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

[anthonyj]

When is Elon allowed to buy stock? Next week? He always buys stock during squeezes

 

[UncaNed]

Not going to be building the Loop to O'Hare here in Chicago. New mayor, etc.. they are basically shut down.

Perhaps by unions that don't like that it's so much cheaper than union-built subway transport.

 

[MC3OZ]

Why do you think Tesla can ramp up production at any rate they choose? They are limited by their starting size. The bigger players don't have that limitation.



For Tesla, sure. Why do you think this is the bottleneck for everyone else? Are you referring to global limitations? I've read that at some point there may be a problem with supply of some elements used in batteries, but no one is saying that is certain since the expected point in time is far enough out the supply is not so certain.

Basically the advantage Tesla has is 10 years of relevant experience, very capable in house engineering and an eco-system of parts of the right type at the right price.

Raw materials for batteries might be a problem, but Tesla is already working on it...

I think the Chinese, VW Group and Daimler will all do well...

A "Tesla Killer" is a myth, but a "Tesla Growth Inhibitor", or 2 are a possibility limiting Tesla to 10-12M rather than 20M... the most likely player in that space is VW Group...

 

[Compton]

Yeah, I read that. Soooo.... When are they going to make the "less expensive" vehicles?

I still think Tesla won't be able to grow quickly enough by using the compounding of reinvesting their profit mostly because the profit just isn't high enough. So far there have been essentially no profit in any year and this year isn't looking to be the year this changes.

As a rule of thumb, to cut the price of a car in half requires a 10 fold increase in volume. 245,240 in 2018, likely 340,000 in 2019 for about a 40% increase. This will take about 7 years for a 10 fold increase if they keep up the same rate of increase, or 2026. By then there will be so many competing cars from so many companies Tesla will be inundated with competition. In reality there is no reason to believe Tesla will continue to grow at such a rate.

They've done great because everyone else has been watching, expecting them to fail. Tesla hasn't, so they started to ramp up their own production of EVs. Tesla has awoken sleeping giants.

Hi - "T3slaOwner", a new account I see. This is at least the third within a couple of months.

 

[MC3OZ]

Gali has a new video on the Pickup:-

I agree with his eventual 150K sales target...

In terms of where to build it, Tesla may need a new factory on the East Side of the US, to build Model 3, Model Y and the Pickup...

That would smooth out a lot of their delivery logistics...

I also think a car factory outside of California may help convince some US Pickup buyers that Tesla is a US company...

So I can't quite see Gali's late 2021 target, perhaps late 2022 for early low volume production...

They make make the Semi at GF1 but beyond that it is going to take time to sort out housing and all the associated issues.

They may build something at Lathrop, but again my hunch would be something Plaid..

They may squeeze Model 3, Model Y and updated Model S/X into Fremont, but again my guess is that is about the limit..

But it is very easy to be wrong in trying to guess this stuff... I'm not confident.... apart from the minimum 150K annual demand for the Pickup

 

[StealthP3D]

Elon hopes for a lot of things and I hope to lose 20 pounds before Christmas.

Even I can show you how to lose 20 lbs. before Christmas. Use the "first principles" approach that Musk has used for his numerous and substantial accomplishments.

As a human, you consume and burn a certain amount of calories in a specified timeframe. If you are maintaining a consistent weight those two values are in equilibrium. If you want to lose weight, it is necessary to burn more calories than you consume. Excess weight is stored as fat. Because 3,500 calories equal about 1 pound of fat, you need to burn about 3,500 additional calories to lose 1 pound. So, losing 20 lbs. requires burning an additional 70,000 calories without increasing the number of calories you eat or eating 70,000 calories less without reducing the rate at which you burn calories. You could also do a combination of both to achieve your desired goal.

This "first principles" approach has worked amazingly well for Musk and, if you put your mind to it with the same kind of dedication Musk uses, I'm confident you will achieve your goal. There is no mystery here, it's just a matter of dedication combined with knowledge.

 

[PeterJA]

When are you going to read Tesla's answer to that question?

Master Plan, Part Deux

Yeah, I read that. Soooo.... When are they going to make the "less expensive" vehicles?

Your reply shows you didn't read it, or didn't comprehend it, or are just trolling with no interest in educating yourself.

Summary for non-trolls: Tesla has no need to make less-expensive vehicles (although Elon said they will eventually) because anyone will be able to afford a Tesla that pays for itself as a part-time robotaxi. That's Tesla's plan, in addition to driving down costs via technology advances and massive scale.

 

[Artful Dodger]

Yes, I came to a similar conclusion: I don't think Ihor's TSLA data is reliable October this year, not even as a trend indicator. Either his model broke down, or it was never correct to begin with.

The obvious conclusion is that Ihor's statistical model was created by fitting data to the general market, and that that underlying model does not apply well to TSLA.

In other words, reject the null hypothesis. Something else is going on with TSLA.

 

[StealthP3D]

Summary for non-trolls: Tesla has no need to make less-expensive vehicles (although Elon said they will eventually) because anyone will be able to afford a Tesla that pays for itself as a part-time robotaxi. That's Tesla's plan, in addition to driving down costs via technology advances and massive scale.

I think the whole "Tesla's are very expensive" story has gone too far. Yes, they make some very nice cars and, fully loaded, you are going to pay for what you get. but they also make some very affordable cars like the Standard Range Model 3 for less than $40K. Once you figure the gas and maintenance savings, the insurance and the resale value after 10 years, it's actually less expensive to own than a car like a Honda Accord or a Toyota Camry. It's also safer. How much is your family's safety worth? Apparently not much if you chose the Honda Accord which actually costs more over a 10-year timeframe.

Of course, some people think *any* new car is expensive because all they ever buy is $2,000 clapped-out cars with 150K miles that are starting to burn oil. If that's your metric, yeah, any new Tesla is going to seem expensive. And so is a used Tesla with 150K miles, comparatively speaking. There's a reason for that. They are still very nice cars, even with high mileage. People *want* them, that's why they sell for more. It's called "desirability".

 

[StealthP3D]

I agree with his eventual 150K sales target...

With trucks being the #1 seller in the US automotive market, I think it makes more sense to talk about production targets instead of sales targets. They will sell every one they can make, it's just a matter of how many they can make.

I think Gali is wrong about the range of the base model being 350 miles. I'm guessing 220 miles. That's enough for a contractor that works in one city with perhaps trips to nearby rural areas and is the only way to keep the price of the base model under $50K. I'm expecting to order the longest-range version (hopefully around 400 miles) and I imagine there will be some expensive options that are going to be hard to pass up. Truck buyers like to spend a lot of money on options because their truck is part of their identity so it would be a mistake for Tesla to not capitalize on that.

 

[Alphacrux]

The idea that traditional automakers can “beat” Tesla once they focus has been exposed as pure fantasy over the last few years.

Bolt
Leaf2.0
I-Pace
Taycan
Etc.

Each are very compromised compared to Tesla’s cars. Despite the best efforts of legacy carmakers. At this point they are just fighting among themselves.

And with the Y Tesla is just going to take another massive step forward - 48v architecture, reduced wiring, robotic wiring installation, new subframe manufacturing techniques and probably a few other things we don’t know about.

Eventually other automakers may take a significant share of the ev market. But by that time, the ev market will be tens of millions of units per year. I believe that ARK has this in their models already.

 

[hobbes]

You want to know the moment you were added to the block list? Find a comment replying to you and tagging “Paul91701736” aka MachinePlanet. That mechanism is how a TSLA Bull gets their,uh, block. I guess the tweet would be hidden to you now though.
I need to try harder, as I’m still not blocked!?!

Has anyone tried blocking one of the TSLAQ guys themselves by applying this tag to one of their own messages ?

 

[printf42]

My advice to troll, get a real job you would be proud to tell your grandchildren one day.

My advice to people feeding the troll, just stop, I saw enough of that, let’s talk about truck.

 

[SPadival]

How is this worth listening to? These guys are delusional - I'd rather get financial advice from a toaster.

Obviously, you haven't seen the defiant, #LFG "Rallying the trolls" tweets from babycharts.

 

[-=buzz=-]

I'm open to being convinced otherwise: in what way is a short-seller in advantage over a long-buyer, without the uptick rule in place?

Both are able to mark up or down the price in a similar fashion via LIMIT or MARKET orders, and both have to provide similar trading power to back their transactions:

• a long has to post 100% of the cash of the shares purchased (either via real cash or via margin borrowing),
• a short has to post 102-105% of the mark-to-market value of the shares sold, in cash (either via real cash or via margin borrowing) - and also has to secure the borrowed shares within ~5 trading days (which I agree is too long and too lax).

I agree with you that adding the uptick rule (which would forbid it for shorts to actively bid down the price) would be good policy - but I don't see it giving them any tools that longs couldn't be using.

Do they really need to provide all in cash? I thought you could provide other stocks as collateral, which allows you to effectively double your investment size. A long can't buy with money he doesn't have, and for margin he has to pay.

The best strategy for a long to buy is slow, to avoid raising his entry price.
The best strategy for a long to sell is slow, to avoid reducing his profits.
The best strategy to short should be slow, to get maximum possible downside exposure. But, if they dump it all at once, it can put a dent into the stock price, putting your top shorts immediatly into the money and allowing you to reduce your investment at a profit, or even triggering stop losses which multiply the price drop.

While a long could trigger limit buys with a spike caused by fast buy-in, it's proven that triggering a panic sell on no news is much easier than a rally.

 

[Artful Dodger]

And on a down day....hmmm

What happened is that after today's bear raid @12:19 ET, volume dried up:

• avg vol from 09:30 to 12:18 was 62,396 shares/min (10.48m trades in 168 min)
• avg vol from 12:19 to 16:00 was 36,216 shares/min (8.04m trades in 222 min)

VWAP for the day was $330.87 with $6.259B in total trades, reflecting early trading.

In the 3 mins from 12:19 to 12:21 there were 446,566 shares traded, or about 259K more than we'd expect based on the day's avg vol until then. Shorting had the effect of dropping the SP from $331.12 at 12:18 ET to $326.56 by 12:21 or a $4.56 drop.

Longs noticed and stopped buying on the way down. After lunch, SP recovered slightly to close $0.32 higher than the open and -$0.42 down vs Friday's close.

Low volume makes it much easier to manipulate the SP for the rest of the day, which was the goal of today's bear raid.

All in all, today was a show of strength and resolve by some very large bears, who emphatically demonstrated they will not go quietly into the night.

 

[EV forever]

This is why I get angry when I see people buying EVs from legacy automakers and Tesla owners saying we’re all on the same side. The truth is we’re not. Nobody here should be applauding any money going to these companies, even if it’s for an EV. The truth is it just helps them prop up their ICE business. So no, I’m not happy when I see a bolt, leaf, i3 on the road.....

From my perspective, any EV purchased means one less ICE purchased. As a TSLA investor would I like them to be all Teslas...sure...but it is impossible and the mission statement is to transition us to renewable energy transportation. It does not say by Tesla alone.

At least the Bolt, Leaf and i3 are actual EVs. It annoys me to no end when I see hybrids and plug-in hybrids bundled with EVs for benefits and incentives. In SoCal, it is common to see a giant gas guzzling SUV in the car pool lane with a car pool sticker - these are cars with labels as some electric or hybrid drive which gives them a tiny amount of electric range. They still have two large exhaust pipes on the rear (gas holes as my hubby call them), so clearly not that gas efficient. If you truly want to reduce emissions, it has to be a pure EV, no polluting gas emissions involved.

Those cars you listed were designed specifically to make EVs look undesirable. They're three of the ugliest cars ever made, and it's no coincidence.

Yes, the Leaf was an ugly car, but it was my first EV and I actually loved the ugly thing. The first Leaf was a lease, with low commitment and helped with the transition to an EV from a gas guzzling SUV (Volvo XC 90). Once we got over the range anxiety over the first couple of weeks, we were completely converted and knew we would never go back to a gas car. We purchased the second Leaf (after the leased one was totaled in an accident) to wait for the Model 3. So overall, drove a Leaf for 5 years and over 60K miles.

I think these cars do serve a purpose, mainly in helping transition folks off gas cars. However, they need to be EVs and not plug-in hybrids; the later serve no purpose as you are always relying on gas as the back-up option.

 

[RobStark]

Detroit produces ~3M full size trucks for North America per year (US,Canada, and Mexico).

If max capacity for Tesla truck is 150k units per year that is a fail IMO. That doesn't force Detroit's hand. They will sell a lot of profitable ICE trucks.

Tesla needs to produce at least 4x that number to take away most of the highly optioned premium truck market. 600k units per year and about 20% of the market. Toyota and Nissan are niche players in this market.

Per leaks from UAW during contract negotiations, GM plans to have capacity for 80k full size electric pickups and SUVs per year i.e. electric Silverados,Sierras, Suburbans,Tahoes, and Escalades.

150k Tesla trucks per year is like Tesla having a total North American capacity for Model 3 at 2x the Chevy Bolt. ~50k. 150k Tesla trucks is not compatible with 2 TWh of battery capacity and 20M vehicles per year.

 

[RobStark]

EV Sales: Europe September 2019

 

[CorneliusXX]

To people engaging trolls, I would like to remind that performance of a troll is measured by the number of responses he/she collects. I believe even "you're an idiot" counts as response. A controversy, that is.

To the troll, even though unlikely to succeed, I have following items to consider:
- you are not participating in a foreign policy of the country
- what Putin commits by impoverishing the Russia's population is genocide. You know full well that retired people do not receive sufficient pension to buy medication they need and they die prematurely on a regular basis. You know that young couples are afraid to bring children into the lawlessness and poverty. You know the money they need goes to dozens of documented palaces and yachts Putin and each of his cronies have and their offshore accounts.
Your are participating in this by providing informational cover and it is how future generations will value your "work", not by what you write about Tesla.

Perhaps we should create a "dispelling newcomer FUD" thread with standardised answers for the major topics. Then we can just link it and say see point 1, etc. when they arrive. It would save hours of time on this thread.