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

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Hmm, everyone has been buying Tesla now including my parents who are usually the last to get in. I'm getting my hair cut and my stylist is talking about how he has been trading TSLA options and I'm listening to his other client talk about her TSLA options trades. Tipranks show TSLA as the 11th most popular holding and the 6th most popular holding of top performers. I hate to jinx it but does this mean we are in a bubble now?

I think you are in a strange circle. Everyone I know still thinks tesla is a joke. And I work in tech in sf.
 
Hmm, everyone has been buying Tesla now including my parents who are usually the last to get in. I'm getting my hair cut and my stylist is talking about how he has been trading TSLA options and I'm listening to his other client talk about her TSLA options trades. Tipranks show TSLA as the 11th most popular holding and the 6th most popular holding of top performers. I hate to jinx it but does this mean we are in a bubble now?

Nope
 
Yes, but the little blue logo doesn't account for service centers! So the map is not entirely accurate. There are probably other inaccuracies too.
Likely inaccurate in TN as well. I will check. In 2013 dealers withdrew objections to the Nashville sales office based upon an agreement I was told at the time. I had threatened to intervene if necessary on my own behalf to be able to continue to buy Teslas and have them serviced in Nashville
I suspect the agreement limited sales and service centers likely to 1-2 sales offices and 2-3 service centers. I have raised the inaccuracy of this map in the past and people from other states have also raised questions.
 
If TSLA shares reach $580 by the time it is added to the S&P 500 index, it will added at the No. 50 ranking of the 505 stock symbols which comprise the index

Wait...wut? o_O
Did you watch Dan Ives (Wedbush) on Bloomberg Business (Youtube Dec 26)?

At 0:44 he says:

"I think right now I view the bear case continues to be still sort of low 200s, but now the Bull case is $580 to $600 in terms of where we could see the stock".​

 
Yesterday, sitting on the side of the 101 Freeway, south of Santa Barbara, CA. In the course of one hour I counted 8 transports trucks full of Tesla's heading south towards Los Angeles.
Lol, okay I'll bite. Sittin' on the side of the road, countin' Teslas? :D


lol, but don't Transport trucks from Fremont to L.A. use I-5 instead of 101?

Cheers!
 

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Tesla will report using US GAAP for all of it's entities for the 10K (annual) and 10Qs (quarterly).

Sometimes a company may need 3 different financials in a country.
1. US GAAP financials (for the 10K)
2. Local Statutory Financials - sometimes there may be a local requirement for financials under IFRS - International Financial Reporting Standards (banks & local governments may ask for this).
3. Local Tax Financials - Tax authorities may have different depreciation rates, etc.

But for investors, we will see everything using US GAAP.
It is also relevant to point out that in quite a few countries there are local and/or regional taxes that sometimes force several returns in a given country. Some of those reconcile out at national and/or multi-national (eg Mercosur, EU) bases. Much such reporting is IFRS-based. As The Accountant said all of this is reconciled to US GAAP.
FWIW, some years ago I ran a company with operations in about 50 countries on four continents. We had >500 tax returns every year. Due to specific requirement we had four distinct accounting conventions and also had to produce consolidated and consolidating statements in both IFRS and US GAAP. It became quite hairy when we could not use Lombard accounting at all for a fair number of countries.

The only good thing about all that is that such complexity affords substantial opportunity to manage timing and even amounts of income and expense. Then there is transfer pricing and so much more.

Tesla is becoming more adept at international accounting management by the day. Earnings volatility will, over time, show less volatility as these processes improve. That will happen with nothing nefarious, only making the most tax and earnings beneficial decisions.
 
Quick update from Fremont. Some buyers who were promised 12/31/2019 8 pm "Factory Delivery Event" pick-ups have been texted their Model 3's will not be ready come back next year (with no tax credit). I advised them to show up anyway and play dumb since it is always a crazy time and some people will get drunk and forget to pick up their cars (just joking). Seriously, with all the employees pulled into this event, it will not be organized. I shared my 9/30/2018 story to help make sure every car gated out the door into the Fremont Factory Outboard Logistics Lot is SOLD!!

I will be at FDC 5-7 pm on 12/31/2019 and plan to head for the factory after that. I'll see if Tesla lets me Livestream it. It should be crazy times!

Russ Engle wrote:

"You might still get a car since some people will get cold feet, etc. They are *really* disorganized at end of quarter with all their internal volunteers that don't know what they are doing! It is a zoo in my experience and very fluid situation.

I will be volunteering this year on 12/31 and volunteered last year to show people how to pair their phones, etc.

Here is my 9/30/2018 last day of 2018 Q3 Model 3 story: (briefly) I'm a stockholder so I was doing them a favor I could have waited until Q4 with the same tax credit.

1. They let me out of my $2K+/month March 2016 Model X P90D lease 6 months early so I could buy a Model 3 Performance. Note it had to be a Performance model to cover their hit on the early lease return. Okay - whatever.

2. They were supposed to home deliver it to my Fremont house on 9/30 midday from their home delivery hub south of factory on Kato (used to be old Fremont service). No show and no contact. WTF?

3. I drove to said home delivery hub. The manager searched "no cars" for home delivery we're really sorry. Why don't you go to the Fremont Delivery Center to see if they can help you?

4. Drove to Fremont Delivery Center and talked to a manager who searched inventory: "We have a VIN we can give you, it's not Performance, and it is black instead of the white interior, would that work?" [me: Yes! I didn't really want Performance anyway since my wife didn't like it whenever I "launched" our Model X].

5. I asked like 5 times "Are you sure I can return the X 6 months early to buy this Model 3 Dual Motor w/ AP"? They called "Ownership Loyalty" and got approval.

6. Closed the deal on the iPad around 11 pm. Hung around to help other people with the basic operation of their new cars.

7. Left our Model X parked where they told me to. Was amazed to see the variety of old gassers people got rid of to get into a Tesla, from old clunkers to name brand Euro and Japanese models.

8. It took until January 2019(!!!) for TSLA and US Bank to inspect the 2016 Model X P90D and close out my lease. Good thing I saved a bunch of photos to document the condition. There were no extra charges except for some extra miles.

Bottom line: Tesla is all hands on deck 12/31/2019. If I were in your shoes, I would just show up with my original email invitation (play dumb) and try to pick up your car. if they can locate a Model 3 that meets your requirements they will definitely sell it to you to help their 2019 Q4 and 2019 annual sales and financials.

You might even see Elon there if he's in town at this "event". He dropped by on 12/31/2017 with former CFO Uhuja at Fremont Delivery Center. My friend said CFO was personally "approving" personal checks to pay cash! No kidding.

Worst case you can enjoy a special Tesla event with DJ, food, and drinks (if it's like other "events" I've attended), and meet some other owners.

Good luck!!

Russ"
 
They said that GF3 is currently body and assembly only. I assume all this will be done in China soon e.g. Q2. "Know" might be a strong word. That is my best guess based on the incomplete information we have.

I took "body and assembly only" to mean everything but the powertrain. Seats are labor-intensive and the labor in China is considerably cheaper than Freemont. It would be easy to replicate the seat making shop in China so I've been under the assumption it wouldn't take any longer than getting the general production lines ready so that's how they would roll. It will boost margins.
 
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If those employees are customers, and the cars become their personal property, then I think they count as deliveries and quite a few GF3 Q4 costs would attach to those units - and this could indeed help Q1 profitability.

Tesla did this in July 2017: just ~22 units delivered to employees in Q3"17 IIRC, and they were counted as deliveries in their Q3 financial report.

The CoGs of the thousands of units they made in November-December would carry over into Q1, but that's OK and standard accounting practice.
I also wonder if there are any internal or compensation targets that get triggered by deliveries prior to Q1 2020...
 
I took "body and assembly only" to mean everything but the powertrain. Seats are labor-intensive and the labor in China is consideraably cheaper than Freemont. It would be easy to replicate the seat making shop in China so I've been under the assumption it wouldnn't take any longer than getting the general production lines ready so that's how they would roll. It will boost margins.

o_O Seats are a whole factory in of themselves...

Behind The Scenes At Tesla's Seat Factory — #CleanTechnica Field Trip | CleanTechnica

So it is another large area with a lot of robots... And since the Fremont seat factory can produce way more seats than currently needed it is probably lower on their priority list to get set in China.
 
I want to add some of my thoughts on the accounting for GF3. First some background on me

Lol, you should have included this recent Group Photo of the "2019 TMC Investor Discussions" senior membership in your comment!



And yes, that IS @KarenRei sitting with her head in her hands thinking "what are these old FOOLS talkin' 'bout? They have NO CLUE!!"

Cheers, and a very Happy 2020 to all.
Lodger

P.S. Yes, that's @UncaNed standing 2nd from the Right. ;)

P.P.S. Bonus points to the member who recognizes @Lycanthrope here in Brussels
 
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I guess the question is do they have enough Q1 demand for 105k+ deliveries? There could be a temporary dip. But let's hope that does not happen.
I think you're stuck in 2019. GF1/Sparks is at 10K Model 3 packs per week RIGHT NOW. Those Model 3s will all get built, whether at Fremont or at GF3/Shanghai. They'll adjust pack shipping as required.

That's about 120K Model 3s, plus if we add in a conservative 15K (likely higher) Models S/X from Fremont, thats at least 135K production for 2020Q1.

Logistics will actually be better than 2019 due to the presence of GF3, so the percentage of delivered/produced vehicles may actually increase.

Cheers!
 
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