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

[RobStark]

• exclusive Supercharger network

What ever happened to the German government forcing Tesla to open the Supercharger Network in Germany to the public? Three years ago we discussed this a lot.

 

[Prunesquallor]

Tesla PR needs to get out in front of this fire nonsense and lay out the stats about how safe Tesla’s are compared to ICE vehicles - get out in front of as many tv news cameras to comment as possible - opportunity to turn this FUD into a big PR win.

"From 2012 – 2018, there has been approximately one Tesla vehicle fire for every 170 million miles traveled. By comparison, data from the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) and U.S. Department of Transportation shows that in the United States there is a vehicle fire for every 19 million miles traveled."

Tesla Vehicle Safety Report

 

[azaz]

TSLAQ so mad SEC/DOJ action is against Under Armour and not Tesla

 

[Krugerrand]

Why else would they sell the chicken wit the golden eggs?

So we short it?

 

[Johann Koeber]

What ever happened to the German government forcing Tesla to open the Supercharger Network in Germany to the public? Three years ago we discussed this a lot.

Not much. Tesla Superchargers now have the required plug. But they are not enabled to let other cars charge.

Tesla has gifted many destination chargers to Hotels and Restaurants. Most of these are also locked so that they service only Tesla vehicles.

I see some of the Tesla drivers using the Ionity chargers, even when Tesla superchargers are available. The 8 € per charge fee comes out cheaper than the 0.33 € per kWh charged by Tesla - if you charge more than 25 kW.

Another queer observation: On one of the superchargers I frequent (Münchberg) the charge is not 0.33 € but 0.34 € per kWh.

 

[dennis]

I've been wondering when we'll hear from Tamberrino. He's overdue.

Edit: His current price target is $158 so I'm guessing that's why he doesn't want to talk about Tesla right now.

Tamberrino left Goldman Sachs two months ago. They haven't named a new auto analyst yet so there is no coverage on Tesla from GS.

 

[Skryll]

NBC nightly news just had a report on Tesla's "alarming" number of fires. And in the report said that the NHSTA has open an investigation

Fire sale tomorrow? I’m in with some dry powder

 

[UncaNed]

I kind of feel the same way. But it would be super sweet if they showed off an early stage concept for an electric excavator, bulldozer and cement mixer, with a view to dominating construction and mining support vehicles, together with a mobile power pack station. And agricultural tractors. Churn those babies out and kill red diesel.

Caterpillar has a substantially higher market cap than Tesla, you just need to show a credible path to take away a good chunk of its market share to get a sustained bounce in valuation.

Or a skate for a cement mixer, 20-ton dump truck, garbage truck, fire engine, single-axle straight 20' box truck, utility company heavy service truck, heavy tow truck (all basically long Semis).

 

[Off Shore]

Or a skate for a cement mixer, 20-ton dump truck, garbage truck, fire engine, single-axle straight 20' box truck, utility company heavy service truck, heavy tow truck (all basically long Semis).

You forgot motorhome.

 

[Antares Nebula]

ChargePoint CEO On Tesla Being Early, The Model 3, And Tesla ‘Bashing’

 

[UncaNed]

... As various Chinese suppliers and Tesla, among many others, advance technologically it seems far easier to position for optimal results. I suspect version 5 or so of Tesla roof will include active directional optimization. We seem to be nearing some major breakthroughs, one of which certainly is the advent of bi-directional panels that are installable to be quite effective sunshades too...

Are you suggesting tracking shingles??

 

[UncaNed]

You forgot motorhome.

Lighter, single rear axle frame adequate for motorhome, UPS trucks, & school bus.

 

[⚡️ELECTROMAN⚡️]

From Fortune magazine this month. Figures my favorite stock is an “approach with caution” company, ran by an erratic founder.

 

[kengchang]

View attachment 473006 From Fortune magazine this month. Figures my favorite stock is an “approach with caution” company, ran by an erratic founder.

Only someone erratic would start a space rocket company and electric car company at the same time.

 

[SteveG3]

Why leap to an enormous evil conspiracy theory when there are far simpler explanations at hand?

Is our mainstream press so easily corrupted by the threat of losing in the future some car and oil advertising?

A simpler answer is that the mainstream press gets eyeballs by bashing things.

But to me there is a more basic answer: the editors and reporters who actually control the content of the mainstream media are in the same bubble as other Tesla skeptics. To them, Musk is a hotheaded billionaire producing expensive toys they can’t afford, and generating massive debt that can’t be repaid.

Sometimes the media shapes public opinion, sometimes the reverse is true. See for example “weapons of mass destruction”. They didn’t manufacture that narrative, but they went along with it.

The good news for Tesla: public opinion can change. In Tesla’s case I think it’s already changing, as more and more people sing the praises of their new Tesla car. And if Tesla can string together more than two consecutive quarters of profit, that will change the overriding sentiment of investors.

Having read coverage of Tesla for so many years, I think the far greater conspiracy theory would be to assert that the laws of probability have conspired to have CNBC, The NYT, WSJ, AP, Reuters, NPR, the LA Times, etc., etc. all together error thousands of times towards unflattering misunderstanding of facts and events in regards to Tesla for every time they error towards a flattering misunderstanding of the same. Thousands to one.

Negativity bias in the media (negative just sells better)?

How is it that virtually any suggestion of a new drivetrain technology from virtually any automaker not named Tesla, from startups to global incumbents, is highlighted as a glowing possibility for the future, while for Tesla such statements about where their tech is going is doubted, scoffed at, or referred to as "shiny object dangling" diversion from the laundry list of ongoing Tesla disasters then recited in such articles.

I find it nearly impossible that there isn't rampant intellectual dishonesty in the programming pumped out about Tesla.



PS our mainstream press is a for profit business. They have taken no oaths towards some kind of journalistic code of ethics, they have no oversight, and they drift further and further towards pay-to-play programming for hire. They are selling programming, just like McDonalds is selling fast food... what makes them money, that's what they sell. At this point, I think there's barely much more interest in informing the public about our world at these programming outlets, than there is interest in McDonalds about educating the public about health and nutrition. Of course, I'm sure both air emotionally evocative promos that this is exactly what they are about.

Sharyl Attkisson left a 20 year career at CBS Network News, having won Emmys, and an Edward R Murrow Award for investigative reporting over this very issue... pay-to-play taking over what airs, and what does not. Don't hold your breath for any mainstream media outlets to report on this phenomena.

 

[Captkerosene]

Saudi Arabia approves IPO of world’s most profitable company — Bloomberg

Anyone else feel like this is the saudis way of saying “we know oil is dead in ten years so we’re going to take sucker money to get less exposed to the transition”?

If you think oil is dead in ten years then you are the sucker.

 

[Singer3000]

Or a skate for a cement mixer, 20-ton dump truck, garbage truck, fire engine, single-axle straight 20' box truck, utility company heavy service truck, heavy tow truck (all basically long Semis).

We’ve had quite a bit of discussion on Tesla vertically integrating into mining. If that happens, I’m quite sure they’ll make the ancillary vehicles required. Whether fully or as a skateboard who can say.

Once Semi is up and running in large scale way, the other thing you’d expect to see is an autonomous electric forklift and such like for an end to end logistics solution (minus the ships ). A use case of LIDAR perhaps!

 

[PeterJA]

Yeah, kinda like the people who focus on the rare allergic reaction to a vaccination that saves millions of lives. There's a name for people like that:

Wackos.

I prefer: Wackadoodles.

I'm disappointed that smart people who recognize the corruption of media and government by a powerful industry (Big Oil) sneer at other people who recognize the corruption of media and government by another powerful industry (Big Pharma). But that's the power of propaganda.

Of course this is off-topic (like the quoted posts).

 

[SteveG3]

I agree with the reasons you enumerate. I also think it's important because the faster they reach that high-volume goal, the more difficult it will be for incumbent ICE makers to ask for and win a massive bailout to make up for their years of EV neglect and delay.

If Ford, GM and FCA (or whatever they're called in the future) can convince voters and legislators that their manufacturing capacity is required to produce EVs fast enough to stem greenhouse gas emissions, I think there's a good chance they'll be able to ride the coming wave of policies aimed at combating climate change and get taxpayers to fund the investments they neglected out of greed and laziness (e.g. battery manufacturing). Legislation has already been proposed that includes grants to auto companies to pay for EV manufacturing equipment. That would be a bitter pill for me to swallow, both because as an investor I think Tesla should reap the rewards for nearly unilaterally pushing innovation in this realm, and because the vindictive side of me wants to see those ICE companies punished for their destructive decisions.

It would be so satisfying if, in response to a proposed bailout, decision-makers could point to Tesla and say, "They're producing enough EVs to serve the market and achieve our policy goals. How did you guys manage to piss away so many massive advantages? Welcome to the free market, you're on your own." I suppose that's unrealistic to hope for, but still, probably more likely to happen if Tesla keeps driving relentlessly towards 20M vehicles a year.

I think the long game for the global incumbents is propping up by protective governments in the form of funding and tying the hands of outside companies. I suspect the latter will be particularly blatant in the case of the potentially massive robotaxi industry. Whether by nation, states/provinces within nations, or cities, I suspect it will be common for the robotaxi business to be like a regulated utility. I would not expect, for example, Germany, German states, or cities, to award these licenses to Tesla. It seems we've already seen signs of this hand-tying of Tesla in Europe and Germany with regard to what's already been held back in these areas in regard to AP/FSD capabilities already run in the US.

You raise the possibility of the US public not being game for this.

I think the US automakers will rely on the German government and Japanese government doing this for their automakers, which will make selling a US gov't bailout/propping up of GM and Ford far easier. Given how much of the economy and national prestige so to speak the German and Japanese automakers are for their countries, I think this scenario is quite likely.

PS if this does come to pass, let's not hold our breath for the media to discuss the irony of the years of (twisted, exaggerated) bashing Tesla as living off government support, only to be massively dwarfed by mountains of government propping up of GM and Ford to survive the transition to EVs.

 

[KSilver2000]

"From 2012 – 2018, there has been approximately one Tesla vehicle fire for every 170 million miles traveled. By comparison, data from the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) and U.S. Department of Transportation shows that in the United States there is a vehicle fire for every 19 million miles traveled."

Tesla Vehicle Safety Report

The age of the ICE vehicles, which is almost 12 years in the US, probably is a factor in the statistic of ICE vehicle fires per x miles traveled. Almost all of the vehicle fires I’ve seen on the freeway are the really old cars. But, probably won’t make it 9x less even if you filter for similar age ICE vehicle fleet.