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

[RobStark]

Well, going out of business is exactly what happened to the majority of the tire manufacturers when they didn't switch to making radial tires soon enough. Firestone, Uniroyal, BFG--gone (brands owned by some other company now). Goodyear only survived because of their other products. Government has already bailed out the U.S. auto industry once. They are not going to be too keen on doing it again.

Automakers are much more important to national economies than tire makers and much more important to national pride.

Ergo, they will receive much more support than tire makers.

 

[humbaba]

He gives no consideration to the net FTDs at any time. IMO, there are considerable FTDs that are not being properly reported. These are a key component of the ability to cap the stock.

Do you know that he doesn't? He talks about having sources "on the street" but I don't think he has said anything that limits his data inputs. Its just that he has limited data and uses that for an estimate. In general it is quite accurate, but in specific cases it can fall apart. I don't feel like trying to find his tweets relating to the significant miss he had with $TSLA short interest, but he acknowledged it.

Remember, he is more concerned with the overall performance of the model as it produces data that is sold. He has an incentive to be right, but not particularly to introduce biases to account for particular stock outliers.

 

[ggr]

Mod: trying to catch up, moved 23(!) posts to Incandescent heat pump stuff (out of main) . No more here. No more motor cooling here either please. --ggr

 

[Unpilot]

sorry, I looked

Finally we have someone to blame....NEVER look again.

 

[Fact Checking]

And I disagree with you. I think he is trying to prevent and kill others. He pretty much said he’d kill them because they didn’t join him.

We have the Chinese EVs to take the lower end of the market.

Agree with this thought. At first it seemed like Elon/Tesla was ok with having the niche production that was the Halo products of the EV space. But with their aggressive pricing across all models this year while increasing the value/range at the same time, I've sense a notable change in their approach and attitude. They've said screw it with maintaining a high level of profitability, we just need to be positive FCF. Elon has seemed less and less focused on the stock price and/or shorts. They're frustrated with the lack of progression from practically everyone else in the market and are now focusing on taking as much EV marketshare as possible.

After they announce their battery tech breakthroughs and unlock true super mass production of battery cells and packs and have Model 3/Y production to 1-1.5 million/year, I expect them to continue lower the 3/Y/S/X prices. Them lowering 3/Y prices will enter those cars into truly mass appeal price brackets. I definitely see a sub 30k Model 3 version in 2 years.

Edit: I could also see them lowering the S/X prices so much in 2 years that annual production could be 150-200k/year. The announcement from Elon that the Pickup truck will start for under 50k was a definite shot at pickup auto makers that Tesla isn't interested in the huge margins that trucks get right now. GM/Ford/Dodge better be prepared

Agreed. I think 2018 was a turning point for Elon, when he realized that traditional carmakers and other dependents of fossil fuel income are not just unwilling to join the EV transition, but are also actively using their oversized media influence and other underhanded tactics to ensure that Tesla fails so that inconvenient EVs can be suppressed - and were also attacking Elon's other ventures in the process, such as SpaceX.

For Elon this turned Tesla, which for many years was more of a side project to his main love SpaceX, into an existential fight. He got more engaged, took full control, cleaned house and applied his SpaceX cost engineering and vertical integration experience to Tesla more consistently. This will possibly also kill/reduce a couple of gascar companies much faster, but that's really just a side effect, not Elon's main purpose.

The 2019 Model 3 Performance price cuts were also aimed at the bread and butter European sedan segment of BMW and Alfa Romeo, and now he's got Porsche in sights as well, who should fear a $100k 4-door Nürburgring champion with 100,000/year production capacity far more than the originally planned $250k 2-door Roadster 2 Nürburgring champion with a few thousand sales per year.

 

[Cherry Wine]

Anyone with a good understanding of money markets care to opine on this story?

Bloomberg - Are you a robot?

Fed’s First-in-a-Decade Intervention Will Be Repeated Wednesday

The Federal Reserve took action to calm money markets, injecting billions in cash to quell a surge in short-term rates that was pushing up its policy benchmark rate and threatening to drive up borrowing costs for companies and consumers. The central bank also said it’s willing to spend another $75 billion Wednesday.

While the spike wasn’t evidence of any sort of imminent financial crisis, it highlighted how the Fed was losing control over short-term lending, one of its key tools for implementing monetary policy. It also indicated Wall Street is struggling to absorb record sales of Treasury debt to fund a swelling U.S. budget deficit. What’s more, many dealers have curtailed trading because of safeguards implemented after the 2008 crisis, making these markets more prone to volatility.

 

[jerry33]

Have you seen what passes for FUD nowadays?
*shakin my head*
I remember when SAF used to have some editorial standards, dangit
View attachment 456328
"But a CEO w/ a pot head".

I guess that means he [the CEO] went to college.

 

[Fact Checking]

Have you seen what passes for FUD nowadays?
*shakin my head*
I remember when SAF used to have some editorial standards, dangit
View attachment 456328

The spelling errors are funny too: I'm also pretty sure that he didn't really mean to write "he uses GFs to grow weeds" but "he uses GFs to grow weed", right?

(The Shorty Air Force must really be projecting there.)

And these guys are holding ~40 million TSLA shares short. SMH.

 

[Cherry Wine]

FOMC cuts fed funds rate, 7 officials project one more by year end

WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) - The Federal Reserve on Wednesday trimmed its benchmark interest rate to 1.75% to 2%, with a sizable minority projecting one more rate reduction in 2019.

FOMC cuts fed funds rate, 7 officials project one more by year end

 

[hobbes]

And release notes have leaked, too- interesting that it says "Enhanced Summon is designed to allow your car to drive to you (using your phone´s GPS as a target destination) or a location of your choosing...". Didn´t know you could direct it elsewhere, which at least makes a very good party trick. Imagine you leaving from a restaurant, you go out to fetch the car, your company follows a bit later and is the car drives up to pick them up - but without you in it .

Smart Summon on V10!!! Found in Facebook : teslamotors

And another update in this series, just keeps coming: Elon says smart summon coming to all HW 2.0+ cars
1https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1174379370032427009?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw

 

[Tslynk67]

Build it and they will come

Tesla on Twitter

 

[Fact Checking]

FOMC cuts fed funds rate, 7 officials project one more by year end

WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) - The Federal Reserve on Wednesday trimmed its benchmark interest rate to 1.75% to 2%, with a sizable minority projecting one more rate reduction in 2019.

FOMC cuts fed funds rate, 7 officials project one more by year end

The FOMC has twelve members, right? So "7" is probably more than just a "sizeable minority" - is it a slim majority?

 

[Hock1]

Do you know that he doesn't? He talks about having sources "on the street" but I don't think he has said anything that limits his data inputs. Its just that he has limited data and uses that for an estimate. In general it is quite accurate, but in specific cases it can fall apart. I don't feel like trying to find his tweets relating to the significant miss he had with $TSLA short interest, but he acknowledged it.

Remember, he is more concerned with the overall performance of the model as it produces data that is sold. He has an incentive to be right, but not particularly to introduce biases to account for particular stock outliers.

Have you ever seen him ever mention FTDs? No. IMO, many FTDs are created by "market makers" who are shorting stock that is not borrowed (under the Madoff Exception). I recall sometime in the past, Ihor denied that "naked shorting" even exists. His numbers are based on the assumption that the market is a zero-sum game. When shares that don't exist can be sold, it is not a zero-sum game. Reported short interest is a joke. IMO, an artifact.

 

[Fact Checking]

Build it and they will come

Tesla on Twitter

View attachment 456333

And that's the blue Plaid prototype in the picture! First time Tesla acknowledges it in an official photo I believe.

 

[Right_Said_Fred]

Just like the heat pump discussion the motor cooling discussion has found a new home: Motor cooling (out of main)

 

[Right_Said_Fred]

It wouldn’t surprise me if Tesla builds a few supercharger stalls at the Nurburgring when Plaid comes out.

Only my timing was a bit off

 

[Todd Burch]

I have to admit, I find the last few days stock price action to be baffling. What exactly is going on here? Are the big investors *really* this blind?
We can ALL see now that the taycan is not ANY competition whatsoever.
We can see that hardly anybody wants an audi e-tron, now whatever what they do.
We can see that the jaguar i-pace isn't even much of a threat either...

So currently the model S,X and 3 are all entirely unopposed. There is ample evidence that manufacturing is coming soon to China, and that Chinese demand is extremely strong. There is evidence of very strong demand in Europe, Elon has been relatively quiet, there is no *bad* news coming from anywhere...

And yet Tesla stock is still below its level a year ago. This is totally insane. The stock MUST be a lower risk now we have the chinese factory making such progress, the competition shown to be useless, and more tech breakthroughs coming internally, along with the maxwell acquisition, talk of plaid mode, million mile batteries and so on...
Plus V10 software is nearly here.

Why are people not buying, this stock seems like a no-brainer.... but then...its taken people THIS LONG to see wework is overvalued so...maybe investors are just idiots?

I think the big dudes are waiting to SEE profits. If Tesla's production numbers continue to go up and the profits don't come, they'll keep waiting on the sidelines. As was said by an analyst on the call about a year ago, they want to see Tesla turn into a company that makes money. (Yes, we all know they are now cash flow positive)...I'm talking profits.

When we see that, some will come back in. When we see it *consistently*, then we're off to the races.

 

[Fact Checking]

I recall sometime in the past, Ihor denied that "naked shorting" even exists.

I'd like to quibble with this part: I believe Ihor used the SEC definition of "illegal naked shorting", which is failure to deliver shares under the rules (within ~3 trading days), which rules are arguably very friendly to shorts.

Under that metric there's been I believe near zero "failure to deliver" events for TSLA, which is not surprising, given how widely shorted TSLA is - it's in the top 3 short positions by nominal value so the borrowing pools would be among the most liquid ones.

You on the other hand call the current rules and electronic trading system that allows new short positions without first securing borrow-able shares as "naked shorting" - which is a different definition and not what Ihor was talking about. By your definition probably 99% of shorting done on the NASDAQ is technically 'naked shorting'.

In that sense Ihor's positions on this were always self-consistent and pretty plain, and I don't really understand the Ihor hate. Ihor could have amplified the TSLAQ message over the years by timing his reports to only happen after big drops in the price - I never saw him do that. Ihor is actually sympathetic to Tesla investors and predicted an epic short squeeze once the ball gets rolling. Denying that an epic short squeeze is even possible is one of the core orthodoxies of any TSLAQ person - which he clearly isn't.

 

[mongo]

Only my timing was a bit off

Nah, you're good. That is a prebuilt skid with flex conduit running to the power source. Not (yet) a permanent installation.

Permanent per @Cherry Wine below.

 

[Stars aligned]

Build it and they will come

Tesla on Twitter

View attachment 456333

Now, that's fantastic. Clean energy drives the Nurburgring record. Fingers crossed.

And they resisted to go down the route with bio diesel. Fart mode is better than cow fart mode, of course.