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

[jhm]

Tesla Is Once Again the Most Shorted American Stock

Yay!!! That's more shares for the rest of us.

 

[Mike Smith]

Tesla stock could hit $6,000 in five years, says ARK Invest CEO

1) Tasha clearly nod nod wink winks at 1:07 that they'll be upping their price target in the next few weeks ("I can't disclose what the number will be, but look out for it"). The market is increasingly paying attention to what ARK says about Tesla.

2) She makes an excellent point that many TSLA analysts are probably about to have their coverage taken away and be replaced by tech analysts, who will have much higher price targets.

3) ARK is becoming famous as the firm that got Tesla right. 12.5% of all incoming contributions go straight into TSLA.

 

[Artful Dodger]

Half-time Report:

SP: $531.82
Vol: 10.0m Shares
​

Update:

VWAP: $531.8177
Volume: 10,045,653
Traded: $5,342,456,319.87​

So that 12:45 EST (half-time) spot price was 'XACTLY == VWAP

Yeah, TSLA on Wall St is just...

Cheers!

Kabuki Theatre (TSLA Ed.) - Wed, Jan 15, 2020

Summary for today's session: (as of 4:00 pm EST Close)

VWAP: $529.39 (full-day)
Volume: 17,091,868
Traded: $9,048,255,046.21​

So, we can note these two things about the Afternoon:

• only 7,046,215 shares traded in the 2nd half of today's session
• the 2nd half ASP ($525.84) was much higher than the Closing SP ($518.50)

Let's also examine vol and ASP from 14:45 hrs to the Close at 16:00 hrs

VWAP: $522.02 (final 1.25 hrs)
Volume: 3,724,287
Traded: $1,944,135,495.72​

More than half of the Afternoon's trading (52.9%) was done in the final 1:15 hrs (38.5%) of the Afternoon. That's also an increase of 1.8 x the volume of the early part of the Afternoon (27.7k min vs 49.7k/min).

This has all the signs of a classical bear raid:

• Wait for low-volume lull in trading
• pounce on Macros with a huge mulipler (5.5x vs the NASDAQ-100 ndx)

TL;dr Don't worry about this *sugar*. It'll pass. And don't let those nasty bares scare you into dropping your shares. #RIGHTBRAIN

UPDATE 2: Daily Short Selling volume

Date: 01/15/20
Shares Shorted: 4,617,649
FINRA Reported: 8,031,615
Short Percent: 57.49%​

Now keep in mind, this data source is for FINRA members only. Other large players like Market Makers may not be included in these reports, but we can at least estimate the size their impact by finding the relative volume of trades that is NOT reported via FINRA. For today, that is:

17,270,303 NASDAQ reported shares - 8,031,615 FINRA reported shares =

9,238,688 (53.5%) shares traded via non-FINRA agencies

That's got to have some effect when the stock drops $20 on low volume.​

Cheers!

 

[TradingInvest]

Firstly, here are the camouflaged cars from today's Wuwa video:

View attachment 500549​

Observations:

• Since they are parked next to Model 3's they are clearly not Model Y's, as Model Y's are visibly taller.
• They don't seem to be longer than the regular Model 3's parked next to them.
  
• If they are just regular Model 3's, why are they camouflaged?

Secondly, the camouflaged Model 3 photos from a few months ago were not photoshopped to the best of my knowledge, they were taken by "JayinShanghai" in August and were posted in the September-November time frame:

Jay in Shanghai on Twitter

"Tesla Model 3 prototypes with potentially longer wheelbase spotted https://electrek.co/2019/10/29/tesla-model-3-prototype-longer-wheelbase-spotted/ via @FredericLambert"

"I was the one who took the photos back in August, here is another angle."

BTW., JayinShanghai is meanwhile working for Electrek I believe, his photos were certainly not a photoshop and not a joke.

BTW. #2, while browsing Twitter I also found this much higher resolution full-GF3 render attributed to Tesla China (this was posted back in November as well):

The "long wheelbase" speculation is I believe just an artifact of lens distortion from a bad smartphone photo:

Someone on Twitter did a comparison of the side photos:

Clearly it's just a regular Model 3 - possibly a MIC one, hence the wrap.

My guess is that those camouflaged Model 3's were from the very first trial production of GF3, and maybe the paint shop was not fully up yet so someone had the idea to use a camouflage wrap.

Or maybe first production had out of spec panel gaps and they hid them with the camouflage. If that was the intention it certainly worked!

Someone online said his friend owns those two camouflaged Model 3s. It's not really a camouflage, his friend owns a factory that produces chess boards.

 

[Tim S]

Maybe I am just not following the logic here. Index funds don't make money buying or selling stock but make it on their service fees. So they don't care what the price is for a new member so I don't think there will be much front running on stock purchasing. Now that is not saying others won't want to make a play for inclusion. It looks to me that inclusion could pop stock 5%on announcement based on ServiceNow(NOW) recent inclusion.(not that TSLA trades like any other stock) I didn't look to see what short interest they had. I do think being in the S+P may mellow out price moves after a stabilizing period.

ServiceNow's stock jumps on cloud company's addition to the S&P 500

I maybe wrong but I don't think making it in S+P is going to move the stock much. I hope I am proved wrong.
I remember a stock that I traded that went from OTC to Nasdaq listing and every one thought it would rocket on listing.
It was a big yawn event- (so I guess that was priced in)

trailhound

NOW is up about 15% in less than 2 months since it was added to the S&P 500 in November.

It was also up about 20% in the month leading up to S&P inclusion. I'm sure some of that was frontrunning.

 

[mickificki]

@DaveT out with another video analyzing Ark’s Kathie Wood(s?) $6000 target in 2024. Nice to hear another solid viewpoint.

 

[pz1975]

I added a new baby to my Tesla family today - ordered a Model Y to replace my 2013 Model S! Sorry for the OT but I needed to share my excitement with someone...and who better than here?

 

[Fact Checking]

This is an interesting trend, lithium prices have more than halved in 2019 after the Chinese halving of the EV subsidy:

Subscribe to read | Financial Times

This should eventually roll into Tesla's battery prices with the 12-month trailing formula they are using with Panasonic.

A very coarse approximation of the effect of this on margins:

• If ~80 kWh cells in a Model 3 LR contain about 63 kg of lithium-carbonate, the ~55 kWh SR+ pack contains about 43 kg, and if the sales mix is 50%/50%, then the average per unit consumption would be 53 kg of battery-grade lithium-carbonate powder.
• The Model S/X battery size is 100 kWh, ~78 kg of lithium-carbonate.
  
• With 92,550 Model 3 deliveries and 19,450 Model S/X deliveries Tesla used approximately 6,400 metric tons of lithium-carbonate. If prices dropped from the $23,000 peak to $9,000, then the cost of that went from $147m to $57m - a $90m improvement in margins at current production levels.
  
• If we assume that due to the 12-months trailing average the shift in spot prices was delayed, this would give Tesla an about $20-$30m improvement in GAAP profits per quarter - certainly not peanuts.

If that and the drop in the price of other raw materials like is what drove the Model 3 margins improvement in Q3, then I'd expect Model 3 margins to further improve in Q4. So after initially disagreeing, I now concur with @KarenRei that further margin improvements are a potential upside to Q4 earnings.

 

[jhm]

The price is back down to where it was on monday...

And that's where Grumpy old guy likes it. Over $540 is trouble. Trouble, I tell you! But $520 is just right.

 

[Dare]

Tesla stock could hit $6,000 in five years, says ARK Invest CEO

1) Tasha clearly nod nod wink winks at 1:07 that they'll be upping their price target in the next few weeks ("I can't disclose what the number will be, but look out for it"). The market is increasingly paying attention to what ARK says about Tesla.

2) She makes an excellent point that many TSLA analysts are probably about to have their coverage taken away and be replaced by tech analysts, who will have much higher price targets.

3) ARK is becoming famous as the firm that got Tesla right. 12.5% of all incoming contributions go straight into TSLA.

What a great interview! A positive and friendly environment with hosts that are both knowledgable and ready to learn. Unlike some other channels...

 

[fdutra1]

Kabuki Theatre (TSLA Ed.) - Wed, Jan 15, 2020

Summary for today's session: (as of 4:00 pm EST Close)

VWAP: $529.39 (full-day)
Volume: 17,091,868
Traded: $9,048,255,046.21​

So, we can note these two things about the Afternoon:

• only 7,046,215 shares traded in the 2nd half of today's session
• the 2nd half ASP ($525.84) was much higher than the Closing SP ($518.50)

Let's also examine vol and ASP from 14:45 hrs to the Close at 16:00 hrs

VWAP: $522.02 (final 1.25 hrs)
Volume: 3,724,287
Traded: $1,944,135,495.72​

More than half of the Afternoon's trading (52.9%) was done in the final 1:15 hrs (38.5%) of the Afternoon. That's also an increase of 1.8 x the volume of the early part of the Afternoon (27.7k min vs 49.7k/min).

This has all the signs of a classical bear raid:

• Wait for low-volume lull in trading
• pounce on Macros with a huge mulipler (5.5x vs the NASDAQ-100 ndx)

TL;dr Don't worry about this *sugar*. It'll pass. And don't let those nasty bares scare you into dropping your shares. #RIGHTBRAIN

I'll UPDATE in about 45 min after the Daily Short Selling volume numbers are out.

Cheers!

Thanks for that info. I left my trading desk about an hour before close thinking that the market wasn't going to do much before close,,,, wrong! BTW what is the ASP?

 

[Artful Dodger]

I added a new baby to my Tesla family today - ordered a Model Y to replace my 2013 Model S! Sorry for the OT but I needed to share my excitement with someone...and who better than here?

Congrats! So when's the est'd delivery date? Inquiring minds want to know!

Cheers!

 

[Nocturnal]

Tesla stock could hit $6,000 in five years, says ARK Invest CEO

1) Tasha clearly nod nod wink winks at 1:07 that they'll be upping their price target in the next few weeks ("I can't disclose what the number will be, but look out for it"). The market is increasingly paying attention to what ARK says about Tesla.

2) She makes an excellent point that many TSLA analysts are probably about to have their coverage taken away and be replaced by tech analysts, who will have much higher price targets.

3) ARK is becoming famous as the firm that got Tesla right. 12.5% of all incoming contributions go straight into TSLA.

Yeah it was crazy hearing her imply a higher target. Even 6k in 5 years is hard to imagine but their logic is straight forward.

I added a new baby to my Tesla family today - ordered a Model Y to replace my 2013 Model S! Sorry for the OT but I needed to share my excitement with someone...and who better than here?
View attachment 500575

No roadster? What, do you not like Tesla?​

 

[⚡️ELECTROMAN⚡️]

Responding to @StealthP3D's comment to @Vines

If the current price action is causing you to question your buy and hold strategy, that suggests to me that you really aren't comfortable or ready for buy and hold. You are instead a day or at least short term trader (in my lexicon, any trade that is influenced by this particular quarter's execution, numbers, results; that's short term). Any trade influenced by daily changes in share price - that's a short term trade.

For buy and hold, what you're looking for are changes in company strategy and/or prospects for the company strategy to succeed. These changes don't happen on a quarterly basis, nor are they influenced by details in the quarterly results. In Tesla's case specifically, a car that isn't delivered this quarter is a car delivered next quarter. Assuming no incentives, the revenue and profit are the same.


I'm personally a buy and hold investor. A few months back when the share price was under $200, I wrote then that I was as concerned about the $1xx share price as I would be by a $4xx share price. I didn't expect to see $4xx or $5xx (I didn't include it in my example), but in both cases they mean the same thing - nothing. I own exactly as many shares of the company now as I did then.

I grant that waking up to a $5xx share price is more fun than a $1xx share price, but nothing has happened in the last few months to change my investment thesis for the company - it continues to be a 10+ year horizon and a belief / expectation that at some point the company will be trading at $5xxx - an order of magnitude from here. Since I've read an investment thesis that prices out to $5x,xxx by 2030, all of the price action the last few months qualifies as noise. Even in the $5,xxx outcome, recent price action is just noise (where recent encompasses the trip down to $1xx, and the current trip to $5xx). If you're short term, such an idea is outlandish.


The big thing here, and we can use Tesla as our example - back in 2013, the shares had been trading in a range in the $20s and $30s. People were getting into the groove, short term trading the swings back and forth. Life was good for short term trading. And then there was a surprise profitable quarter and the share price disconnected from its trading history. It took 6 months(ish) and the shares had established a new trading range - $130-$180. In today's share price dollars, that'll be a move from the $300s to the $1300-1800 range.

Have we experience the same disconnect from the previous trading history? Maybe. Maybe not. I don't know. I know that I expect it to happen sooner or later and I don't want to be scavenging for pennies in front of the steamroller when it happens (besides - I don't have the time or energy to trade short term).

I do know that I personally suck at short term trading (any trading that depends on quarterly results, or shorter term), and I know that if I noticed that stuff, then I'd have sold out of that last run that turned into my first 10 bagger.

And if I noticed that stuff today, then I'm confident that I'd be selling out of my next 10 bagger just in time to avoid it.


I write all that, to maybe help you see what a buy and hold mentality looks like, and what you'll need to wrap your brain around. There are plenty of situations where buy and hold isn't the right approach - I don't know what's right for you, but if you think buy and hold is right for you, then I suggest strategy over deliveries for the focus of your research and study.

But it’s just so tempting to gamble and try to sell at the peaks, and then buy back at the bottom with these huge price swings we’ve seen in the last few years. It’s a psychological battle for me. With today’s price action I’m feeling like we hit the peak and will start heading back down. Still waiting to see more of a trend though, but this is the first time my gut is telling me to get out since the run up after the Q3 earnings report. Hopefully the gut’s just being paranoid. This stock has given me a bit of PTSD over the last four years. I guess that was your point. Just buy, hold and relax.

 

[neezer]

Men’s Cybertruck Bulletproof Tee

How awesome is it that they monetized this? Haha!

 

[neezer]

Why you likely don't own Tesla, explains CEO Tom Lydon

 

[ZsoZso]

Yes, I see Blackrock at #5 and the Saudi PIF at #3.
What I am not seeing is Tencent! I remember a few years back in similar Dec-Jan time frame a big run-up was attributed to them accumulating and they stopped just shy of 5%. But I do not see them on the table.
Did they sell off their shares? Was that contributing to the mid-2019 sub-200 era ?

This was bugging me so I did a bit more googling around to see if I can find anything about the disappearance of Tencent's investment in Tesla. Unfortunately, I could not find any specific mention and the Nasdaq institutional-holdings page does not appear on the wayback machine either, so I can't find older versions of the list to compare.

What I found about the Tencent Tesla investment / links:
1. Plenty of articles from March 2017 reporting that Tencent bought 5% of Tesla shares.
2. Several later mentions of the same info with no update on change in ownership
3. Couple of articles about some negative findings of a Tencent lab relating to Tesla auto-pilot from April 2nd 2019:
Tencent Keen Security Lab Proves Tesla Autopilot Can be Tricked - Pandaily
Tencent lab publishes findings on Tesla Autopilot flaws
4. A report about Tesla-arcade including various Tencent titles as entertainment options in cars, but with no mention of any ownership or tighter relationship between Tencent and Tesla from Dec.20, 2019:
Tesla Arcade in China to get online multiplayer titles from Tencent

So, all of this provides no solid data about when Tencent dumped its Tesla ownership.
I can only speculate, that after the security lab's negative findings in April, and considering the bad Q1'19 ER, they decided to get out of TSLA and they contributed to driving down the share price to its sub-180 low.

If anybody has more specific information about when Tencent sold their shares, I'd love to learn about it!

 

[dl003]

NOW is up about 15% in less than 2 months since it was added to the S&P 500 in November.

It was also up about 20% in the month leading up to S&P inclusion. I'm sure some of that was frontrunning.

I think Tesla's SP 500 inclusion is going to be very different, if only because of the high short %. SP 500 inclusion will mark the end of an era of rampant FUDs. The squeeze is going to be bad. They're still holding on to an imaginary tough Q1 but that ain't gonna happen.

 

[NicoV]

Do you think S&P inclusion isn't priced in yet?

The S&P500 trackers still need to buy. No way to know what that effect will be.

 

[pz1975]

Congrats! So when's the est'd delivery date? Inquiring minds want to know!

Cheers!

It says "late next year", obviously not updated yet for 2020 so late 2020. Note I am in Canada and we always get new models months after the US starts getting their deliveries.