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

[Buckminster]

But I will bet my first born

I only have one, I can't double down on this.. At what point do they become expendable?

Clearly, establishing new nuclear power plants is not economical - anywhere.

As for keeping existing plants running, its a matter of establishing a cheaper, alternative supply so a planned, orderly phase out can be done - assuming none of the several serious problems with nuclear power are urgently pressing - and my argument is that Sweden is not suffering from these pressing problems.

And as I pointed out, Sweden is increasing its CO2-free, non-nuclear power production via wind turbines, which are (or at least have been) cheaper than PV.

As for Germany, it is my understanding that Angela Merkel seized the opportunity offered by the Japanese nuclear disaster to get Germany started on its phase-out of nuclear power. From the point of view of minimizing CO2-pollution it was too early, but if she had waited, there would not have been the political will to do so at all. An example of Realpolitik. Another such example is that Germany keeps its DDR-era lignite power production alive, so as to keep the labor in that obsolete and seriously polluting industry employed.

Bit behind in UK. We are struggling to get anyone to take our money to build more obsolete monstrosities....

 

[winfield100]

Not sure anything official is being done to reverse "pull" juice but there is a lot being done on smart charge/grid control See Electric Nation. (U.K.)

OT
University of Delaware 5-6+ years back
V2G (vehicle 2 grid)
30-40 minicoopers 100% electric
To be used for frequency regulation and ancillary services
(Mini virtual peaker power plants)
(loosely coupled, scaleable, etc)
They gave a talk to our EV club

 

[Fact Checking]

He only touched upon Tesla lightly?

I don’t think so. He talked nothing but Tesla the whole 20 minutes. He hit upon all his usual FUD points - Musk is a fraud, competition will kill Tesla, poor quality cars yada yada.

My apologies: I didn't listen to it myself - only repeated anecdotal data without fact checking it => FAIL ...

Thanks for fact checking the fact checker!

 

[Fact Checking]

Regarding 4 consecutive quarters of profit, Q4 is in the bag. But Q1 might be a miss with many EU and China deliveries missing the deadline. Q2 should be fine.

So the '4 consecutive quarters of profit' usually derives from a (common) mis-reading of the S&P 500 inclusion rules.

But Tesla is going to be added to the S&P 500 in May if Q4 goes as expected and if Tesla posts a minimal profit in Q1 - what matters to S&P 500 inclusion is the sum of 4 consecutive quarters and the last quarter being profitable.

BTW., why would EU or China deliveries miss the deadline in Q1? Shipping delays are usually highly predictable.

 

[cheshire cat]

OT
University of Delaware 5-6+ years back
V2G (vehicle 2 grid)
30-40 minicoopers 100% electric
To be used for frequency regulation and ancillary services
(Mini virtual peaker power plants)
(loosely coupled, scaleable, etc)
They gave a talk to our EV club

Sorry I meant in UK, We only recently got rid of the red flag, but understand "they" are looking at updating the the 1830? Law on carriages and animals on the highway, soon we may be allowed electric scooter and skateboards and other modern paraphernalia

 

[mblakele]

I like attributes of your idea, but spacex investment horizons are decades long and could not withstand public ownership. Anything that would crack open spacex books would limit Elon’s long term plans. He’s already having to raise money to fund the BFR simultaneous to the satellite network, and finding the process as tasteful as a fecal transplant.

I agree. That’s why my wildly speculative idea would keep SpaceX private. I’m sorry if I implied anything else.

 

[lklundin]

Bit behind in UK. We are struggling to get anyone to take our money to build more obsolete monstrosities....

Ah yes, Hinkley Point C. It will provide a good 3 GW of electricity (equivalent to 6+ GW of wind turbines, more so for PV, due to the difference in capacity factor), at a terrible, terrible price for the tax payer.

Somewhat similar to Germany's lignite production, it has to do with keeping an unprofitable industry alive. Since in this case the UK's nuclear weapons program is involved, there is also some national pride involved. That pride is turning out to be exceedingly costly...

 

[Buckminster]

OT

Ah yes, Hinkley Point C. It will provide a good 3 GW of electricity (equivalent to 6+ GW of wind turbines, more so for PV, due to the difference in capacity factor), at a terrible, terrible price for the tax payer.

Somewhat similar to Germany's lignite production, it has to do with keeping an unprofitable industry alive. Since in this case the UK's nuclear weapons program is involved, there is also some national pride involved. That pride is turning out to be exceedingly costly...

Don't worry - we have plenty of things going on that will maintain our pride at current levels. Brexit and HS2 to name just 2....

 

[mblakele]

1)Italian Fiat was gifted Chrysler by the Obama administration in exchange for taking over Chrysler pension liabilities.

2) Italian management created a new company, FCAU, incorporated in The Netherlands and domiciled in the United Kingdom for tax purposes.

3) The largest shareholders in FCAU continue to be Fiat founding family Agnelli.

The Agnelli family also owns a significant chunk of The Economist. It's useful to keep that in mind when reading anything The Economist writes about the auto industry, Tesla, or Elon Musk.

Economist Group - Wikipedia

 

[JRP3]

If it's not a "conventional" ride share? If it collects you, seats you in a private compartment, with services, takes you to precisely where you require?

Unlikely to take that form for most.

 

[Rarity]

In the words of Wikipedia, "Citation Needed".

Tesla investors are on the right side of this. You don't hear Tesla complain about steel and aluminum tariffs. The loud moaning from Ford and GM goes on.

 

[Starno]

Elon Musk's Bad Week Gets Worse as SpaceX Lays off 600 People

Ahh c'mon.... wonder if will affect TSLA tomorrow

 

[EVMeister]

First of all, who the hell are CCN? Second of all, what bad week?

 

[cheshire cat]

Ah yes, Hinkley Point C. It will provide a good 3 GW of electricity (equivalent to 6+ GW of wind turbines, more so for PV, due to the difference in capacity factor), at a terrible, terrible price for the tax payer.

Somewhat similar to Germany's lignite production, it has to do with keeping an unprofitable industry alive. Since in this case the UK's nuclear weapons program is involved, there is also some national pride involved. That pride is turning out to be exceedingly costly...

Think you're over egging the pudding there old bean

 

[Lessmog]

OFF TOPIC

stable government,

Well, that remains to be seen. Sweden held general elections on Sep 9. TODAY, a good four months later, a news conference announced the possibility of a new Social Democrat-Center/Liberal-Green government-base constellation, to be tested in Parliament on Wed. We have, alas, joined the many countries hexed by splinter politics, where it is a real struggle to decipher election results into viable political agendae. (The two major political blocs do not amount to majority, neither is keen on cooperation with the other and both want to exclude the more extreme parties on either end of the spectrum, so deadlock has been assured so far.) The looming threat of an expensive extra election, as well as further gains for extremes if one must be held, has been instrumental in forging an understanding. So far ...

As always, the easy solution is if everyone else adjusts to MY agenda Do we need to elect a new population?

 

[BioSehnsucht]

Sunday Off-Piste posting...………..

An aside (should most probably go somewhere else but this I my favourite destination).

There is a lot of broad BMW i3 ridicule about its looks - and they are different (weirdmobile?). I've blown hot and cold since it came out but grew to like it a lot once we had one parked where I could peruse it each day. I like that it is different in an EV way - short overhangs; huge wheels in the corners; stubby nose (with mini frunk!); long wheelbase and some stylish/naff (delete as the feeling takes you...) detailing.

So now I present empirical evidence from our experiences since owning it (7 Months). It certainly attracts a lot of attention (mainly because they are so rare in South Africa - and especially in our out-of-town rural area - one other I believe which I've never seen)

Almost without fail 'unprejudiced'/bewildered/new-to-the-i3 people LOVE the looks. I've even had a few people (women as it happens) walk over and say;- "I noticed your car and I don't know what it is but I love it!"

Others often they express how much better it looks in real life over photos - I agree. I've even had (wait for it...):- "It is beautiful" This is based on 3-4 interactions every week!

So maybe us experts/judgemental folk coming from a position of car knowledge should pull our heads in and accept that BMW did a good job...…….

Still hate the suicide doors; the tyre noise and wandering steering! But otherwise - all good.

(Another aside.. I read that VW are testing their ID EVs in South Africa as the tar is so rough it helps them with tyre noise suppression!!)

OK I know beauty is in the eye but it seems that our i3 gets about a 90% + approval rating and you can't say that about many designs. (Tesla excluded)

I'm so far Off-Piste now I've lost my way....

i3 is definitely a weirdmobile, but it's not as weird as some. There's a fine line between being cool and futuristic and inspiring, and being unattractive and bizzaire, and the i3 manages to stay on the good side of that line in my opinion, but it's definitely built to scream "I'm an EV!" visually. It's not that making a statement is bad, but that too often the design choices to do so tip over into the ugly / unattractive / trying too hard to be cool side of the line ... I feel that i3 managed to skirt the line without crossing it.

 

[BioSehnsucht]

What happens when you add 1B electric cars to the grid? I have my theory but would be interested in others take. Hint, mine points to high demand for solar and storage.

Wind too, where practical (as it often is stronger at night and that's when a large portion of charging occurs). Some wind, more solar, and lots and lots of storage...

 

[Remus]

True.
There's no reason why instead of 10,000 panels in a solar park there couldn't be 1 panel on 10,000 connected homes.

While I agree with your main point, reliability maybe a factor here.

Maybe not so good of an example here, each Tesla super charger location have many stalls vs other charging network use more spread out approach where only one or two per location. The former can tolerate small number of equipment failures without total unavailability.

I think a community based mini grid maybe a sweet spot in the middle.

 

[Oil4AsphaultOnly]

True.
There's no reason why instead of 10,000 panels in a solar park there couldn't be 1 panel on 10,000 connected homes.

Easy, 1 inverter versus 10k inverters.

 

[cheshire cat]

First of all, who the hell are CCN? Second of all, what bad week?

. WHOOPS red face