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

[Garlands]

Hi. new here. My new interest in Tesla had me listening to the CC recently. I thought I heard they were now going to change from building all overseas units at the start of a quarter to a more even production mix. If they built overseas production in January and Feb. why would they still be in transit in April?

The ships didnt reach Europe/China until the very end of March, so some of the deliveries were pushed into April.

 

[sundaymorning]

I wonder if those moaning about the InsideEV's estimates have actually read their article? I suggest they do so...

Tesla Model 3, S & X Sales In U.S. In April 2019

Our estimates show that Tesla delivered some 10,050 Model 3 to U.S. buyers in April 2019. That's slightly down compared to the 10,175 in March, but hugely up compared to the 5,750 we estimated for February

You always want to compare the first month of the quarter with the previous first month, this indicates that M3 deliveries are quite robust and doing well.

Quite naturally SX and sales were a bit slower in April, the first month of the quarter. But inside EVs sees orders have already picked up:

Tesla sold 1,250 Model S and 1,025 Model X. Meanwhile, in March 2019, Tesla sold an estimated 2,275 Model S and 2,175 Model X, so April represents a significant combined drop. However, we see a rise in orders now, likely due to the recently announced range boost, but those orders won't be fulfilled right away.

 

[EVNow]

This post has 10 disagrees and 3 ironic funnies. The arrogance of this forum is astounding.

So - if people don't accept whatever you wrote, everyone is "arrogant" ?

You made zero effort to actually analyze where the loss was coming from. There have been multiple posts on this explaining what happened which apparently you didn't read - but you want everyone to just like your zero info post ? So who is really arrogant ?

 

[Matias]

And it was the cheapest version, so rising prices further would probably be a bad idea

Btw, has there been any official explanation, why Tesla discontinued 75 version?

 

[neroden]

Where does one find the total sales for the month of April or more appropriately the production numbers for April so one can see how many are in transit?

One doesn't. Production numbers are a serious trade secret and most of the leaks have been blocked now. Euro deliveries are tracked on another thread on this forum (via regulatory filings) and will mostly be available in a couple of weeks. China deliveries are a black box with no leaks. Some people track ship loadings, though.

 

[RobStark]

FCA to shift to quarterly sales reports in the U.S. and Canada

Tesla is a trendsetter in more ways than one.

 

[Spacemanspliff]

Tesla sold 1,250 Model S and 1,025 Model X. Meanwhile, in March 2019, Tesla sold an estimated 2,275 Model S and 2,175 Model X, so April represents a significant combined drop. However, we see a rise in orders now, likely due to the recently announced range boost, but those orders won't be fulfilled right away.

You misquoted the numbers.

1250+1025 are from April 2018.

According to insideevs April 2019 was
1050+825 so on the down side but understandable given where production was in March.

 

[Remus]

I thought it was a very good report. Tesla US Model 3 deliveries were on the high side of what I considered likely (and I put my numbers down here yesterday, so people can check that). I figured this would be treated by Wall Streeters as a neutral report, and I think it was.

the problem is wall street had a much more dire view to the situation than you did. So if you both see this as neutral, that is NOT an agreement.

 

[KarenRei]

Here's a piece of news we'd like to see in the coming weeks or months: adding a third shift back to S+X. That would be taken as a hugely bullish signal.

If it's going to happen (no guarantees... they're more cell limited now without the 75Ds, after all), I wouldn't expect it too soon. It's going to take time for them to ramp up motor production, suspension production, and new S+X production in general.

ED: Then again, with how few they produced in Q1, there should be a cell surplus....

 

[KarenRei]

Well wouldn't there have been a spike in deliveries in Norway/Netherlands/Spain? I just saw a chart someone posted and there were just gradual daily sales in April in those countries. That does not sound like a ship arrival which would create peaks and valleys.

You need to look at those charts again. Red *is* April. It's comparing to the first month of past quarters. And blowing them all away.

I'm not sure why you're talking about ship arrivals, though. Ships just feed EU and Chinese inventory. Deliveries steadily feed off of said inventory - until it's gone.

 

[MarcusMaximus]

Hi. new here. My new interest in Tesla had me listening to the CC recently. I thought I heard they were now going to change from building all overseas units at the start of a quarter to a more even production mix. If they built overseas production in January and Feb. why would they still be in transit in April?

Others here can probably answer "why" better, but we know for a fact that many of them were. There have been very large(record breaking) deliveries in the European countries that publish real-time registrations in April, long before any ships this quarter could have possibly reached Europe(many, in fact, before any ships even arrived to pick up cars produced this quarter).

As I remember, there was also at least one batch that missed its ship entirely last quarter, which may be in the in-transit, but others here may know better than me on that.

 

[neroden]

If these estimates are even remotely close, what happened to the “record April” Tesla was claiming? Even if you give benefit of doubt and doubled the total for non-US markets, it’s just ~25k.

That is, in actual fact, a record for the first month of a quarter. Go look up last October on InsideEVs, remember that essentially no Model 3s were sent abroad last October, and double the S/X numbers for overseas sales. 22,900. 25K is more than that.

And yes, they're almost certainly sending half the cars (if not more) overseas right now. Remember, overseas backlog is huge, US backlog is not. Even when unwinding the "wave", they have good reason to send at least half overseas.

These are not bad in itself given the Tesla story. But when compared to talking points by Musk and others at Tesla, those are some typically crappy numbers. This is not how you start a quarter with an estimate of 90-100k. Still can’t get to an average of 5,000/wk model 3’s.

On the contrary, they're definitely over 5000/week already. We won't know how much over until we get estimates on European Model 3 deliveries for April.

They still need to get to 7000 though.

 

[neroden]

And if it is [Panasonic losses] is it just because they couldn't scale as anticipated?

The combination of information indicates that Panasonic was having a very high scrap rate on their battery cell production -- in excess of 30%. That WILL lead to large losses.

 

[neroden]

Wait, Tesla only sold @12,000 cars in the US in April?

Am I the only person who finds this disappointing?

Apparently not, but you should be. Anyone with half a clue knows that more than half the cars went overseas in April.

 

[MarcusMaximus]

You misquoted the numbers.

1250+1025 are from April 2018.

According to insideevs April 2019 was
1050+825 so on the down side but understandable given where production was in March.

Your order is wrong there. April 2019 was 825+1050. Model X deliveries up 25 vs 2018, but S down 425.

 

[KarenRei]

Others here can probably answer "why" better, but we know for a fact that many of them were. There have been very large(record breaking) deliveries in the European countries that publish real-time registrations in April, long before any ships this quarter could have possibly reached Europe(many, in fact, before any ships even arrived to pick up cars produced this quarter).

As I remember, there was also at least one batch that missed its ship entirely last quarter, which may be in the in-transit, but others here may know better than me on that.

Small batch, just a couple hundred cars. Got loaded onto the Glovis Sonic as a secondary payload. Which is currently making the rounds around Asia.

 

[MarcusMaximus]

Btw, has there been any official explanation, why Tesla discontinued 75 version?

Nothing official on the 75, I think. Standard Range was temporarily discontinued due to production issues with the refresh. Which is why it was re-introduced when they started making the refresh.

 

[KarenRei]

The combination of information indicates that Panasonic was having a very high scrap rate on their battery cell production -- in excess of 30%. That WILL lead to large losses.

I know I'm not the only one wondering when, not if, Tesla will unveil their own cell lines. We know how much they obsess over vertical integration. Their problems with Panasonic will only accelerate the push to in-house this last key element.

Wouldn't be surprised if Grohmann is working on it right now.

 

[neroden]

How in the world did you set a low range of just 7k?

Karen's low end number was about the same as my low end number of 8K. If you have a good idea as to the US/overseas split, you can go from production rates to US deliveries. But it's very dependent on your US/overseas split estimate.

 

[neroden]

I get that. But the total in those 3 countries is about 1,500 deliveries in April. Where did the other 9,000 in-transit cars go? I still think many were indeed done in US and Canada.

Have you heard of Germany, France, Italy, etc.? These are countries in Europe where Tesla delivers cars. You can look them up on a map.

You may also have heard of China. It's this big country bordering the Pacific Ocean. Tesla delivers cars there too.