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

[lklundin]

sorry if already posted.

Big Short’s Eisman Ends Bet Against Tesla, Calling It Cult-Like

Eisman covers. Appears to have covered in the recent past. Not to be confused with Einhorn.

Having read the article, I have to wonder what Eisman will think of GM once Model Y and especially Cybertruck starts taking market share. And GM Cruise? Really?

 

[Cherry Wine]

How do you know this?

I'm just looking at the standing buy orders on the order book. There was about $100M sitting between the bid-ask and $700. As of now I think it's around $60M as we broke through $750.

It also makes sense psychologically. The price gapped up so fast that a lot of potential investors missed their ticket to the train the first go 'round, and an expected correction is their chance to get on board.

Third, nothing about the company has changed fundamentally. The action leading up to earnings, which got us to that $650 level in the first place, was more of a short hug / re-evaluation than a squeeze, and I think is not a level far below which the stock will drop for long barring a calamity within the markets / the company.

Just my $0.02.

Yea, I'm not much of a day trader. Guess I screwed up. If it drops more tomorrow I will buy some back, if not I only sold 3 shares for ~160% profit. I'm not a big time investor like some people here, I just took my $5k refund Tesla gave me last year and purchased their stock with it Wish I sold yesterday though, but no big deal I guess.

If you hold shares and not options, you'll get your chance at those levels again.

I just got off the phone with one of my friends. I sold enough shares yesterday at 959, just minutes before the crash, to pay off my house. He called to ask me how I knew when to sell?!? I had to tell him I really had no idea. It just hit a number that I had in my head for a long time as a goal to pay off my house. If I knew it was going to drop, I would have sold all my shares and bought back in after this dip. When we hung up, I still don't think he believed me...

I took some profit yesterday too. I think a lot of folks did, especially call holders, because the rapid run-up created an enormous amount of wealth for those folks that made it very difficult to resist the temptation to sell. This is a big part of today's move, in my opinion. Helped along by our short friends, of course.

This squeeze (may I call it a squeeze ?) will end up being a wealth transfer of ~ $350k to me from the shorts.

I want to take this moment to thank them, and to invite them to the next party.

Now, back to our regularly scheduled 10 year horizon. Go Tesla !!

Indeed. It's nice to pour a decent chunk of that wealth back into Tesla the company, both for the stock but also the planet and future generations. I can't imagine what the other side would be doing with it.

 

[Curt Renz]

So who is selling based on Ralph Nader attacking Tesla and Musk? He is on CNBC calling for an SEC investigation for insider trading. I wonder how much he is short TSLA.

Here is the interview on CNBC this morning of "new stock market analyst" Ralph Nader. Decades ago he made his name as a lawyer investigating car safety, which has nothing to do with his argument against Tesla. We can give credit to the anchor for being incredulous that Nader offered no evidence for his claim that a Tesla insider has been manipulating the stock. It appears more like Nader himself is attempting to practice stock manipulation.

 

[lklundin]

He didn't get into specifics, just complained about Musk promising things (he called it puffery) and how the price has gone up beyond any reason. So this has to be insider trading. He said he actually likes what Tesla is doing with EVs and solar energy but thinks this is all manipulation. He is clueless about the real manipulation of course.

Nader is clueless. Without any selling from share holders with inside information, there can be no insider trading. Clueless and apparently desperate for attention.

 

[Nocturnal]

Can anyone remind me of when we expect battery day? I want to start watching calls for a couple weeks after that.

Before the Cybertruck reveal, I decided to go very aggressive with a $6000 call bet. Yesterday, for a brief moment, that bet hit 1 million.

I'm oddly calm today despite that dropping more than half. The calls still have plenty of time and I think I'll still have an opportunity to win that lotto. Even if it doesn't, I still took out a decent win a few weeks ago, so I can sleep well at night.

Your nerves are far stronger than mine. If it's still a ways to expiration I'd wager you have a good shot at getting back there.

Nader is clueless. Without any selling from share holders with inside information, there can be no insider trading. Clueless and apparently desperate for attention.

Fair or not, his legacy is that he helped GW win (which resulted in Iraq, Syria, etc. etc.) rather than his history of saving lives by pushing the auto industry to care about safety. It's still confusing why he is set against attacking the safest car company out there. I don't want to slam somebody for their age, but he's just probably a little too old to understand Tesla. ​

 

[Alphacrux]

Not sure if this has been posted already:
Speculation flies after tech entrepreneur Elon Musk changes Twitter bio location to Austin

 

[scubastevo80]

Jeez, I don't know what people are complaining for. Apparently most are speculating instead of investing.
View attachment 508206

I'm sure there are quite a few speculators here, but many investors as well - I, for one, plan to hold TSLA long-term if they continue to fire on all cylinders. That said... in looking at yesterday's parabolic chart, I decided to reduce my position size (TSLA was 2x my target weight) by half. When I did that, I told myself I would buy back in the following day on a meaningful drop to lock in some gains. I personally ended up selling yesterday at $935 and buying back this morning at $760. I was willing to take that risk and am happy with the trade.

Fortunately or unfortunately, I'm now locked into holding that position for 60 days due to my company's personal trading requirements.

 

[VT_EE]

Licensing battery tech to accelerate electrification may not make the best sense (for a few reason) in my option.

Ultimately, one or many of the majors will have to merge with Tesla as maybe the fastest way. In the merger deal, Tesla will get all their useful production facilities and land. Shareholders in the majors will convert their stock to tsla. All "transition" costs of factories and employees will be negotiated and also be a determinate of stock deal.

As far as the unions of the majors, they will renegotiate contracts with Tesla. They either decide to stick with dying majors and their organization structures, or transition to Tesla and negotiate a deal that works for them under the new electric car and solar&storage world. It will be a clean slate that they can start with a better outcome right away and consult with current Tesla employees as to the benefits and non-benefits of their working conditions and compensation. Also, technical and engineering training in EVs, solar, and energy storage will be very enticing as well. Employees of the majors can now have the opinion for long term career path security in the emerging mega industries. It will allow for mass transition without uncertainty of unemployment as ICE manufacturers downsize. Instead of worry, excitement of new long term stability could take hold. They have the option to join solar, energy storage, or vehicle etc., teams.

If it only makes sense to Tesla and shareholders, this will very much accelerate the transition to sustainable production and consumption. I think with an eventual road map for monopoly break up will also be required since at a certain point Tesla will provoke governments to determine it non-innovate and harmful to continued economic/social prosperity as structured. But this is far off, but nessessary to get governments further on board. I also think this could lead to governments focus on investment in road networks to upgrade for better vehicle AI safety as well as accelerate vehicle autonomy across the fleet.

As opposed to licensing, we as shareholders might be closer to getting full electrification through an eventual push for merger/acquisition deal with the majors for assets and employees/talent.

This would cause all kinds of problems with dealer franchise laws. The new entity would have to use existing dealers. I don’t see Musk ever merging with existing majors.

 

[woodisgood]

And shorts are more prone to panic if it pumps to $1,000+, it goes both ways. Anyway I'm happy that I unloaded most of my calls yesterday, still have some $1,000 calls for March that I bought for a pack of turkey jerky and a few ITM calls for 2021 that I bought for about 30 8-foot 2x4s from Home Depot. Still long tons of shares, might sell 50 of them at $900 so we can blow past $1,000

See this is why you're you and I'm me. I buy the damn 2x4s.

 

[M3Rider]

When I was modeling that, I was trying to mirror the 2013 move and Bitcoin's parabolic move. If it rebounds and breaks $1,000 this week, then yes, replace those numbers and expect some serious carnage

Does it have to be this week? MMs can have their Max pain for all I care if we're back to the old growth pattern on Mon.

 

[Mkorpal]

Your nerves are far stronger than mine. If it's still a ways to expiration I'd wager you have a good shot at getting back there.

6/19s, so I feel like I have at least a month before I start to worry about time. I suspect I'll have another shot in that time. And I'm ITM with them now, so if this is the base, I'm in good shape.

 

[Prunesquallor]

Elon Musk
@elonmusk
Gentrify Mordor?

Y 77.9%
N 22.1%
298,394 votes · Final results
4:31 AM · Nov 14, 2019·Twitter for iPhone

Gentrify = build a gigafactory
Mordor = place where Tesla is not allowed to sell directly

Mordor - heart of ICE Truck country.

 

[davecolene0606]

Here is the interview on CNBC this morning of "new stock market analyst" Ralph Nader. Decades ago he made his name as a lawyer investigating car safety, which has nothing to do with his argument against Tesla. We can give credit to the anchor for being incredulous that Nader offered no evidence for his claim that a Tesla insider has been manipulating the stock. It appears more like Nader himself is attempting to practice stock manipulation.

Not be be redundant, but...

MSM policy “everyone is equal, everyone gets a say with equal weight without regard to qualification or experience”

oh, and has ponied up the customary “appearance fee”

“You decide”


Fire Away!
(It’s the batteries, Stupid!)

 

[lklundin]

With some shame I have to admit I temporarily got shaken out. So yeah, I'm a weak long now. I rode it all the way down from 350 to 178 and kept buying. The lowering of my average price insulated me against the drop last spring.

But the last 20 hours the manipulations, the huge movements and the amounts at stake were getting too much for me. So I cashed out at 760 this morning with a profit op $520k (yep, I know I could have chosen a much better moment as that is near the low).

I will look if I can get back in over the next weeks when things settle down, because I fully believe in the long term prospects of this company. Maybe I'll start writing puts and buying long-term calls, but I first need to switch provider to be able to do that as my current provider does't offer options. Sorry guys for participating in this drop.

You need to consider the risk that your portfolio transfer can take much longer than anticipated and that during such time you may be unable to trade. From I started the process of opening my new account (with Interactive Brokers) and until I had my portfolio transferred (until which point I could not really trade), 30 days went by. Since you seem to be flush with cash now, it should be much faster, but you should still take care not to get left behind when the SP takes off again.

Btw, from yesterday's intraday peak, I am down 240k€ (on paper), so that's a new thing to experience. I did buy a single call option, betting that the SP will recover in the coming weeks, just to get something out of the trading day...

 

[anthonyj]

Does it have to be this week? MMs can have their Max pain for all I care if we're back to the old growth pattern on Mon.

Imagine how defeated shorts would feel and the FOMO that would occur if Tesla broke $1,000 this week. If institutional investors were behind this huge move up, then I don't think Max Pain matters anyway.

 

[Cherry Wine]

Another thought: is it accurate to think that if so many people sold to close their calls yesterday (and it sounds like a ton did), that MMs would have delta hedged by selling shares?

 

[Leo9]

Looks almost ready to move again..

 

[AquaMan]

My opinion, as a complete idiot, on the recent action:

First of all, I believe TSLA is going to $2,000 and beyond. I'm apprehensive about the reality of FSD, but Tesla doesn't need every Model 3 to be a potential robotaxi to be wildly successful.

What happened yesterday was total BS, but given the crazy quick rise in SP, TSLA was quite vulnerable to such an attack, which, after it ended, continued to shake out out a lot of weak hands. (Among them, me, but I rode out the drop for a pretty long time.) I honestly believe there were a lot of "euphoric chasers" driving it up. Fast... scary fast... as I expressed above several days ago.

I went to cash this morning at around $780 SP, while I still had double my initial deposit. My account net worth was at 25X my initial deposit late yesterday. If it had maintained its momentum just one more day, my account net worth would have nearly doubled again in one day to 40X my initial deposit, because I was being VERY aggressive with near-term, high strike calls... as I always intended to be when I opened my account. And as I will be again. I just hope the move is a bit slower this time, which will make it less vulnerable. Again, zero regrets.

The way I see it, even though my account net worth dropped a LOT, I didn't lose a penny because I don't "own" the money until I sell. I expected the volatility, otherwise I would have put my money elsewhere.

Personally I'll need to see it stabilize before I get long again. And I definitely will. When it climbs again, I just hope it does so a bit more slowly. Maybe we're at the bottom, but I'm not confident enough about that to get back in quite yet. Maybe tomorrow. Maybe Monday.

The good news is, we've been above $900 already, which means it's easier to get there again. The other good news: This actually wasn't a major "shakeout" as it may feel for some, especially fellow aggressive options traders like myself (gamblers). The current price was an all-time high just two days ago.

(Yes, this is advice, but it's from a complete idiot.)

I expect a few "disagree" votes. That's cool. But know I'm being sincere.

 

[Thekiwi]

Waiting for the inevitable IV crush before getting back into LEAPs.

 

[StealthP3D]

The TSLA chart kind of looks like the VW short squeeze.

I don't see any meaningful similarities. And I wouldn't expect to. Two completely different situations.