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

[Pezpunk]

Everyone including the most deluded TSLAQ cult member expects Q2 deliveries to be much better than Q1 deliveries, so what we are seeing is attempts at "preemptive positive news nullification."

For the entirety of the last quarter they were running the gloom-and-doom thesis non-stop: that the Q1 drop is permanent, that Tesla is over, no growth whatsoever, that nobody wants to buy America's most satisfying car anymore now that it's even more affordable and is available to a 3x larger sedan market globally.

Now that Q2 delivery numbers are very likely going to falsify that false narrative rather forcefully, they are going to pivot to one of these:

• "Tesla might be delivering a lot of cars, but there's no profit in it!"
  
• "Q3'18, Q4'19 and Q2'19 were as good of a quarter as it gets, they are all outliers!"
• "Tesla is structurally unprofitable, they are never going to have three profitable quarters in a row!"

In other words, Tesla shorts and bears are going to do what they've been doing for the last 10 years:

Eventually investors might see through these self-serving lies, until then it's going to be ... volatile.

I wonder if they ever look back in awe at how far they've come. It wasn't so long ago they were declaring the Model X completely unbuildable, and now they're all the way up to "sure, they can deliver half a million cars a year, but..." excuses. Can't wait to see what they come up with next. Perhaps by 2025, we'll be hearing "sure Tesla is making a killing profit-wise and dominating the worldwide electric car market, but just look at the Tesla Killers the mainstream manufacturers have coming as soon as they emerge from bankruptcy!"

 

[MarcusMaximus]

What’s with all the Sunday Tesla articles telling us that delivery numbers are unimportant for reasons ranging from profit matters to Tesla should be more like BMW? It’s like they want everyone to ignore the numbers Tesla is about to post. I have no idea why they’d want that. Odd journalism

It doesn't matter whether Tesla delivers 90,000 cars or 900,000 in the 2nd quarter — what's more important is whether Tesla goes mass-market or stays luxury

“Before you conclude that I'm about to insist that BMW is in trouble, don't. BMW isn't in trouble. But BMW serves as a useful guide to what kind of car maker Tesla should be.” Lol

They realized the demand angle isn’t going to work anymore next week, so they’re shifting the narrative. Interesting how the articles showing up in the presumably unbiased press seem awfully similar to marketing campaigns.

 

[Singuy]

What’s with all the Sunday Tesla articles telling us that delivery numbers are unimportant for reasons ranging from profit matters to Tesla should be more like BMW? It’s like they want everyone to ignore the numbers Tesla is about to post. I have no idea why they’d want that. Odd journalism

It doesn't matter whether Tesla delivers 90,000 cars or 900,000 in the 2nd quarter — what's more important is whether Tesla goes mass-market or stays luxury

“Before you conclude that I'm about to insist that BMW is in trouble, don't. BMW isn't in trouble. But BMW serves as a useful guide to what kind of car maker Tesla should be.” Lol

That is the dumbest headline ever. The definition of mass market is delivering 900k cars a quarter. These people really got a perfect score on the English portion of the SAT and graduated from top colleges? I know a journalist can't land a job with them just having mediocre credentials..since there are so many journalist who struggle to even find jobs.

It's the same logic as "It doesn't matter if you get an A or a F, it only matters if you get good grades or not".

 

[MarcusMaximus]

That is the dumbest headline ever. The definition of mass market is delivering 900k cars a quarter. These people really got a perfect score on the English portion of the SAT and graduated from top colleges? I know a journalist can't land a job with them just having mediocre credentials..since there are so many journalist who struggle to even find jobs.

It's the same logic as "It doesn't matter if you get an A or a F, it only matters if you get good grades or not".

It would actually seem more impressive if they sold that many while staying a luxury brand. If they can sell 900k cars while maintaining high ASP, they’ve just invented a whole new enormously profitable market.

 

[pyromatter]

 

[Mader Levap]

What’s with all the Sunday Tesla articles telling us that delivery numbers are unimportant

That's sign that delivery numbers will be good.

 

[PeterJA]

[Business Insider's Matt DeBord:] “Before you conclude that I'm about to insist that BMW is in trouble, don't. BMW isn't in trouble. But BMW serves as a useful guide to what kind of car maker Tesla should be.” Lol

Max Planck said (paraphrasing): Science advances one funeral at a time.

It seems Big Auto advances one prison sentence at a time.

VW is the only automajor that has woken up to the threat from Tesla, maybe because their top management went to prison over Dieselgate and were replaced by new blood.

BMW has not woken up. BMW is doomed. Tesla is already eating BMW's lunch, and will crush them within five years, says my crystal ball.

https://www.carsales.com.au/editorial/details/nobody-wants-evs-says-bmw-119190/

 

[wipster]

Except the Netherlands did a crazy record and both Norway and Spain were down more than 8% from Q1. So the question is, whether the Dutch numbers are the outlier or Norway and Spain are.

But unless there are a number of new Tesla's sitting around in inventory, isn't the sales, delivery, and registration a function of the number of cars delivered to the country, specifically model 3's? So the more sent, the more sold right?

 

[Chocochip]

What’s with all the Sunday Tesla articles telling us that delivery numbers are unimportant for reasons ranging from profit matters to Tesla should be more like BMW? It’s like they want everyone to ignore the numbers Tesla is about to post. I have no idea why they’d want that. Odd journalism

It doesn't matter whether Tesla delivers 90,000 cars or 900,000 in the 2nd quarter — what's more important is whether Tesla goes mass-market or stays luxury

“Before you conclude that I'm about to insist that BMW is in trouble, don't. BMW isn't in trouble. But BMW serves as a useful guide to what kind of car maker Tesla should be.” Lol

This was an opinion piece, written by Matt DeBord who has historically been fairly supportive of Tesla.

Everyone including the most deluded TSLAQ cult member expects Q2 deliveries to be much better than Q1 deliveries, so what we are seeing is attempts at "preemptive positive news nullification."

I believe the author is simply confused about what Tesla’s goal is, rather than trying to move the goalposts. He seems to analyse the company from the perspective of an ordinary automaker with the unique goal of maximising profits, and he seems convinced that Tesla should position itself as a high-margin, luxury car maker, an alternative BMW. Because he seems to think Tesla will not increase production capacity much from where they are now.

Of course, Tesla is all about growing the EV market share and increasing awareness, even at the expense of little or no profit for the foreseeable future, and of course they plan to quadruple their production capacity in the next 4-5 years.

I will give Matt DeBord the benefit of the doubt and assume he is just clueless, on this particular occasion.

 

[RFernatt]

That's sign that delivery numbers will be good.

 

[mrdoubleb]

But unless there are a number of new Tesla's sitting around in inventory, isn't the sales, delivery, and registration a function of the number of cars delivered to the country, specifically model 3's? So the more sent, the more sold right?

This quarter Tesla sent 2 ships less to Europe than in Q1, so that's ~7k less cars to sell. They also had about 4k cars which werenledtbiver from Q1 and delivered in April. So in theory they had 3k cars less to sell. Unless they somehow managed to put more cars on the ships than the ~3.6k average of Q1.

 

[MP3Mike]

This quarter Tesla sent 2 ships less to Europe than in Q1, so that's ~7k less cars to sell.

You're making the assumption that they always put the same number of cars on every ship. (And that every ship has the same capacity.) Where for Q2 Tesla specifically said that they were now filling the ships. Which means they were putting fewer cars on the ships in Q1.

 

[geneclean55]

This quarter Tesla sent 2 ships less to Europe than in Q1, so that's ~7k less cars to sell. They also had about 4k cars which werenledtbiver from Q1 and delivered in April. So in theory they had 3k cars less to sell. Unless they somehow managed to put more cars on the ships than the ~3.6k average of Q1.

How many non-RORO ships were sent to Europe containing S/X destined for Tilburg assembly?

 

[Artful Dodger]

This was an opinion piece, written by Matt DeBord who has historically been fairly supportive of Tesla.
[snip]
I will give Matt DeBord the benefit of the doubt and assume he is just clueless, on this particular occasion.

Lol! Have you read his twitter feed? He's TSLAQ-pwnd. But you got the clueless right.

Matthew DeBord‏ @mattdebord Apr 15

Spent a bit of time mixed in with the #TSLA #TSLAQ thing this weekend. This is all you need to know: Both sides are wrong. This entire debate needs to be reset around what TSLA actually is as a business.

19 replies 0 retweets 5 likes​

So, upon10 weeks of reflection. Matt has concluded that BMW is fine, and Tesla is doing it wrong? And it doesn't matter what their production report is, 'cuz they're wrong?

Give me a break. This is a profit-motivated opinion piece, timed to affect the Market by pre-conditioning reaction to the production report. Typical BI tripe.

'This is all you need to know.'

 

[Tslynk67]

Some partially Tesla related info. Some of the local facebook groups have accounts of what we found out when we put down our deposit on an Eplus Leaf SL last month. All the allotted 2019 Eplus Leafs have been sold or assigned in this province. Now anybody wanting one is being told 10 months as even most of the 2020’s allotted to the province have been pre-sold. (We have to wait till Feb for ours). The Kona customers are getting similar responses but shorter waits and there are still a few on Vancouver lots. But the Tesla angle is that many in the discussions are just saying screw it and are ordering Tesla’s which they can get in a month to 6 weeks. Tesla is still the only mass manufacturer of EV’s and its starting to show in a big way.

Right now about 8 percent of all new auto sales in B.C. are Electric. Just conjecture on my part but for the rest of the year I bet 90 percent will be Tesla’s. I think within a couple years our poor Leafie will be surrounded by a sea of model 3’s. We’ll be the poor cousins. .

Seriously though. Compared to a year ago there are a BUNCH of model 3’s driving around our little town. Kinda cool. .

Is it just battery supply that's dictating this, or a reluctance to increase the production?

 

[Artful Dodger]

This quarter Tesla sent 2 ships less to Europe than in Q1, so that's ~7k less cars to sell

The first 2 ships in Q1 weren't full, they appear to have only filled the last 2 ships. Loadout in Q2 should be much higher. Tesla could easily have matched total vehicles shipped.

But what matters is deliveries, since that will define the bounds for the Q2 Earning Report. And we see a smaller wave this quarter, more sustained deliveries in early June and less of a final weekend push compared to Q1.

I think Tesla does well learning by experience. I do hope we get SR+ numbers broken out, but if not we can estimate them fairly well.

Cheers!

 

[mrdoubleb]

How many non-RORO ships were sent to Europe containing S/X destined for Tilburg assembly?

It appears they stopped doing that. Or at least we've seen ships from SF Pier 80 carrying both Model 3 and S/X. So I am not sure if they kept the East Coast (Houston?) shipments as well.

 

[JRP3]

This was an opinion piece, written by Matt DeBord who has historically been fairly supportive of Tesla.

As I've pointed out previously DeBord is "uneven" at best.

 

[mrdoubleb]

The first 2 ships in Q1 weren't full, they appear to have only filled the last 2 ships. Loadout in Q2 should be much higher. Tesla could easily have matched total vehicles shipped.

But what matters is deliveries, since that will define the bounds for the Q2 Earning Report. And we see a smaller wave this quarter, more sustained deliveries in early June and less of a final weekend push compared to Q1.

I think Tesla does well learning by experience. I do hope we get SR+ numbers broken out, but if not we can estimate them fairly well.

Cheers!

Not sure if we had solid intel on the second ship in Q1. On the first one we only had ~1500 cars so I calculated the per ship average compensating for that.

They shipped 23+4k in Q1 via 8 ships. First one was 1500 which leaves 25500. 25500/7=3642.

 

[Tslynk67]

What’s with all the Sunday Tesla articles telling us that delivery numbers are unimportant for reasons ranging from profit matters to Tesla should be more like BMW? It’s like they want everyone to ignore the numbers Tesla is about to post. I have no idea why they’d want that. Odd journalism

It doesn't matter whether Tesla delivers 90,000 cars or 900,000 in the 2nd quarter — what's more important is whether Tesla goes mass-market or stays luxury

“Before you conclude that I'm about to insist that BMW is in trouble, don't. BMW isn't in trouble. But BMW serves as a useful guide to what kind of car maker Tesla should be.” Lol

I read that article but failed to see his point.

He saying that Tesla should make more cars, but then states "By the way, no matter where Tesla lands in Q2, numbers-wise, the total should be a big increase over Q2 2018 — Tesla is the only automaker seeing such a massive demand surge in a US market that's been running at peak levels for going on five years".

WTF does this sentence mean? "And in that context, Tesla shouldn't be pushing, pushing, pushing to sell more vehicles each quarter. It should align its US manufacturing capacity — perhaps 400,000 to 500,000 vehicles annually — with demand for cars that it can make a serious profit on."

So he says we shouldn't focus on Tesla delivering more cars per quarter, but focus on Tesla making more cars?

Uh?