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

[pyromatter]

 

[EVNow]

Acceleration will matter too when compared to the Model 3 - and the $36,000 starting price IMO looks too close to Tesla's pricing be able to compete with the Model 3 on price alone.

VW of course is not a premium brand. Nor is Nissan or GM.

And they can't compete with Model 3 unless their cars are substantially lower in price. This is the big problem they have. Their EVs have to be priced in 20s with 200+ mile range to be able to carve out a thriving market separate from Model 3.

 

[Curt Renz]

Interesting - do you remember any company saying this, but was later confirmed to have been actually true ?

In politics people use this routinely - but in politics we know people routinely lie.

ps : Was this statement in German and was translated ? In that case we should really see what the original statement was and how that is usually interpreted in Germany.

I've been retired for 16 years, so am unable to recall a specific case. But whenever a similar non-denial denial was made by a company "spokesman", it often inspired investigative reporters to eventually unearth the veracity of the original assertion.

 

[EVNow]

Convenience store owners like turnover just like with restaurants. You just have to trust me on this as I have clients who either own the business, property, or both. People don't visit convenience stores to lounge and shop around. That's what a coffee shop is for.

But if the gas goes away they will adopt to attracting customers in some other way. Since they don't make much money off gas - they wouldn't care about that aspect - as long as they can get foot traffic. Yes, they will have to adopt to the changing needs of the foot traffic.

BTW, I wrote about this earlier. Starbucks was not interested in putting chargers - even if they were free a few years back. They wanted quick turnover, not people lounging around - I know goes against the image Starbucks has tried to create.

 

[RobStark]

Nissan Leaf 0-100 km/h is 7,9 s and it has sold over 400 000 cars

0-100 really is not so important metric for most car buyers.

To be clear, i’m not saying whether VW ID is good or bad car, just that 7,5 s 0-100 time is not the problem in its segment (compact family car).

Corvette has sold over 1,600,000 cars. 4x the LEAF.

Model 3 will surpass LEAF next year.

 

[EVNow]

Some food for thought:
teslas stock price is lower now than it was 5 years ago.

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It could also be, that TSLA was overvaluad 5 years ago. It probably was.

BTW 2014 there were 125 million stocks, now 177 million, if share price is the same, company market cap has increased

The reason for the depressed stock price is simple.

The market thought Tesla would be profitable once 3 was being produced in volume. So, in Q4 we saw TSLA close to $380. There was also the notion that Tesla will be able to sell everything it produced easily. Afterall there was a 400k queue.

Q1 reduction in sales & the big loss shocked the market. In Q2 it found that selling 90k+ cars a quarter is not enough to make a profit. So, here we are.

​

 

[njzimmic]

Telsa Energy Storage for the Power Station. Other words, gas powered or electrical/solar?

 

[Nocturnal]

I would say a model y first would cannibalize s/x sales even more while reducing future 3 sales
What Tesla did is perfectly strategic.

FWIW it also opened up the casual racing/performance/Dude bro market which the Y would not have. If the Y had come first perhaps I might be sitting in an M3 rather than P3D now.

I just don't see Y owners as being as aggressive in evangelizing the brand.

 

[Unpilot]

Dude bro market

Is that really a thing?

 

[N5329K]

I've been retired for 16 years, so am unable to recall a specific case. But whenever a similar non-denial denial was made by a company "spokesman", it often inspired investigative reporters to eventually unearth the veracity of the original assertion.

After getting ousted by Mr. Musk, Martin Eberhard spent quite a while consulting with VW. The fact that Eberhard had (once again) been there first ought to keep EM from getting too cozy with the Germans.
Robin

 

[jerry33]

Think VW wants to improve their dirty brand and my conjecture is they could easily partner with Tesla via some sort of supply arrangement where Tesla could build (with VW money) and provide batteries in Europe to VW along with power train and autopilot software. This would give VW their green hat and allow for Tesla to make real money and most importantly - advance the mission.

Assuming VW would partner in good faith. That's a big assumption.

 

[EVNow]

I would say a model y first would cannibalize s/x sales even more while reducing future 3 sales
What Tesla did is perfectly strategic.

Not so sure.

I see a lot of people near me have one "small car" and one "big car". The small car is usually a sedan or hatch. The big car is a CUV/SUV/Van. Model 3 & Y fit quite nicely in those spots. It is possible people are more comfortable replacing the "small car" with an electric first, but I expect a lot of the Y buyers to be 3 owners. In my family we were forced to lease a ICE van to replace the old CUV my wife had. So, atleast for us Y first would have been better. Ofcourse all this is anecdotal.

 

[Fred42]

$36,000 for 260 miles range? That’s nothing to laugh about. Especially since it gets the full $7,500 tax credit in the USA (so an actual $28.5k price)

edit: as Karenrai mentioned below, that 260 miles might not actually be 260 miles.

VW doesn't plan to sell the ID3 in the US.

 

[jerry33]

That's a short term problem. So many startups are burning cash building fast charging that supply will catch up.

The problem is that income potential is low because you're relying on trips as it's always cheaper to charge at home (not counting free hotel parking and such but those are slower chargers). Sure there are apartment dwellers and some condos where you can't charge but as time goes on that will become less and less so your income will decrease over the years. And yes, there are always the short range EVs that have to charge away from home to go anywhere, but those are going to decrease over the next few years as well.

 

[Singuy]

Not so sure.

I see a lot of people near me have one "small car" and one "big car". The small car is usually a sedan or hatch. The big car is a CUV/SUV/Van. Model 3 & Y fit quite nicely in those spots. It is possible people are more comfortable replacing the "small car" with an electric first, but I expect a lot of the Y buyers to be 3 owners. In my family we were forced to lease a ICE van to replace the old CUV my wife had. So, atleast for us Y first would have been better. Ofcourse all this is anecdotal.

There is a higher chance for someone to own two Ys vs a Y and a 3 if the Y came out first. Y is the superior car in every way vs the 3 while paying such a small premium. According too most YouTubers it even looks more proportioned.

 

[jerry33]

Convenience store owners like turnover just like with restaurants. You just have to trust me on this as I have clients who either own the business, property, or both. People don't visit convenience stores to lounge and shop around. That's what a coffee shop is for.

And I ask this out of curiosity: As utilities are slowly shifting residential customers onto TOU, is there any evidence showing utilities willing to sell electricity at cheap enough fixed rates throughout the day to station owners? Or will station owners need to charge different rates at different times of the day?

If the rate difference is large enough, they will put in battery storage and solar panels.

 

[avoigt]

Would that BEV organization still be within the Volkswagen Group (unifying the somewhat conflicting Audi, Porsche and Volkswagen BEV platforms) - or does Diess desire a BEV alliance broader than that, between German carmakers, perhaps with foreign carmakers included as well?

Its an independent and existing e.g. SW development organization for BEVs within Wolfsburg the HQ of VW. Audi and Porsche are separate and although they share some services this is not one of it. Given that the ICE business is making 99% more revenue and profit vs BEV they have been able to hire the best talent internally simply because they have more budget, more influence and more power. You can imagine what that means for BEV.

Diess is an outsider and the other CEOs in Germany do not like him and do not speak his language. Even within VW many just wait for the right moment to take his chair. If the i.D.3 does not sell it may get difficult for him already in 2019 but I expect it to happen latest next year. Wish him big success though as he is one of the very few who understands what needs to be done.

There is no consensus between VW & BMW, Daimler, Audi, Porsche what the strategy forward is. Most other either go for Hybrid or still believe BEVs will remain in a nice once the hype is over. Most vote for PHEVs

 

[jerry33]

I've been retired for 16 years, so am unable to recall a specific case. But whenever a similar non-denial denial was made by a company "spokesman", it often inspired investigative reporters to eventually unearth the veracity of the original assertion.

Not to worry then, there are none left.

 

[KSilver2000]

BTW, I wrote about this earlier. Starbucks was not interested in putting chargers - even if they were free a few years back. They wanted quick turnover, not people lounging around - I know goes against the image Starbucks has tried to create.

I haven’t done any calculations to see whether it makes sense, but I’m not totally surprised if that was really the case. Large majority of Starbucks locations have very limited parking space allocated to them. Given the amount of sales/turnover they need to have, someone taking a spot for 40+ minutes, especially during peak hours is likely not ideal. I’ve explained a while ago that it would definitely not make sense if they had to pay for it.

But besides all that, it’s not Starbucks that would need to approve it. Ultimately it’s the property landlord that would need to approve or not since Starbucks doesn’t own the properties they operate on.

 

[abasile]

In my family we were forced to lease a ICE van to replace the old CUV my wife had.

Did you consider a used Model S, possibly for as low as the $30k ballpark? The older Model S with the large frunk has a good amount of cargo capacity. Our family just returned from a long camping trip in national and state parks, and our 2012 Model S served us well. We packed too much stuff and it still fit without too much difficulty.

The cargo volume of the Model Y is expected to be about the same as that of the 2012 Model S. A brand new Model Y will have the advantages of seating for up to 7 adults (if two of them aren't too large or can squeeze a bit), the latest Autopilot/FSD hardware, and available all-wheel-drive. I'm keeping a close eye on the Y, and I think it'll be a winner.