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

[lklundin]

Moving to 2170 cell/pack means moving pack production out of Fremont. It means lowering unit costs for the SX and model 3 and creates space for some other activity at Fremont.
How often can you improve margins on your entire product line, and improve performance (charging performance, as well as that track mode ability).

It is only about six months ago that Tesla still needed to ramp up the Model 3 production in order to not run out of cash.

While Straubel and other battery experts were maybe not fully involved in the Model 3 ramp, I think Tesla's window for upgrading the Model S/X production to use a 2170-based pack only opened quite recently.

And with all these other exciting things for Tesla to do, the answer for them is probably: Not very often.

 

[Fact Checking]

They said from the start S would contain all the best technology, yet they went on record to explicitly say it will not be getting 2170 batteries.

The 18,650 cells are actually pretty competitive - for example it's unclear at this point what the Roadster 2020 will be using: 2170 or 18,650 cells?

The 2,170 cells are cheaper to manufacture, due to the larger form factor - but for Tesla's top of the line vehicles that's a secondary factor.

Do we have any comparisons of 2170 vs. 18650 effective energy density? Surprisingly I found very little usable information about this online.

 

[EVNow]

Well, Tesla down 2% for no particular reason. Bounced back from 279, though.

 

[Krugerrand]

GF3 build costs in China may be funded by Chinese loans, but that does not mean there are no GF3 costs incurred in the USA. Much work was done on design prior to breaking soil, all of it in the USA. There will be a GF3 team based in USA working feverishly right now.

Copy and paste? Maybe with a few ‘let’s do this instead’ obvious improvements/efficiencies?

Couldn’t any US team ‘expenses’ also be covered by Cina account?

 

[Fact Checking]

Totally agree. I only did so to point out how someone with a historic negative view on TSLA (75 holds, really?) is able to sway MSM to scream, "See, this expert says sell TSLA!"

Well, it came on a day a bear attack was probable, and there were a number of other negative news as well, such as the S/X reduction in production. It's hard to disambiguate how much of this was due to the RBC downgrade, how much due to the S/X production changes.

Plus yesterday also marked the end of the uptick rule, the first day when short sellers could again be the full anti-investors they usually are.

 

[Krugerrand]

Ellison and Net Promoter Score.

I don't like what Oracle did to RightNow after they bought them...

Seems like Oracle is more self serving and Tesla is more society serving.

The concerns are that Ellison interference will destroy goodwill that Tesla has so heavily invested in.

Let's look for data:

Brand ranking:

https://theharrispoll.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/2018-HARRIS-POLL-RQ_2-Summary-Report_FNL.pdf

Tesla is number 3 and Oracle is not listed. Different customer sets.

On interbrand Oracle is 17 and Tesla is 98.... https://www.interbrand.com/best-brands/best-global-brands/2017/ranking/oracle/

On Linked In Tesla is 5 and Oracle is 9.
LinkedIn's top companies of 2018 include Amazon, Facebook and Tesla

This link is pretty good: Tesla Brand Ranking | All Brand Rankings where Tesla is listed!

Long story short: Oracle can be heavy handed and self serving. That will not play well for a company like Tesla that depends on goodwill. Different customer sets.

Is Ellison going to screw up Tesla's relationship with the public, who is their customer, as Tesla sells direct?

Does nobody get tired of the deja vu? Exact same talk when Murdoch hit the room. OMG!!!

Relax. The sky isn’t falling.

 

[lklundin]

The 18,650 cells are actually pretty competitive - for example it's unclear at this point what the Roadster 2020 will be using: 2170 or 18,650 cells?

The 2,170 cells are cheaper to manufacture, due to the larger form factor - but for Tesla's top of the line vehicles that's a secondary factor.

Do we have any comparisons of 2170 vs. 18650 effective energy density? Surprisingly I found very little usable information about this online.

This assumes the same cell chemistry with only the form factor changing, or no?

 

[Krugerrand]

The 18,650 cells are actually pretty competitive - for example it's unclear at this point what the Roadster 2020 will be using: 2170 or 18,650 cells?

The 2,170 cells are cheaper to manufacture, due to the larger form factor - but for Tesla's top of the line vehicles that's a secondary factor.

Do we have any comparisons of 2170 vs. 18650 effective energy density? Surprisingly I found very little usable information about this online.

 

[KarenRei]

To do that properly you need downtime on the line... 4-6 weeks anyway. They're been running the line full bore just to keep up.

You don't create a couple weeks downtime on a line with layoffs.

 

[mongo]

Cause it's FC I'll post here and not in: 2170s for the Model S soon [Speculation]

The 18,650 cells are actually pretty competitive - for example it's unclear at this point what the Roadster 2020 will be using: 2170 or 18,650 cells?

The 2,170 cells are cheaper to manufacture, due to the larger form factor - but for Tesla's top of the line vehicles that's a secondary factor.

Do we have any comparisons of 2170 vs. 18650 effective energy density? Surprisingly I found very little usable information about this online.

Roadster needs the increased volumetric efficiency to fit the 200 kWh pack .
2170 pack more into smaller area due to height, less cells means less labor and weight per modules/ pack.

If each cell has 15mm vertical non-active space due to terminals/ can/ space then they pack ((79-15)/(65-15)) = 10% more active area due to height, if there is 2mm dead space in the diameter ((21-2)^2/(18-2)^2 ), they pack up to 40% more volume per can. Combined, that is 55% more energy per cell. However, I expect they remove some layers from the core to improve cooling. Still, much improved.

This assumes the same cell chemistry with only the form factor changing, or no?

Sure, if there was reason to trade off energy density, power, and longevity on a 3 vs S...

 

[KarenRei]

Nice spike this morning totally offsetting the early drop. A good day's price action will hopefully spook the people who've been trying to time the bottom into getting off the sidelines.

 

[Causalien]

Ahh, executed my option sell at the low of the day in the beginning. Might be one of those famous last world thing. But catching the bottom of the knife is like getting a hole in one.

 

[MP3Mike]

Another potential problem: how quickly is the conversion of European Superchargers to Model 3 charging progressing? It would suck and would create a PR backlash from critical first adopters if the first owners would find only half of the Superchargers working, with no adapter cable available. Journalists will also increasingly write about the Model 3 during this introductory period.

According to the tracking I have seen they have gotten to about 15% of the Supercharger sites so far. (I just don't know how well maintained that spreadsheet is.)

 

[j6Lpi429@3j]

Nice spike this morning totally offsetting the early drop. A good day's price action will hopefully spook the people who've been trying to time the bottom into getting off the sidelines.

eah I hope so. I am deeply in the red due to some extreme optimism by me a few weeks ago. I'm hoping to at least get out of half my positions come Q4 earnings, but I may even jump them out early if we go over 345 before then...

I think I'll stop swing trading TSLA The pure insanity of the MSM coverage and blatant stock manipulation by idiots is too much for me. I'll stick my current swing fund into permanent holds.

I still cant understand how any analyst with a verified long term return less than inflation is still in employment.

 

[sandpiper]

You don't create a couple weeks downtime on a line with layoffs.

You do if you're reducing sales volume by 2/3 and cutting 1 out of 3 shifts. In reality cutting 1/3 shifts reduces volume less than a 1/3 because three shift operations struggle to do scheduled maintenance.

 

[EVNow]

Well, Tesla down 2% for no particular reason. Bounced back from 279, though.

Now its tracking Nasdaq - 0.4% up vs 0.45% up.

 

[KarenRei]

eah I hope so. I am deeply in the red due to some extreme optimism by me a few weeks ago. I'm hoping to at least get out of half my positions come Q4 earnings, but I may even jump them out early if we go over 345 before then...

I know the feeling :Þ I wouldn't describe myself as having had "extreme optimism" a few weeks ago, but current prices are definitely painful. I timed the top-end quite well, but really underestimated the bottom end, so had to use more leverage than I wanted buy calls low to offset higher buys. Note to self: never underestimate peoples' ability to freak out and overreact about Tesla.

I plan to rebalance before earnings but I definitely want to have some good leverage going into it. That said, if the price goes up enough beforehand, my rebalancing will be a leverage-reducing one.

 

[tivoboy]

Sending mixed messages during a negotiation is good tactic:

White House confident US-China trade deal will happen by March 1

Probably closer to the left hand doesn’t know what the right hand is doing.

 

[printf42]

1. Nope, GF3 is funded by China.
2. New boards are cheap to make, and not all vehicles will need them. AI Chips (TRIPS) maybe not.

CAPEX doesn’t hurt profits, but depreciations/interests will, so it doesn’t matter where the funding come from, unless I’m wrong on this.

New chip will have cheaper unit price when you have large volume, but when you ramp up production, there are fixed costs you need to factor in.

 

[EVNow]

Now its tracking Nasdaq - 0.4% up vs 0.45% up.

Wrote a bit too soon. 0.8% down vs 0.3% up.

But on a tick by tick - Tesla is following Nasdaq. That was not the case mostly since Friday.

My best case scenario is that pre-ER SP will go back to early levels of 34x. After ER - depending on the sentiment, it could go up or down. If it goes up, all is well. If it goes down - history says the SP will be back to pre-ER levels within 2 weeks. In this best case scenario - I was hoping to sell my positions that I bought when SP was 35x, pre-ER essentially break even - taking help of the high IV. I'd break even or make some money on calls I'm buying now depending on what happens to SP after ER.

Ofcourse, if the SP doesn't recover pre-ER (atleast to 32x, if not 34x), it gets messy - but chances of SP going up after ER would be much higher.