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

[Fishy Fish]

If Elon is laying low, it's because Elon wants to lay low (or he's crunched for time). The board does not pull the strings!

It might only be that he's doing double time, wrench in hand, assembling model Y's on the line. Hear they want to minimize rectifications...

 

[Jack6591]

Also Elon has been missing from Twitter for 2 days now, not even a like, which if I remember correctly very rarely happen without an announcement, something is up.

"And I think it would be one of the most exciting days in Tesla's history and we're just trying to figure out the right timing for that,"
Elon Musk

I am an unwavering supporter of Elon Musk. Elon will be written into history with the greatest inventors, engineers, designers, entrepreneurs, and businessmen of all time. More than all of this, he will be immortalized for his altruism — for changing the course of anthropologic climate change,

Timing ain’t Elon’s strong suit. My hope is that Team Tesla, steps up to the bar, and nudges Elon in the right direction — at just the right moment.

Battery Day, are you ready to change the world? I am.

 

[StealthP3D]

This is one of the best "Solving the Money Problem" videos. It really ties everything together in the big picture. This should be required viewing for every Wall Street Stock Analyst.

As an investor, I've long known that Tesla has a huge tailwind in that they are exactly what we need in a world that has a changing and warming climate due to over-reliance on carbon energy. Tesla is on the right side of history. Historically, I've always viewed this advantage as being canceled out by the difficulty of disrupting the multi-billion dollar fossil fuel industry. The entrenched interests will fight to stay relevant and keep the money rolling in. Historically, they have a lot of power.

However, I've recently had a change of perspective about this. I now believe societal momentum has become a POWERFUL tailwind that will help drive Tesla and their method of addressing problems to wild success. I believe this tailwind is more powerful than the opposing forces and growing more quickly every year. The hearts and souls of the entire world is behind Tesla's goals, if not at the surface, then at the essence. Because even an individual who ONLY cares about money and power probably knows climate change is a powerful force that must be addressed. Of those who don't understand this, it is simply a function of not knowing enough. As time goes on, momentum can only build and we don't need every last straggler for the effect to become very powerful.

In investment, this kind of tailwind is basically unheard of. In itself, it's not enough to guarantee Tesla's success, but it's a powerful tailwind behind a company that is so focussed on their mission success they would likely succeed even without such a tailwind. It will just add to the strength and speed at which Tesla succeeds while the power and influence of the opposing forces will wither, they cannot maintain their influence, no matter how hard they fight.

Thanks to all the 'Greta's' out there who are helping to speed the change. Change tends to happen much more slowly than many of us like but I now see it as stronger, faster and more certain than ever, thanks to building momentum behind sustainability and the knowledge that it is necessary to take action now.

 

[MC3OZ]

I now believe social momentum has become a POWERFUL tailwind that will help drive Tesla and their method of addressing problems to wild success.

Taken in context I expect Battery Day to be the milestone which marks the start of the transition from "early adopter" to "early majority" for EVs and energy storage.

Normally the drivers of that transition are:-

• Price - same or lower
• Functionality - same or better
• Convenience - same or close enough...

Battery Day should help tick the Price box, and help tick the Convenience Box.

Functionality is already a clear win for Tesla...

Social Momentum is one other tail wind unique to Tesla:-

• Being morally right..

"Being morally right" means Tesla staff are more committed to the mission and strive to work harder and smarter, for many it isn't just a job.

"Being morally right" means customers are more likely to accept minor shortcomings on Price, Functionality and Convenience.

This may mean customers are more likely to pay a bit more, and no one complains about Tesla margins, if these are slightly higher than the competition.. All customers know the survival of Tesla is important...

The last item on the Convenience list is service. Transition to "early majority" means more resources, but also more need to implement timely solutions... "Being morally right" means many customers are patiently waiting for a good service outcome.. IMO as always, Tesla will deliver...

 

[AZRI11]

Elon tweets
https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1272048461899157505?s=19

 

[Papafox]

Bears are running a 2x multiple on TSLA vs NDX (macros) on the way down:

-1.5328% / -0.7764% = 1.974
or 2.0x vs NASDAQ-100​

View attachment 550829 View attachment 550828

...but only allowing a 1.5x multiple on the way up: this is an example of "capping".

Paging @Papafox

Yep, you noticed one of the oldest tricks in the book for working the stock price down during the day, the old weaker ups than downs technique. The thing is that people notice TSLA responding to the macros and think it's just general weakness of TSLA plus the impact of macros. It's a much more insidious manipulation than standard capping, where a fixed price is held while the rest of the market rises.

Good eyes!

 

[Artful Dodger]

Is Giga Berlin being financed with German backed low interest loans?

Here's some news revealed for the first time this week (confirmed for us who long expected this) in the new 2019 Tesla Impact Report: (PDF - 19 MB)

"Emissions Credits: Accelerating Deployment of New Factories" (Pg 18 of 57)

"In 2019, we generated almost $600 million of revenue selling zero emission regulatory credits to other OEMs. All of the proceeds from such sales will be used for building new factories to produce EVs that will continue to displace ICE vehicles."​

We may learn more in the 2020 Impact Report, but I'd guess that 'all the proceeds' from the CO2 Credits deal with FCA will go toward funding the rapid buildout of GF4/Berlin.

Cheers!

 

[Green Pete]

Elon tweets
https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1272048461899157505?s=19

Great to hear he's alive...

I caution against over interpreting the length of time between tweets as being significant.

Elon a man unique in history and the future likely prove that. It's unfortunate that the frequency of his tweets has somehow become an important metric.

 

[heltok]

This is one of the best "Solving the Money Problem" videos. It really ties everything together in the big picture. This should be required viewing for every Wall Street Stock Analyst.

As an investor, I've long known that Tesla has a huge tailwind in that they are exactly what we need in a world that has a changing and warming climate due to over-reliance on carbon energy. Tesla is on the right side of history. Historically, I've always viewed this advantage as being canceled out by the difficulty of disrupting the multi-billion dollar fossil fuel industry. The entrenched interests will fight to stay relevant and keep the money rolling in. Historically, they have a lot of power.

However, I've recently had a change of perspective about this. I now believe societal momentum has become a POWERFUL tailwind that will help drive Tesla and their method of addressing problems to wild success. I believe this tailwind is more powerful than the opposing forces and growing more quickly every year. The hearts and souls of the entire world is behind Tesla's goals, if not at the surface, then at the essence. Because even an individual who ONLY cares about money and power probably knows climate change is a powerful force that must be addressed. Of those who don't understand this, it is simply a function of not knowing enough. As time goes on, momentum can only build and we don't need every last straggler for the effect to become very powerful.

In investment, this kind of tailwind is basically unheard of. In itself, it's not enough to guarantee Tesla's success, but it's a powerful tailwind behind a company that is so focussed on their mission success they would likely succeed even without such a tailwind. It will just add to the strength and speed at which Tesla succeeds while the power and influence of the opposing forces will wither, they cannot maintain their influence, no matter how hard they fight.

Thanks to all the 'Greta's' out there who are helping to speed the change. Change tends to happen much more slowly than many of us like but I now see it as stronger, faster and more certain than ever, thanks to building momentum behind sustainability and the knowledge that it is necessary to take action now.

I really like this take on the same material:

 

[RobStark]

Here's some news revealed for the first time this week (confirmed for us who long expected this) in the new 2019 Tesla Impact Report: (PDF - 19 MB)

"Emissions Credits: Accelerating Deployment of New Factories" (Pg 18 of 57)

"In 2019, we generated almost $600 million of revenue selling zero emission regulatory credits to other OEMs. All of the proceeds from such sales will be used for building new factories to produce EVs that will continue to displace ICE vehicles."​

We may learn more in the 2020 Impact Report, but I'd guess that 'all the proceeds' from the CO2 Credits deal with FCA will go toward funding the rapid buildout of GF4/Berlin.

Cheers!

Tesla gets revenue from the sales of regulatory creditis in North America and Europe regardless of whether they build a factory or not.

Tesla is getting about $300M in incentives to build Giga Berlin from the various German governments.

Additionally Tesla is spending ~$4B to build Giga Berlin. Those monies are not coming German government backed low interest loans. As the originally poster suggested low interest government loans could be used in lieu of a capital raise.

Local and national Chinese government backed low interest loans are funding construction of Giga Shanghai but that doesn't seem to be the case elsewhere. It seems here in the US local and State governments are willing to give ~$1B in tax rebates/credits to get a Gigafactory(Terrafactory) built in their area.

 

[CorneliusXX]

Very interesting read on the downgrades. GS and MS were the underwriters for the most recent capital raise which was announced on February 13th morning. MS reiterated underweight rating for TSLA on Feb 6th with a price target of 350. GS did not cover TSLA back then. Stock was down 6% premarket on Feb 13th and finished up 4%. It also makes sense when you think about the leaked email related to semi production.

I would think the battery technology advancements would be announced before any capital raise is completed.

Has anyone attempted to model out an estimate of cash needs for capex over the next few years building up on a per project basis rather than a % of either current capex or some other ratio? The reason I ask it that it feels like there needs to be a pretty rapid expansion in capex spending to meet all the upcoming expansion plans. I think we've had it a bit easy with the Chinese expansion as they've just been handing out free money so it's probably not a good baseline assumption for cash needs on upcoming expansion plans.

The following items need to either be completed or well under construction within the next 2 years:

• Fremont
  • Ramp model Y production
• GigaNevada
  • Ramp cell production for the semi
  • Ramp powertrain production for the semi
• GigaBerlin
  • Complete Y factory
  • Complete cell factory
  • Localise supply chain with probably seat and powertrain factory
  • start next phases for (probably 3 & semi) along with required local supply chain (batteries/seats/ powertrain)
• Giga"Texas"
  • Giant battery cell production plant
  • capacity for c.500k MY, 250k CT, 50k Semi (guess numbers)
• Global/other
  • Supercharger rollout
  • Megacharger rollout
  • battery storage (from powerwall to megapack)
  • Solar roof production expansion

I'm sure there's other items that I've missed (e.g. ridesharing program, unannounced products, etc) but all of the above sounds like it will cost far more to produce than the low single digit billions tesla has been spending on capex over the last couple of years.

 

[wtlloyd]

NEC Pulls the Plug on Storage Integration Business

I think that in 5 years, the focus of what Tesla is will put vehicle manufacturing in 2nd place. To their credit, NEC has realized energy storage has reached a point that low hanging fruit is gone, and only full devotion to the mission will move forward.

 

[RobStark]

Tesla Safety Chief Announces Coronavirus Is Not Circulating At Fremont Facility | CleanTechnica

 

[DutchDriver]

For those who where thinking there was just the Grand Venus sailing to Europe with new Tesla's, there's even a second ship full with Tesla's heading Europe!
The Grand Venus has left San Francisco May 26th and will arrive June 18th in Zeebrugge.

But now I've seen that Silver Ray has left New York June 5th and will arrive in about 12 hours in Zeebrugge!
So thats good news for the Q2 delivery numbers!

 

[Prunesquallor]

...
We may learn more in the 2020 Impact Report, but I'd guess that 'all the proceeds' from the CO2 Credits deal with FCA will go toward funding the rapid buildout of GF4/Berlin.

Cheers!

Once again, the irony just kills me.

 

[Christine69420]

Work is progressing in foggy Shanghai. Jason Yang is out with a new video from GF3:

 

[troym]

I’ve been searching for the thread with Q1 delivery predictions and which members were closest but can’t find it. Anyone have the link? And same for Q2? Tks

 

[Highway2Heel]

Nope. That's clearly backwards. Why would you want them to build when it costs more instead?

Absolutely. Everything is on sale. Another form of “buy low, sell high”.

 

[kengchang]

For those who where thinking there was just the Grand Venus sailing to Europe with new Tesla's, there's even a second ship full with Tesla's heading Europe!
The Grand Venus has left San Francisco May 26th and will arrive June 18th in Zeebrugge.

But now I've seen that Silver Ray has left New York June 5th and will arrive in about 12 hours in Zeebrugge!
So thats good news for the Q2 delivery numbers!

Source on this?

 

[Rarity]

Work is progressing in foggy Shanghai. Jason Yang is out with a new video from GF3:

The lack of loading docks on Phase 2 is remarkable. Where are the general assembly lines going to be? Or are they going to vertically integrate everything on-site?