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

[SO16]

I certainly do think we're seeing a serious dip in S/X demand in the US due to th $7500 tax credit expiration...

The tax credit is cut in half right now. Not gone.....yet.

 

[Buckminster]

OK. So fill in ND and then double. Still, my point is that there is arguably a *logical finish point* to Supercharger construction. It's not an unending expansion.

Agreed - once they have around 10,000 subterranean SCs in the martian Southern Hemisphere they can call it a day. Anything more would be overkill.

 

[SOULPEDL]

That's already happening. Every Tesla has the AP hardware installed and EAP is running in shadow mode transmitting data back to the mothership, teaching the AI.

Not that I heard (from the factory, but don't tell them I said so). Notice when Elon quotes how many millions of miles of AI learning, he's counting only those miles while EAP is engaged. The rest of the data collected is speculation and I'm sure they could just set triggers to upload when EAP is over-ridden or something to that nature, but all speculation here and likely top secret.

To your previous point, by including FSD in the high end models they become the flagship seeds for marketing. If I get into a luxury version of a car, I'd expect all the bells and whistles. An early assumption could easily be made that they all come with FSD... to get them in the door and start the sales discussion. As to whether or not this freebee is impacting profits, my guess is that there's plenty of room about to be revealed on Jan 30th. (Interesting that the Earnings date was pulled in, again, maybe avoiding the super bowl hangover with a dose of reality and another reason for us to party even harder. Hey, maybe a superbowl ad... wishful thinking, and too costly.)

 

[Nocturnal]

That's not an excuse. They needed, like, five stations to finish North Dakota. That's what, $5 million? Maybe $10 million?

They have that much cash in hand, Karen.

That sort of decision has a name. "Penny wise, pound foolish"

Is it though? Is it critical to cover ever area? Eventually yes but for now?

I live in the wealthy/dense suburbs of Kansas City and my nearest SC is an 45minutes to an hour away. I guarantee it will get more use than some random road in North Dakota.

OK. So fill in ND and then double. Still, my point is that there is arguably a *logical finish point* to Supercharger construction. It's not an unending expansion.

How can it ever be finished? Until the amount of Tesla's on the road (ignoring if other EVs eventually use the network) stops growing then how can the SC network stop growing?

 

[Zhelko Dimic]

yes, I still think there is a chance we dive deeper (we MIGHT get under 250$ from a technical standpoint). Layoffs and changes to production happened THIS year, so any of the positive effects of that won't be seen in the Q4 numbers. And, well why did they do them? Because they realized they were way over burdened in various areas. Therefore, I think the Q4 has a more than decent chance of being sort of ugly, AND the forecasts could be equally ugly.

I'd actually like that. This is one of the first times when we're this low and I'm not finding myself over-leveraged.
I'd be ready to bring some serious money from HLOC to play...
I usually miss bottoms and near bottoms because they look scary and I'm leveraged.

 

[TheTalkingMule]

Placed my first options orders since [what came to be known as] The Great SCTY Debacle of 2016. I expect my aggressive limit orders will not fill and SP will skyrocket from literally right now. You're welcome.

 

[Unpilot]

Placed my first options orders since [what came to be known as] The Great SCTY Debacle of 2016. I expect my aggressive limit orders will not fill and SP will skyrocket from literally right now. You're welcome.

Well it is green as I look at it right now...almost ready to break out ...up .02C

 

[tivoboy]

For anyone playing with options and leverage, I want to share my experience.

These kind of slides I used to find gut wrenching. I tried to keep brave face, and I probably didn't comment much, trusting it will recover (as it did. So I'm not sure how visible my state of mind was even to regular, long-term members of this forum.

I find this last move inconsequential and irrelevant, even-though I'm close to 100% TSLA invested.

Difference is that I don't have leverage, and small ones I'm considering would be well under 10% of my portfolio.

Most good or very good options trades have a significant GUT WRENCHING moment at least once or twice before going totally 3-10X.

Or to 0 of course, but more often than not, it's going to make you sick and be painful, before it becomes a thing of beauty.

 

[neroden]

Is it though? Is it critical to cover ever area?

YES.

Eventually yes but for now?

YES, RIGHT NOW.

I live in the wealthy/dense suburbs of Kansas City and my nearest SC is an 45minutes to an hour away. I guarantee it will get more use than some random road in North Dakota.

The point of Superchargers is to make road trips possible. For that you require geographic coverage.

Tesla actually wants low usage. High usage is expensive and unnecessary for Tesla. In bigger cities, there will alreay be other places to charge (at home... at your hotel...) and Tesla wants to drive as many people as possible to those locations. (Pricing should be below gasoline, but above all possible destination chargers).

Making road trips possible sells cars which will otherwise not be sold. Right now, I literally cannot drive to visit my friend in North Dakota. It is an incredible marketing failure.

This is not the biggest issue from a marketing perspective -- that's the service issue -- but it is the one which can be fixed by spending under $20 million dollars. It's penny-wise, pound-foolish to not finish the US geographic coverage, especially when they're *so close*. Being able to advertise "Drive anywhere in the lower 48 states, knowing that there's always a place to charge" is incredibly valuable. They can't say that right now because of North Dakota.

Now, in Mexico, for instance, Tesla is a lot further from geographic coverage... so maybe it makes sense to postpone Mexico for a while. Same with Australia. But there's so little money needed to finish the job and have a massive selling point in the US, that they really should finish it.

It's like almost finishing a building and then just sort of leaving it there because you can't be bothered to spend money on the last few punchlist items. It's really weird.

 

[shlokavica22]

@tivoboy I'm trying to sell put short, strike $300 for March that would trigger around $277 (price $39.5)
Do you think there is still chance we dive deep? Today's trading makes me think we may have turned a corner, so maybe I should just pull a trigger at current prices...

Cash covered I suppose?

What about this instead:
- Sell Jan15'21 195p
- Buy Jan15'21 430c
Total cost ~0, Delta - 0.595,Theta -0.017, Margin- $5,961

Less risk for you and bigger upside.

 

[Tslynk67]

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.)

I still don't understand why Tesla have to convert the SuC's to CCS. Yes, I understand the need to have the CCS on the M3 to take advantage of non-Tesla charging, but why they couldn't wire the port in such a way that it would function as CCS when plugged with CCS and type 2 when plugged with type 2 and SuC type 2 when SuCing is beyond me.

If all that makes sense.

Sorry, off topic...

 

[homer214]

We’re green. $287.87

 

[NicoV]

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.)

Pretty well apparently. I saw this morning on FB that Aartselaar was upgraded yesterday and it’s on the list now, together with 2 other superchargers in Belgium that got upgraded yesterday and today.
“Service diminished” on your Suc map is now like ‘the Apple web store ist down”!

 

[ZeApelido]

My super-optimistic prediction is Tesla will begin production of Model Y, in Fremont, in Q3

 

[KarenRei]

That's not an excuse. They needed, like, five stations to finish North Dakota. That's what, $5 million? Maybe $10 million?

Now apply the exact same statement to the rest of the Supercharger network. Canada Superhighway? Eastern European expansion? Overcrowded stations in... well, many markets now? Upgrading EU chargers with CCS? It's not a single-location issue. Progress is wanted everywhere. Perhaps North Dakota is your particular focus, but everyone's particular focus will be different.

 

[Big Earl]

No surprise. More of that will surface once Tesla has been moving along and this years are declared history for BEVs.


David McLeod‏ @macrockets
So Mathew Battle admitted this week that he’s paid to bash Tesla all day, every day. Who else is paid to do this? $TSLA $TSLAQ

2h2 hours ago
Replying to @macrockets
Big oil pays me. $12.50/ hour is nothing to sneeze at.
Login on Twitter

Battle is a professional Twitter troll and FUDster. He was very active during the presidential election and is now working on Tesla. If you sift through his followers, you'll find some prominent progressive political figures (Ben Jealous is one) who likely fell for his anti-Hillary rhetoric.

 

[DurandalAI]

Placed my first options orders since [what came to be known as] The Great SCTY Debacle of 2016. I expect my aggressive limit orders will not fill and SP will skyrocket from literally right now. You're welcome.

Good, because I bought my first call options ever. Normally I only write options on penny stocks.. I'm all in right now.

 

[NicoV]

I still don't understand why Tesla have to convert the SuC's to CCS. Yes, I understand the need to have the CCS on the M3 to take advantage of non-Tesla charging, but why they couldn't wire the port in such a way that it would function as CCS when plugged with CCS and type 2 when plugged with type 2 and SuC type 2 when SuCing is beyond me.

If all that makes sense.

Sorry, off topic...

I had that discussion to on the FB groups. It’s apparently a cost saving thing.
And supporting CSS is what Tesla has to do anyway in the long run. It gives them the option to open it up to all EV drivers (that would be a stunt!). There is a European law that says that all fast charging should support CCS.

 

[ReflexFunds]

Surprisingly stable US deliveries in first 2 weeks of Jan at c.5k 3s and c.1k S/X according to Alpha Hat. Their GPS based delivery centre tracking was relatively accurate in 2018.

https://blog.alphahat.com/teslas-us-q1-deliveries-are-surprisingly-high-so-far-e87cd1df54f8

 

[MarcusMaximus]

That's not an excuse. They needed, like, five stations to finish North Dakota. That's what, $5 million? Maybe $10 million?

They have that much cash in hand, Karen.

That sort of decision has a name. "Penny wise, pound foolish"

I actually disagree with this. While it’s VERY inconvenient for some very small set of people, that set of people is, well, VERY small. How many people are likely to drive through some random bit of North Dakota in a Tesla?