negative.

He won't stand for monitoring(this has been proven) nor will he refrain from tweeting inappropriately. He is the face of TESLA. He just retweeted a porn site for chrissakes.

 

[Krugerrand]

Well since we are in the weekend and of topic....when it comes to the written word...I aint so good.
I believe I think well and speak well. But translating that into easy to read text is...um ...a challenge.

My spelling is as a third grader....I am pretty sure I flunked grammar. It does not help that the English language is a mess...I usually post from my phone...and am in a hurry.

All this to say I am sure some of my post's look like they were written buy Krugerrand's cat.

That sounded like you just dissed my cat...

 

[Aieukl378]

The fact is 99% of EM's tweets are fine. Its just that 1% that needs to be caught. There are easy technical solutions to this - without having to assume there are only 2 options - tweet or no tweet at all. This can keep all the upside and greatly reduce the downside.

He does not want those 1% to get caught...therein lies the problem.

 

[Right_Said_Fred]

Disagreers are either delusional or don't hold as much TSLA as I do

Yes, those who disagree also hold TSLA. Buy maybe not as much as you, which would explain why you are lashing out so much. It feels as if you are only thinking with your wallet.

You fail to understand that Tesla = Elon, with all his good sides and all his bad sides. You don’t get to choose which sides he can have and which not. You get the complete package.

Without his good sides Tesla would no longer be around and your shares would be worth nothing.

 

[Aieukl378]

Yes, those who disagree also hold TSLA. Buy maybe not as much as you, which would explain why you are lashing out so much. It feels as if you are only thinking with your wallet.

You fail to understand that Tesla = Elon, with all his good sides and all bad sides. You don’t get to choose which sides he can have and which not. You get the complete package.

Without his good sides Tesla would no longer be around and your shares would be worth nothing.

Jeez I'm lashing out because of the self inflicted damage we've all witnessed since the 420 tweet. Of course I'm thinking with my wallet...I mean this is the inventing forum.

And really the only "bad side" is so frustratingly easy to fix vs. the hyper complicated other amazing stuff he does. It just sucks that the few moments a day he gives to a certain social network totally undermines everything else...and he doesn't(nor apparently anyone else on the board) see this.

 

[EVDRVN]

Yes but institutional investors don't want a CEO who is ****ing with the SEC! And what's troubling is nobody at the executive level seems to understand that.

It's one thing to be a cowboy and another to be an immature one that does not learn, I think this frightens many investors and buyers as well. I have enough millennial neighbors to babysit and Tesla clearly needs adult leadership. I know some of the people in the social circles and they are not the most mature folks unfortunately, they just think everything is great and he's just "that way". Even perceptual maturity with any consistency would go a very long way with the public. The CS and support IQ seems to be dropping and my guess is the good ones get tired of the lack of leadership. Very easy changes in the Tesla organization could reap huge rewards. Some of Tesla reminds me of Aptera's change of guard.

 

[Krugerrand]

Yes but institutional investors don't want a CEO who is ****ing with the SEC! And what's troubling is nobody at the executive level seems to understand that.

Time for institutional investors to change with the times. Or we just wait for them to retire.

This archaic thought process that things need to be done the way they’ve always been done is, well - archaic.

 

[Aieukl378]

It's one thing to be a cowboy and another to be an immature one that does not learn, I think this frightens many investors and buyers as well. I have enough millennial neighbors to babysit and Tesla clearly needs adult leadership. I know some of the people in the social circles and they are not the most mature folks unfortunately, they just think everything is great and he's just "that way". Even perceptual maturity with any consistency would go a very long way with the public. The CS and support IQ seems to be dropping and my guess is the good ones get tired of the lack of leadership. Very easy changes in the Tesla organization could reap huge rewards. Some of Tesla reminds me of Aptera's change of guard.

Well said. I mean how would you feel killing yourself as an employee at Tesla, having your stock compensation fall and here's your boss making rap videos, having a pissing match with SEC etc. etc. Then asking for more...and more

 

[Aieukl378]

Time for institutional investors to change with the times. Or we just wait for them to retire.

This archaic thought process that things need to be done the way they’ve always been done is, well - archaic.

For serious?

 

[guidooo]

I get it...it's funny for teens(which I think make up 25 million of his 26 million followers) who see their idol sort of acting like them, rebeling against authority(SEC), stupid memes etc. but damn, is that really important in the grand scheme of things?

Apparently it is.

Isn't it more destructive than constructive?

Probably also depends on what a person really wishes to construct. With Elon being Elon, that's probably also bit difficult to value.

Isn't luring institutional investors back to TSLA more important?

To me it isn't, unless survivability of Tesla is at stake. There can be more reasons to invest then immediate monetary gain,

 

[EVDRVN]

And really the only "bad side" is so frustratingly easy to fix vs. the hyper complicated other amazing stuff he does. It just sucks that the few moments a day he gives to a certain social network totally undermines everything else...and he doesn't(nor apparently anyone else on the board) see this.

You beat me to it, I see it in their company all the time and it's like it's woven into their management culture. It's uncanny and trickles from the top down. Not a Tesla exclusive, many companies have this issue. I think the issue is that manny companies in the valley are poorly managed and many people have not worked for companies with good vertical leadership.

 

[bhtooefr]

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

Personally I prefer shorting Lyft.

...my Ford options position is looking awful right now.

To be honest, the thesis that I used to buy Ford puts is less true now, with the VW and Rivian deals... I'll be looking for an exit on that one.

You can install a charger in the garage. You can literally force your landlord to let you -- it's California law. Consider talking to them about it.

Although, AFAIK, your landlord can require hiring an electrical engineer to design the installation, as well as require you to carry a $1M umbrella policy over the installation.

The decision on where to build the Model Y may be made in a couple weeks. We are well aware of the labor situation affecting Panasonic right now, but there are other factors which may influence the site selection. So here's some insight into how water rights/availability in the GF1/Reno area may affect that decsion, written by a long-time Carson City, NV resident and GF1 "outsider" 'carsonight':

...how many trucks would Tesla have coming into and out of GF1? Could Tesla design some sort of hybrid water/car carrier truck, to make the trucks useful in both directions?

Alternately, is there space to do something with GF2 instead? Water rights wouldn't be an issue at all, there, and they need to get employment up in the area anyway...

 

[AcesDealt]

When Tesla says the model 3 was ~20% gross margin, are they allocating GHG to the model 3 revenue before this calculation?

 

[AlMc]

Bailee Gifford had a standing offer to fund additional capital if Musk needs it. He will have to re-confirm if the offer still stands. Them and Ron Baron are my preferred institutional investors. Note that SP is pretty close to the avg price that Baron funds bought at ~ $230. They were the Johnny come lately and may have an appetite to load up further

Tesla backer ready to put more money behind Musk : teslamotors

A lot has happened over the last 6 months. It would be nice if BG reconfirmed their willingness to fund additional capital today.

 

[bzbee]

So if we are talking about 10+ years long term outlook: income will only be as high if Tesla's solution is going to become a de-facto monopoly, and they can price their taxi services to around the pricing of human driven taxi services.

Otherwise if there's competition then robotaxis will set the price of taxi services to below that of human taxi services, human taxi services will gradually die out and robotaxi services will conduct a usual race to the bottom, prices somewhere around the price of expected capital returns.

I.e. the very long run lower price target for a $50k capital investment will be ~5% of the capital, $2.5k/year, or $25k over 10 years.

But in the initial phase they will track taxi services pricing, and will generate 10x higher returns - especially if Tesla becomes the dominant leader in the segment, which they have every chance to achieve.

Regarding Autonomy... I would like to suggest two lectures I found to be very informative. Both are By Shasua (MobileEye CTO) and were presented at MIT’s Center for Brains, Minds and Machines (CBMM).

The 1st lecture is a little old (2017), but provides a great no-nonsense overview (imho) of Autonomous Driving.

The 2nd one is a month old (March 19, 2019) and in my opinion promoted Musk to Do the Autonomy event.
In the recent talk Shashua reviews MobileEye's implementation of Level 4 Autonomous Driving, the logic behind the implementation, and presents examples from current testing phase of level 4 in urban environment.

Apparently VW and MobileEye have a contract to deploy Autonomous EV Ride-Hailing Service in Israel 2022, starting in Tel-Aviv
Volkswagen, Mobileye and Champion Motors to Invest in Israel and Deploy First Autonomous EV Ride-Hailing Service


* CBMM site includes transcripts

1. Great no-nonsense (imho) overview of Autonomous Driving
(link is to CBMM... timed links are youtube) "The Convergence of Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence Towards Enabling Autonomous Driving"

** Introduction by host:

** Beginning of talk
3 pillars of Autonomous Driving: (1) Sensing (2) Mapping (3) Driving Policy

** Lidar (+HD Map) vs. Camera (or Map-Heavy vs Map-Light)

** Driving Policy
(interesting to see how their view evolved... when reviewing the more recent talk)

https://youtu.be/b_lBL2yhU5A?t=1990

** Summary, QA

​

2. Current state of 'Map-Light Autonomy' at MobileEye
(link is to CBMM...) SUCCESSES AND CHALLENGES IN MODERN ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE

** Beginning of talk

** Machine Learning, Deep Learning, Statistical Learning (nice over view)

Successes and challenges in modern artificial intelligence


** Solving the Driving Policy Challenge... How to Guaranty Safety
How to define danger, Responsibility-Sensitive Safety (Regulatory model)
Worst case Analysis,

Successes and challenges in modern artificial intelligence


** Short comment on Joint Venture with VW to commercialize robot-taxis to go live in 2022 (in Tel-Aviv, Israel)

Successes and challenges in modern artificial intelligence


** The Driving Policy Model
Removing the decision out side of the statistical ML domain(!), Perception Challenge(!), Examples

Successes and challenges in modern artificial intelligence


(End of Autonomy talk... talking about Wearable AI:

Successes and challenges in modern artificial intelligence)


** QA(!)

Successes and challenges in modern artificial intelligence
​

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My take-

Disclaimer first:
1. Don't have education or professional experience with Auto, AI or Investment industries.
2. Have a long position in TSLA, although relatively new in the game.

A. It appears that LIDAR(+HD Map) vs Cameras System is a media hype. Both solution are feasible today, Industry leaders recognize both, and there are working examples for both systems (Waymo/Cadillac vs MobileEye/Tesla). Industry players will probably choose their preferred stacks without consulting CNBC analysts.

B. In my opinion Tesla might be a little behind MobileEye. However I believe they can catchup, and still are well positioned to win a substantial piece of the automotive and/or autonomy pie (not talking about the potential of Tesla's other businesses):
Tesla are the only car manufacturer that have their own Autonomy solution. While MobileEye provides it's service to the whole automotive industry. In worst case scenario, Tesla can use MobileEye's solution... Tesla has a huge lead in electrical vehicles, and a growing business while other combatants have a declining business and still didn't figured out electrical cars.
In regards to Waymo, it is my belief that Tesla positioned better, but google cash and support cannot be taken lightly.

Would like to hear other members take on this... Also noticed that there are several member that have formal education/ experience in Autonomy field... @hershey101 @MarcusMaximus @heltok

In any case, hope this information is useful.