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

[HG Wells]

Looks like Trump may impose tariffs on European cars.

The U.S. Commerce Department sent a report on Sunday to U.S. President Donald Trump that could unleash steep tariffs on imported cars

Commerce Department sends report to Trump that could unleash steep tariffs on imported cars

 

[elasalle]

Bill Gates says cow farts are one of the biggest problems - CNN Video

 

[shlokavica22]

You seem to be far more optimistic about Rivian than many of us that have watched what Tesla has gone through the past decade or so. Why is that?

They will not replicate TSLA.
TSLA plays the role of Icebreaker (Tesla- the ICEbreaker). The companies, coming after, will not compete in the same way. Most probably they will be "boutique" companies, or will be bought by someone else.

 

[shlokavica22]

Bill Gates says cow farts are one of the biggest problems - CNN Video

OT

Although the result is the same, some argue the exit point is different. Source- QI. (though I don't know how many non-UK people are familiar with this show).

 

[mongo]

Bill Gates says cow farts are one of the biggest problems - CNN Video

Burps are worse..
And all livestock only contribute 15% or so total...

But in reality, cow burps are much more problematic: 90 to 95 percent of the methane released by cows comes out of their mouths, while 5 to 10 percent is released in the form of manure and flatulence.

https://ideas.ted.com/methane-isnt-...-didnt-know-about-this-potent-greenhouse-gas/

 

[homer214]

Thanks, but no thanks. Super annoying is an understatement. Three minutes, tops and I was out.

“Blah, blah, blah” sums him up. I lasted 40 seconds and so regret giving him a click.

 

[Intl Professor]

OT except to the most generic thinking.

Courtesy of Google News which is doubtless generated using some level of AI:

AI is reinventing the way we invent

The article basically reports on the increasing difficulty and cost of innovation and how AI may help by analyzing data and generating new combinations not seen before which are worth investigating further. The goal is to better master the information available to cut the time and cost of innovation.

The review in the article of some research on new drugs has been done before. This piece's most interesting summary is with a Canadian materials lab. The idea is to extrapolate all possible combinations of atoms for a molecule, study how they might be constructed, what might be their expected properties, look for ways to construct them, examine the cost to produce them, and then try to make prototypes in the "real" world.

One takeaway that illustrates what Tesla might do to increase production is focus on the alien dreadnaught idea. Suppose you model production of a car, how each part might be made, all ways they might be put together, what might be its characteristics (performance, comfort, safety, etc.), how should you automate, when do you use people skills, then optimize each component and their relationships, then do alternative cost extrapolations, et cetera, et cetera. Of course I've conflated design and production with other considerations but that is the idea and it is a way to understand at least the complexity of the task of innovation and how it may be speeded up.

Then you could fire a whole bunch of engineers. Just kidding. Or not.

 

[scaesare]

Did we discuss this here before, or is Jack Richard the first one bringing this up (with a proof)?

If by "here" you mean in this thread, I'm unsure... but it's been discussed a number of times on this forum, notably in the several incarnations of the "When will the S/X get 2170's?" threads.

A number of us have maintained that it's the chemistry (and anode/cathode design) that dictates energy density, not the physical can... and that there's no reason the same chemistry and design can't be supplied in 18650 cells.

Nonetheless, there were a bunch of folks convinced that the 2170's had secret sauce despite early Model 3 pack estimates and specs suggesting otherwise. They were adamant the 18650 was inferior in density and that would mean the S/X would get 2170's soon, along with a significant change in pack capability.

While I agree that Jack's numbers could be a little off for the reasons other folks have mentioned, it's pretty clear the 2170's aren't significantly different form an energy density standpoint.

 

[MTL_HABS1909]

Bill Gates says cow farts are one of the biggest problems - CNN Video

I love how the headline says “Bill Gates says no one knows how to stop bovine flatulence”. Bill is a major investor in Impossible Foods which makes a vegan burger that tastes 99.99% exactly like cow meat. So Bill already knows the solution....

 

[SO16]

You should go work for Atlis and raise $1.4B, I am sure they will give you a good commission.

We know Jeff Bezos didn't do his due diligence. He gives out half a billion dollars like candy. Being a total fool with money is how you get to a net worth of $133B.

I’m sure he meant “easy” as “comparatively speaking”. Why do you think so many investors invest in MANY different companies. They assume most will fail and only need one or two hits.

 

[humbaba]

Man, I'm still so thrilled with the EU getting Spotify rather than Slacker. I've been sitting here trying to stump it with obscure Icelandic band after obscure Icelandic band, and only succeeded once (Wesen, the short-lived side project between Júlía from Oyama and Loji from the defunct Sudden Weather Change). I mean, they even have asdfhg. - a band literally named by mashing keys on a keyboard.

I wonder if the US will be lucky enough to get Spotify at some point? Or maybe there was some sort of licensing problem?

I'm hoping as well, but I think it is just hope. I'm not sure why they chose Slacker, but my guess is cost -- Spotify is number one and they know it. They have no reason to cut Tesla any deal and Slacker is "good enough".

Now, I've been surprised at Slacker's coverage. I'm not as well versed as you on obscure groups, but they had someone I stumbled on, Bjorg Thorhallsdottir (pardon the missing accents, not on a mac ). My main issue with Slacker is also a problem with Spotify: missing minor groups and licensing issues.

For example, neither have Jupiter Hollow (no, not that Jupiter Hollow, it was a midwestern band with AFAIK only one album published), nor Big Hat (no, not that Big Hat, this one toured in the midwest, I have all three albums and was lucky enough to see them live), nor Rondellus (no, close names don't count -- one album, Sabbatum, which is Black Sabbath translated into latin and played on medieval instruments). They only seem to have more recent songs from Muslim Gauze But outside of fringe examples, both have quite good coverage of even obscure bands.

The regional licensing bit is the other frustration as I rather like AKB48. There's one album that is licensed for the west and is all you can get on Apple or Spotify (well, there's the Candy Rush song from a movie -- at least the album has been added). That's quite a bit of material that simply isn't available: I'm up to something like 35 albums+singles which gives fair but incomplete coverage of their song catalog. In my Tesla I can search for and find AKB48, but it won't actually play anything. Plenty of K-Pop, though.

But for someone with less fringe tastes within their authorized region both give excellent coverage and acceptable quality.

 

[Fact Checking]

Well, I'm Spanish, I live in UK, and the most feasible reason for the disappointing Model 3 sales, IMO, is the current price point. The % of people considering price more important than value/price is higher than in other European countries.

Yes, I think there are two main factors in determining a country's demand for new luxury cars such as the Model 3: median free disposable income and historic levels of unemployment.

Here's the ranking of European countries by median free disposable income:

Portugal:     €17,733
Spain:        €19,336

Netherlands:  €24,696
France:       €25,022
Austria:      €26,730
Germany:      €28,473
Norway:       €28,653
Switzerland:  €29,540

Euro-19 avg:  €23,609

€19.3k vs. Netherlands's €24.7k is a significant gap of almost 30%, which would reduce tail-end demand for €50k+ cars by more than 50% I believe.

Another negative factor for demand in Spain is that Spain is fresh out of a big economic crisis, a very deep and long -10% depression in the 2008-2014 time frame, primarily caused by the free capital flows and unbalanced "gold standard" property of the Eurozone that they are part of, which forced deflation on the country for ~7 years:

Real Gross Domestic Product for Spain​

They exited that 6-year crisis only about 3-4 years ago, and it takes time for consumers to get back to 'frivolous' spending like €50k+ luxury cars after such a long crisis.

The "core" part of Eurozone saw mostly uninterrupted growth and economic optimism where 2008 was only an about 2-year blip:

Real Gross Domestic Product for Germany​

Although last year's almost-recession in Germany, which could get worse this year, might play a role later this year. Right now it's not yet visible in unemployment statistics:

Registered Unemployment Rate for Germany​

Which is the main transmission channel of economic uncertainty to consumers, and the main trigger of the feedback loop of reduced consumer spending and economic contraction.

Note how unemployment in Spain is around 14%, which is well off the peak of 26% (!) but still almost twice of that of the pre-2008 levels of ~8%:

Harmonized Unemployment Rate: Total: All Persons for Spain​

All of this makes car buyers in Spain understandably cautious, an I wouldn't expect miracles in Model 3 sales - at least initially: until the fuel savings and Total Cost of Ownership advantages of a Model 3 are well established and the anti-Tesla FUD the strength of the Berlin Wall is broken through.

 

[mongo]

OT for president's day...

I love how the headline says “Bill Gates says no one knows how to stop bovine flatulence”. Bill is a major investor in Impossible Foods which makes a vegan burger that tastes 99.99% exactly like cow meat. So Bill already a knows the solution....

Right... Because people don't fart after eating vegetable starch...
To follow the ICE argument type: you're just shifting the tailpipe

 

[Words of HABIT]

Looks like Trump may impose tariffs on European cars.

The U.S. Commerce Department sent a report on Sunday to U.S. President Donald Trump that could unleash steep tariffs on imported cars

Commerce Department sends report to Trump that could unleash steep tariffs on imported cars

From the Reuters article:
"Late on Sunday, a department spokeswoman said it would not disclose any details of the “Section 232” national security report submitted to Trump by Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross. The disclosure of the submission came less than two hours before the end of a 270-day deadline.
Trump has 90 days to decide whether to act upon the recommendations, which auto industry officials expect to include at least some tariffs on fully assembled vehicles or on technologies and components related to electric, automated, connected and shared vehicles."

Has the actual terms of the proposed details of Section 232 been disclosed? No, says Reuters. Makes no sense for tariffs on fully assembled vehicles or tech/comp. to EVs/Self Driving. I'm thinking Reuters is wrong here and the word or should be changed with and. Should tariffs be approved, I see tariff A% for fully assembled vehicles and tariff B% for tech/comp. to EVs/Self Driving, with B being s small fraction of B if at all, also the latter being much more difficult to regulate. The wording by Reuters is unlikely correct or at least not definitive. For example, no mention of tariffs on non-fully assembled cars. What prevents auto manufacturers from shipping their cars with a couple of key components installed in the Country of destination to avoid the tariff completely? Let's see how this plays out. For Tesla, a company that only builds made to order cars and remains production constrained combined with continuing rapid efficiencies in manufacturing and ongoing lower battery costs, they will be far less impacted on tariffs than OEM (Big Auto Manufacturers).

 

[avoigt]

Nextmove the largest EV rental car company in Germany confirmed an order of 100 Model 3 for Germany, 4 of those have been delivered.

That car is the perfect vehicle for rental car companies, fleet management organizations as well as organizations who given company cars as an incentive.

This is just a start of a large commercial move we will see despite all private buyers.

The last time they confirmed 50 and in the meantime given how popular the car is doubled the order now to 10 units per location.

nextmove erhält vier von 100 Tesla Model 3 für die Elektroauto-Vermietung - Elektroautos mieten

 

[KarenRei]

One takeaway that illustrates what Tesla might do to increase production is focus on the alien dreadnaught idea. Suppose you model production of a car, how each part might be made, all ways they might be put together, what might be its characteristics (performance, comfort, safety, etc.), how should you automate, when do you use people skills, then optimize each component and their relationships, then do alternative cost extrapolations, et cetera, et cetera. Of course I've conflated design and production with other considerations but that is the idea and it is a way to understand at least the complexity of the task of innovation and how it may be speeded up.

That's already done to a great extent. Shapes / structural strength is optimized by physics using gradient-based optimization / genetic algorithms, and there's a whole field of mathematics (popular in large corporations) called Operations Research / Operations Management, where people build gigantic models of a company's operations with tens of thousands of inputs and then have the computer figure out the most financially optimal business decisions.

The role of humans is to design and feed the models as well as possible, not to make the decisions themselves

 

[MTL_HABS1909]

OT for president's day...



Right... Because people don't fart after eating vegetable starch...
To follow the ICE argument type: you're just shifting the tailpipe

I hope this is a joke, but I’m really not sure...

 

[elasalle]

OT for president's day...



Right... Because people don't fart after eating vegetable starch...
To follow the ICE argument type: you're just shifting the tailpipe

Eating vegetables and the steak, means we are carbon neutral diet

 

[Fact Checking]

Makes no sense for tariffs on fully assembled vehicles or tech/comp. to EVs/Self Driving.

I believe Trump's tariff shenanigans (and the government shutdown) should not be understood in the light of a rational economic actor trying to maximize economic and political gain: both the NAFTA v2 and the China tariffs resulted in no real changes to the tariff environment in the end and caused a lot of disruption and cost billions of dollars in the U.S. alone.

Instead it should be understood in the context of a president who is the target of criminal investigations sitting in the White House and creating periodic acts of distraction to keep the narrative away from the crimes he committed, as associate after associate gets jailed or indicted. Here's the full list of the 36 criminal indictments so far (!) in the "witch hunt" FBI investigation, 5 plea deals and Trump's personal lawyer got 3 years of jail time:

All of Robert Mueller’s indictments and plea deals in the Russia investigation so far​

Plenty of witches to distract from, and Trump Junior, probable point man in the Russia connections, has yet to be charged.

Also note that the way Trump imposed tariffs also gave him a discretionary 'list of companies exempt from the U.S. tariffs' economic reward mechanism, which is a hotbed of "favor hoarding" and outright corruption.

With that background I'd not expect the upcoming European tariff war to be any less violent than the NAFTA or China one.

 

[VValleyEV]

While I agree that Jack's numbers could be a little off for the reasons other folks have mentioned, it's pretty clear the 2170's aren't significantly different form an energy density standpoint.

Yup, my takeaway also: that the MS battery pack is not made obsolete by the M3. So at least from that aspect, no huge push necessary in near term to re-engineer the MS to stay energy-competitive in the product line. They can tweak the interior and keep the current design for at least another year or two, while focusing on M3/Y/Semi/Pickup, and HW3 upgrades to those who have purchased FSD.

And that Jack is a terrific old-school curmudgeon resource.