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

[StarFoxisDown!]

I don't think anyone, especially actual investors, are selling from that analyst note or getting cold feet before earnings(considering how low the stock price still is). So I'm guessing the bears are using up quite a but of ammo to cause the drop all morning....its been a pretty impressive drop with how organized and consistent it's been so far. I'm all good with bears using their ammo now before earnings.

 

[Tslynk67]

so a review of the e-tron (found from @alex_avoigt)
Der Audi e-tron - gut, aber noch nicht gut genug • emobly

I don't read german, but according to google translate the reviewer observed 23.3 KWh/100km @ 72 km/h. Or, being metricly challenged, translated to terms I can relate to: 375 Wh/mi @ 45 mph.

Yep, that's the e-turd. Limping along at 45 from 100% full to drained would only be ~228 miles.

Then the reviewer gives the rates for 130 km/h which works out to 530 Wh/mi @ 80 mph. That's a reasonable cruising speed with a theoretical range of 162 miles.

Finally, after discussing range the article says, "Teslas Model X schlägt Audi so sicher nicht." Again, I don't know German, but google says that means "Tesla Model X does not beat Audi so sure" which leaves me scratching my head. Surely the reviewer means that the Model X beats the socks off the Audi?

Or does the Model X consume more than 530 Wh/mi at those speeds?

Late response, sorry, as I've been at a music festival that last three day in, yes, Germany! Saw plenty of Model 3's, and one iPace, but no eTrons.

Motorway speeds in Germany are more like 150kmph, very few are driving as slow as 130 - certainly not in an expensive Audi... My XP100DL at 130kmph will check up around 285W per km, so 450W/m or something like that. But this is the P model, with 22" wheels, it's the thirstiest Tesla ever built.

At 70kmph the consumption is about half the amount, you can go a long way in a Tesla at those speeds.

 

[DragonWatch]

Humm, I find the discussion of AutoPilot rather funny.

My wife refers to autopilot as a drunk teenager. I find it a marked improvement from our 2017 1Q17 X over our 2019 2Q19 version. I treat the system with respect and realize it is not perfect.

This discussion reminds me of the joke back in the '90s between the end user of a new computer and the technician on the other end of the phone, "please pack up the computer and mail it back because you are to gD stupid to operate it." Okay, I am sure it was worded much more funny/eloquently than my mix of words

 

[Nocturnal]

Interesting results. I conducted a Twitter poll of how likely people would be to sign up for a FDA/EMA approved Neuralink implant. Now, of course, this is totally non-scientific, including a participant bias towards Tesla fans. But still:

Nafnlaus on Twitter

View attachment 432740

Even if the actual take rate among the general public would be much lower, I strongly suspect that they've got a huge market for these implants, beyond just people with neurological disabilities.

I'm sure it'd be at least a decade before such a general public implant would be approved, however.

I haven't been paying attention, but what would that let me do?

Late response, sorry, as I've been at a music festival that last three day in, yes, Germany! Saw plenty of Model 3's, and one iPace, but no eTrons.

Motorway speeds in Germany are more like 150kmph, very few are driving as slow as 130 - certainly not in an expensive Audi... My XP100DL at 130kmph will check up around 285W per km, so 450W/m or something like that. But this is the P model, with 22" wheels, it's the thirstiest Tesla ever built.

At 70kmph the consumption is about half the amount, you can go a long way in a Tesla at those speeds.

That's only in small pockets without congestion though right? My main experience was on the autobahn (can't recall the #) between Munich and Salzburg. IIRC back in 2007 only about half had no limit.

 

[Vines]

Been looking for a dip the last week or so to buy back in but hadn't seen it yet. Maybe the bear attack will be good to drive SP down for a nice lowish buy back in.
I am expecting a dip on earnings report, since the bears never seem to miss a chance to spread some FUD, as Tesla likely loses money for another quarter.
"No demand, competition is right around the corner ect."

 

[Cobbler]

The tweet that follows:

Nafnlaus on Twitter

View attachment 432746
...

That's the goal, at least.

I've already created an addiction of checking TMC, Reddit/r/teslamotors, $TSLA SP, Cleantechnica, Electrek, insideEV, Elon's tweets every day.
Imagine doing that every second of the day..... Brain meltdown about to happen

 

[Doggydogworld]

Tesla has chronically overvalued "previously owned" Tesla models, not just for those accepted as trade-ins and marketed as CPOs, but also for the contract amounts used in resale/residual value guarantees and direct lease monthly payment computations. The magnitude of the over-valuations is generally reflected in the quarterly inventory write-downs on the Cash Flow statements (most, but not all, of which is used vehicles in Finished Goods and charged to Services & Other COGS.) The higher trade-in values helps Auto Sales GM% but also contributes to the disturbingly high negative GM% in Services & Other --albeit with a lag of multiple quarters.

As the Volvo stealership anecdote illustrates, used cars are a significant profit center for ICE dealership franchises. Tesla lacks skilled appraisers of trade-ins and eschews minor rehabilitation of non-Tesla vehicles so those profits are ceded to third-parties.​

I also keep coming back to trade-ins as the only viable explanation. A $3k+ average loss on ~50k trade-ins in a quarter sounds believable while a $70k average loss on ~2.5k lease returns does not. But there's no anecdotal evidence of systematic overvaluation - most seem to be around the "Carmax price", give or take. Clarity from Tesla would be nice, but I won't hold my breath.

Where are you getting this information, and where did the other ~6.5k cars go?

As Brian said, the other 6500 were either direct leases or sales with Resale Value Guarantees which Tesla counted as leases for reporting purposes in 2017. The 2017 Q1 earnings letter said 26% of deliveries were counted as leases.

 

[LN1_Casey]

Been looking for a dip the last week or so to buy back in but hadn't seen it yet. Maybe the bear attack will be good to drive SP down for a nice lowish buy back in.
I am expecting a dip on earnings report, since the bears never seem to miss a chance to spread some FUD, as Tesla likely loses money for another quarter.
"No demand, competition is right around the corner ect."

I agree; I think if Tesla does anything short of profit for this quarter (and likely requires good profit, since it did record quarter in production/sale.). The bears and FUDsters will wail and moan and harrumph all they can to squish the SP.

I'm fine with either outcome--either the SP goes up (yay!) or it goes back down, just in time for me to buy some more, haha. If it goes down enough, than I'll get my August bonus in time to buy a nicer chunk*!

*comparatively speaking, anyway. I'm still not moving more than single digits each purchase.

 

[Cherry Wine]

Local Tesla club attended a car show and I gave out about 17 rides to people. The local news was there and I gave the camera guy a ride and a quick spiel about the features. Made the local news! It was a decent little segment. They described it as a ride in a Tesla self driving car, showed me driving with the visualizations, and talked about autopark, lane keeping etc.

Crappy phone recorded video if anyone is interested. I had hoped they would keep in my audio talking about the car but oh well. The camera guy said he was shocked by how fast it accelerated.

https://youtu.be/hNAV2mLtWE4

Going to have to build more factories to keep up with demand once more people become aware of how fun it is to drive a Tesla. I was always supportive of and interested in the company; my obsession and equity stake didn’t take place until after I had driven one. Not a coincidence.

 

[Fred42]

I've already created an addiction of checking TMC, Reddit/r/teslamotors, $TSLA SP, Cleantechnica, Electrek, insideEV, Elon's tweets every day.
Imagine doing that every second of the day..... Brain meltdown about to happen

Do you have a friend who can introduce you to a blonde?

 

[Nocturnal]

Going to have to build more factories to keep up with demand once more people become aware of how fun it is to drive a Tesla. I was always supportive of and interested in the company; my obsession and equity stake didn’t take place until after I had driven one. Not a coincidence.

Same with me. I had closed out my stake a while back to buy a home. Got back in majorly after taking delivery.

Every single person was amazed. A few were hard core car enthusiasts types. One was at the show with his low rider and I think I convinced him to skip the audi wagon and look at a Model Y. Others were regular joes, all were super impressed. Even had a couple moms with kids that were just there because their teen kids wanted a ride and both left saying basically "wow, this is really nice. How much did you say these were?".

 

[EVNow]

I also keep coming back to trade-ins as the only viable explanation. A $3k+ average loss on ~50k trade-ins in a quarter sounds believable while a $70k average loss on ~2.5k lease returns does not. But there's no anecdotal evidence of systematic overvaluation - most seem to be around the "Carmax price", give or take.

In Q4 services loss was 135M. Inventory write down was 25M and loss on disposal of fixed assets was 28M.

I think the latter was likely difference between what they got in auction and what they valued as take in.

BTW, the s/x/3 forums here regularly talk about how the trade in price offered was quite low compared to what they can get by selling on their own privately. So, it seems to be the same as all dealers. Except, I think Tesla probably has better leverage in pricing the trade in cars since most people have already ordered 3/s/x. They should be able to price the trade-ins to match actual expected auction price and thus not take a loss.

If we take the values I gave above for Q4, per delivery they have lost $278 in inventory write down and $316 in disposal of fixed assets. If they took in trade ins only in 50% cases, the total loss would be ~ $1K per trade in.

ps : There is substantial other service losses even if all of Inventory write down and loss on disposal of fixed assets are going into services & others.

 

[ReflexFunds]

There were some brief Tesla comments from Elon in a recent Spacex interview - the whole interview is worth reading. I particularly liked this comment: "Everything except rockets I wanna clean."
Extended transcript: SpaceX CEO Elon Musk on putting boots on the moon and Mars

Well, I think Tesla's actually made great progress towards a sustainable energy economy in terms of from solar to storage to electric vehicles. I think for electrification of transport Tesla's arguably advanced the cores of sustainable transport by ten years, maybe 20. Probably at least ten.

The fundamental good of Tesla I would say should be measured by to what degree has it accelerated the advent of sustainable energy. And I think it's about a decade. Maybe it's two decades. These are small numbers in the grand scheme of things. But they do matter from a total sort of CO2 capacity of the oceans and atmosphere.

And I wish there was some way to do rockets by the way without burning things. But there isn't. I mean, Newton's third law, no way around it. So balancing what is the best for humanity, well, there's just no other way to do it except rockets, whereas there is another way to do terrestrial transport, including aircraft and everything else.

Everything except rockets I wanna clean. It can be done with batteries, and will be done with batteries. It's important like to note that I think the world would move towards sustainable energy without Tesla as a catalyst. It would just get there; it would just take longer. And so what's the marginal value of effort, like, how much more could Tesla make it happen if, let's say, if I consider my own time. If I were to fully allocate myself to Tesla, how much faster could we grow versus if I don't full allocate and sort of just put my time between SpaceX and Tesla? I think the marginal value is relatively limited. I think I could maybe make it happen a couple years faster. And then you feel like you could say like the Keeling Curve of CO2 parts per million in the atmosphere, like how much of [a] dent would that make? I'd rather have a Tesla take a couple years longer and still have SpaceX 'cause I think this is the right balance for the greater good.

KLUGER: Lastly, there are gonna be feet on the moon. There are gonna be feet on Mars. Could they be yours one day?

MUSK: I would like to go to the moon and Mars. I think that'd be quite fun. But I need to make sure, like, the overarching goal here is help make life multi-planetary. This is not some sort of personal quest to go to the moon or go to Mars. My sort of philosophical foundation is in line with Douglas Adams, "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy." Everyone has their sort of favorite philosopher, but my favorite philosopher is Douglas Adams.
Well, he's dead now, but he's got a (LAUGHS) great attitude, and he's fun guy and a good sense of humor. And what he was essentially saying is, "The universe is the answer; what are the questions?"
And if we expand the scope and scale of consciousness, then we are better able to understand what questions to ask. We'll learn more, we'll become more enlightened. And so we should try to do the things that expand the scope and scale of consciousness. And becoming a multi-planet species and ensuring that we have a sustainable climate on Earth, these are very important to that overarching philosophy. So that's the philosophy I buy into.

 

[Nocturnal]

The fudsters aren't even bothering to try new arguments. They could literally copy and paste their comments from the last tax credit change. "demand pulled forward, etc." It's a joke. The first time? Ok, somewhat believable, 7500 to 3750 is a big drop, but an $1800 drop on a credit that most people don't really consider/understand? Sure guys, sure.

How would this be any different from when you're using a computer manually?



They're not linking it to your limbic cortex.

But yeah, this is getting a bit OT. I just thought I'd share my surprise about how high of an interest there was in getting a Neuralink BMI.

Pass then. Just controlling my mouse etc. isn't worth the hassle.

There were some brief Tesla comments from Elon in a recent Spacex interview - the whole interview is interesting btw
Extended transcript: SpaceX CEO Elon Musk on putting boots on the moon and Mars

We have all our eggs in one basket. I'd rather us have humans elsewhere in the universe just in case. Plus, for all we know humans might be the only intelligent life in the universe. A universe without someone to appreciate it is a pretty pointless thing.

 

[Cherry Wine]

I've already created an addiction of checking TMC, Reddit/r/teslamotors, $TSLA SP, Cleantechnica, Electrek, insideEV, Elon's tweets every day.
Imagine doing that every second of the day..... Brain meltdown about to happen

I can relate. On the flip side, the time it takes to consume the information (or respond) should be a fraction of what it takes currently. I’m about as big an advocate of technology as they come, but even I balk a bit at that level of connectivity.

On topic, the price action to start the week is interesting. I think consolidation is more conducive to a post-earnings rally than a continued run-up — less risk of a sell-off. All depends on the fundamentals coming out of the call, of course.

 

[Artful Dodger]

It was really $1,610 off since the tax credit went from $7,500 to $3,750, right?

Note: the OP is from Edmonton, Canada.

 

[davecolene0606]

Thanks,

yes, I meant if you buy a car from the current stock that is already produced.

Minus the pre-raven MS & MX, and “store demo” models where discount is quantified by mileage, there are no discounts on “already produced”. Tesla builds vehicles and matches them to internet orders. Even when you go to a store your order is processed the same way it is if you order online at home. If a store gets a truckload of vehicles delivered and one or more have not been matched to an order, you could get that car on the spot, but again, same price as everyone else. Towards the end of a quarter, you may have the opportunity to snag a vehicle that was designated as a “store demo” and get that price. Tesla adjusts prices for all vehicles frequently, but for everyone, everywhere. Elon has made it clear that everyone pays the same price and people have been terminated when caught gaming the system. That is the Tesla Pricing policy in a nutshell.

Fire Away!

 

[davecolene0606]

Specifically: Tesla downgraded to Neutral on battery, competition risks at Roth Capital TSLA - The Fly

Price target downgraded from $238 to... $238. (only "Buy" was downgraded to "Neutral"). Note the hilarious reasoning:

Tesla downgraded to Neutral on battery, competition risks at Roth Capital

As previously reported, Roth Capital analyst Craig Irwin downgraded Tesla to Neutral from Buy. He believes Tesla has a viable path to meet at least the low end of its 360,000-400,000 deliveries guidance for 2019, but this does not eliminate margin risks from rising 2019 battery costs or the impact of intensifying competition, Irwin tells investors. The analyst, who expects the shares to remain range bound until the battery and competition issues are resolved, keeps a $238 price target on the stock.

So this clown clearly shows his complete and utter zero knowledge of Tesla by using “increasing” battery costs as a premise. He must be thinking of every other OEM that uses LG Chem for their drivetrain/battery solution.

What maroon!

Fire Away!

 

[⚡️ELECTROMAN⚡️]

I particularly liked this comment: "Everything except rockets I wanna clean."

I’m pretty dense. What does that mean?

 

[ReflexFunds]

I’m pretty dense. What does that mean?

He’s just saying he want to move all of earth’s economy on to clean/renewable energy, except for rockets which is impossible