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

[Krugerrand]

Funny Tesla Model 3 story; so a good friend who LOVES their car and is not a car person tells me last night at dinner that they took their 3 into service.

I asked what was wrong with it. They said nothing, but they’d had it for over a year and 25,000 miles so something must need to be serviced.

I was like —

As you’d expect, Tesla sent them on their way and said come back in another year. My friend is having a hard time wrapping their brain around that.

 

[Fact Checking]

In 2015, I took a position in Maxwell on the theory that ultra capacitors would somehow be useful in BEVs. Specifically, I was hoping that something would develop with Tesla. (As an aside---after 4 years of holding, I actually lost about 20% on the merger).

Btw., the Maxwell merger happened when TSLA was worth around $260, so in the end that investment, after going to 80% of value, went up 2.6-fold, so the total return should be over +100% now.

Had Volkswagen bought them you'd probably still be at -20%. Had nobody bought them you might be at -100%...

So if you kept the TSLA shares then this wasn't a bad investment, considering the alternative outcomes.

 

[mongo]

Isn't there a Boring forum/thread?

Elon's not gonna do any kind of nationwide boring rollout. This is a trial run for boring habitats on Mars. Period. They'll do whatever number of projects get them ready for that.

Point taken, I'll go there after this. However, I say Boring is useful here on (in?) Terra beyond practice for Mars.

1900' in seven weeks. Now that might include some time to get the tunnels going, drilling vertical shafts. Still that is less than 60' a day and I gave credit for 100'. The cost...I think a gross under exaggeration, the cost of a 1 mile project in Las Vegas is over $50million. Say they cut the costs by 75% as they gain experience and scale that it still just a dense urban area use case and even then not for old bankrupt cities.

Boring is using the second gen machine, not they third that they are developing.
The 1.14 mile test tunnel cost less than 10 million.
The 50 million for Vegas includes 3 tunnels (one pedestrian), 3 stations, the pods, and such. It is not just digging costs.
Any project will look worse per mile cost wise the shorter the distance is.
Regarding progress, Vegas started in November and is at 2,900 feet on the first tunnel as of Jan 30.
Renderings of the project:
Las Vegas News Bureau

 

[Singuy]

No. Elon consistently shoots down super cap ideas. When will people believe him?

He even explains why. Tesla batteries of today can produce more power than the motor can handle and charging time is not much different than a super capacitor with V3. So it's over for super capacitors. There's zero point having them in a car since they are terrible at holding energy.

 

[mrdoubleb]

No. Elon consistently shoots down super cap ideas. When will people believe him?

About the same time they'll stop asking him about S/X moving to 2170s.

 

[Hock1]

Btw., the Maxwell merger happened when TSLA was worth around $260, so in the end that investment, after going to 80% of value, went up 2.6-fold, so the total return should be over +100% now.

Had Volkswagen bought them you'd probably still be at -20%. Had nobody bought them you might be at -100%...

So if you kept the TSLA shares then this wasn't a bad investment, considering the alternative outcomes.

Yes. But I was never going to get more than $4.75 so I sold around $4.72 and bought more Tesla when I wanted to as opposed to waiting. Is there another point you have or are you just playing Monday morning quarterback?

 

[Curt Renz]

The On-Demand, Autonomous & Electric Disruption of Transportation

Tony Seba - January 8:

 

[TheTalkingMule]

Btw., the Maxwell merger happened when TSLA was worth around $260, so in the end that investment, after going to 80% of value, went up 2.6-fold, so the total return should be over +100% now.

Had Volkswagen bought them you'd probably still be at -20%. Had nobody bought them you might be at -100%...

So if you kept the TSLA shares then this wasn't a bad investment, considering the alternative outcomes.

So one of the absolute top battery/cap firms that Elon found important enough to acquire would have been worth nothing today had the acquisition not gone through? Ah.....no.

Elon likely got a bargain, leveraging the fact that he was(is) out on the frontier bidding against no one. Pretty sure the Toyotas/Fords of the world would be or will be scrambling to pay 3x what Elon paid just to try and catch up.

 

[Fact Checking]

Yes. But I was never going to get more than $4.75 so I sold around $4.72 and bought more Tesla when I wanted to as opposed to waiting. Is there another point you have or are you just playing Monday morning quarterback?

My point is that Maxwell shareholders who held on to their TSLA shares gained about +150% of returns through the increase in Tesla valuation - so your point about losing 20% on the Maxwell merger is technically true, but not the full story.

Likewise, other acquisitions Tesla made worked out well too: Grohmann, Hibar, Deepscale - and my favorite one: a Bay area trucking company was bought by Tesla for shares, probably at the insistence of the owner. Owners/shareholders of these acquisition targets made out very well.

 

[Fact Checking]

So one of the absolute top battery/cap firms that Elon found important enough to acquire would have been worth nothing today had the acquisition not gone through? Ah.....no.

The trajectory of the company was pretty obvious (contraction), their future tech was a moonshot and years from production. Maxwell execs and other shareholders would IMO have loved to see a bidding war between Tesla and anyone else, but no-one came. Personally I was amazed nobody else was bidding, but that's what happened.

Super positive outcome for both Tesla and for Maxwell employees/shareholders IMO.

 

[Cosmacelf]

Yes. But I was never going to get more than $4.75 so I sold around $4.72 and bought more Tesla when I wanted to as opposed to waiting. Is there another point you have or are you just playing Monday morning quarterback?

He wasn't criticizing your Maxwell purchase, quite the opposite. Even though you bought Maxwell at a premium (compared to the eventual acquisition price), your thesis was sound and eventually would have made a holder of Maxwell shares whole.

I think the point being that buying strategic battery cell related companies isn't a bad idea.

 

[juanmedina]

Vanguard has matched free trading for stocks that everyone else is doing. Wouldn't you think they will eventually do fractional shares?

It seems like everyone is slowly moving in that direction. Fidelity just did. Vanguard next?

I guess.... by phycologically it feels like the shares cost too much at the current price vs buying splitted shares at a lower price

 

[goinfraftw]

Off topic a bit, but anyone know more about the situation in Kenya?

'This Is Huge': Worst Locust Swarm in Decades Destroy Crops in East Africa

"A changing climate has contributed to 'exceptional' breeding conditions, said Nairobi-based climate scientist Abubakr Salih Babiker.

Migrating with the wind, the locusts can cover up to 150 kilometers (93 miles) in a single day. They look like tiny aircraft lazily crisscrossing the sky.

They are now heading toward Uganda and fragile South Sudan, where almost half the country faces hunger as it emerges from civil war. Uganda has not had such an outbreak since the 1960s and is already on alert."

...backed up by Google Trends as well.

MOD -
Yep: That is definitely Off Topic. If you feel the need to discuss, take it to the "Climate Change etc." thread. Not here.

 

[Hock1]

My point is that Maxwell shareholders who held on to their TSLA shares gained about +150% of returns through the increase in Tesla valuation - so your point about losing 20% on the Maxwell merger is technically true, but not the full story.

Likewise, other acquisitions Tesla made worked out well too: Grohmann, Hibar, Deepscale - and my favorite one: a Bay area trucking company was bought by Tesla for shares, probably at the insistence of the owner. Owners/shareholders of these acquisition targets made out very well.

I don't want to belabor this, but you may not realize that the deal was pegged, to Maxwell shareholders, at $4.75 worth of Tesla shares, no matter what price Tesla went to. There was no benefit to continuing to hold the Maxwell shares. Looking at it another way, Tesla paid a fixed price (in Tesla shares) for all Maxwell shares. This was never going to change. It took , iirc, several months to effect the transaction. Why wait for $4.75 worth of Tesla shares when I could sell immediately and choose when I wanted to purchased more Tesla? So, my 20% loss, for me was the whole story.

 

[EVDRVN]

He even explains why. Tesla batteries of today can produce more power than the motor can handle and charging time is not much different than a super capacitor with V3. So it's over for super capacitors. There's zero point having them in a car since they are terrible at holding energy.

Not true, the MY will have contacts on door handles that are connected to a triggered super cap off sentry mode.

 

[Hock1]

He wasn't criticizing your Maxwell purchase, quite the opposite. Even though you bought Maxwell at a premium (compared to the eventual acquisition price), your thesis was sound and eventually would have made a holder of Maxwell shares whole.

I think the point being that buying strategic battery cell related companies isn't a bad idea.

Thanks for trying to ameliorate this inane discussion. First, the gist of my original post was an attempt to relay to fellow shareholders somewhat unique information about Maxwell's technology and its potential benefit to Tesla. The fact that I lost 20% on my investment in Maxwell was just an aside that I thought was interesting and ironic. FC, and maybe you (IDK), are not understanding what I am saying. One more time: I invested in the company at about $6.00 per share. Maxwell, on the day that the merger was effected ceased to exist as an independent company. The price that was (eventually) paid to Maxwell shareholders was the equivalent of $4.75 per share of Maxwell. If I had held the stock until the merger was complete I would have gotten $4.75 in Tesla shares. It could have been Japanese yen, micrograms of gold, whatever. It was still $4.75. Ergo, a 20% loss on my investment. What FC would have done or what I could have, or should have done is immaterial.

 

[EV forever]

Funny Tesla Model 3 story; so a good friend who LOVES their car and is not a car person tells me last night at dinner that they took their 3 into service.

I asked what was wrong with it. They said nothing, but they’d had it for over a year and 25,000 miles so something must need to be serviced.

I was like —

As you’d expect, Tesla sent them on their way and said come back in another year. My friend is having a hard time wrapping their brain around that.

This morning as we were checking mail we saw one of those ‘courtesy’ letters from Honda dealership advising us to bring our Clarity FCEV for 2 year service. So that triggered questions if th Tesla needs to go in for any service. It has been 22 months already! I was planning to check the model 3 forum about that.

Now the clarity has already been to service 3 times in 23 months due to various recalls and other problems, once for 4 weeks to replace the entire fuel cell stack. No one ever talks about all these issues that these technologies have. Can’t wait to get rid of it and get the Y.

 

[Unpilot]

That right there is why I said ‘almost’.

*pushes summit button on Amazon order for case of arsenic*

Okeedokee then...heading back to work on antigravity/boring/bio defense mode device.

 

[Alphacrux]

This morning as we were checking mail we saw one of those ‘courtesy’ letters from Honda dealership advising us to bring our Clarity FCEV for 2 year service. So that triggered questions if th Tesla needs to go in for any service. It has been 22 months already! I was planning to check the model 3 forum about that.

Now the clarity has already been to service 3 times in 23 months due to various recalls and other problems, once for 4 weeks to replace the entire fuel cell stack. No one ever talks about all these issues that these technologies have. Can’t wait to get rid of it and get the Y.

I keep getting these spam mail letters saying “Warning: your factory warrantee on your 2019 TESLA may be expired! Return this form (along with your enclosed check) for EXTENDED WARRANTEE coverage”.

 

[JustSaying]

New tax law in US eliminated it for many.

How? Did I miss something? The limit of the deduction on new mortgages in excess of $750K?
Thanks...