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

[TradingInvest]

Regarding Tesla's valuation, I think Tesla is not valued by this quarter or next quarter's sales/margin/profit. Anyone who tries to value this business, should look at what this company will be doing in long term.

Tesla is on its way to become one of the largest companies in the world. I am not just saying this because it sounds catchy. You look at the cars Tesla is producing, imagine what kind of vehicles they will be producing in 5~10 years. I think by 2030 they will be producing 20 million vehicles per year, earning at least $10k from each vehicle (vehicle, software and insurance). Actually they could earn $50k from each vehicle if certain scenarios materialize. In the next few years Tesla will start to make boat load of money. I think selling TSLA now is similar to selling AAPL in 2010. I will continue to add TSLA shares when there is good entry.

 

[Cosmacelf]

In 2019 Q1, there were not enough demand, we discussed in details why it happened that way.
This Q1 is different. Q1 production capability has improved a lot from last year, yet this quarter's production is basically all sold out and we are still in January. There are almost 1 million Tesla cars on the road, so awareness is much better now. A Model 3 is not just better, it's way better than any other cars. A test drive will sell the car, it's still true.

Lots of Tesla shareholders now can buy Tesla cars like buying rotisserie chicken from Costco. I bet many people on this forum know what I am talking about. There are at least 500,000 Tesla shareholders. This wealth effect should not be ignored.

Is Q1 production really sold out? Do we know for sure there is enough Model 3 demand for the entire quarter? I guess I missed that memo?

 

[Artful Dodger]

If some are inclined (and it's okay with mods), please feel free to give those of us who can't tune into the call some updates in this thread.

Go over to the CleanTechnica Youtube Channel and watch their livestream as a rerun.

Paging @ZachShahan should really drop into b4 the calls and post a link. Many of us can't connect to the audio feed offered via ir.tesla.com

Cheers!

 

[StealthP3D]

I think people have gotten too used to this thread being a bull thesis echo chamber as the stock went hyperbolic the last month. It isn’t particularly healthy as an investor to not be thinking about downsides or getting upset if someone points out that Elon isn’t perfect (he isn’t, you know). I’ll leave it at that.

I don't want to continue this either other than to point out that even I will point out occasional downsides and freely admit that Musk is human and has faults. I simply felt your characterization was condescending to the point of not being an accurate representation of how Musk presents material and how most of us consume it. Unnecessarily condescending to both us retail investors as well as to Elon Musk. That's all.

 

[SMAlset]

Secret battery lab is at somewhere very cold, that's a hint so it's unlikely to be Tesla's

what comes to my mind could be Dalhousie if he’s actually telling the truth about stuff.

 

[StarFoxisDown!]

Is Q1 production really sold out? Do we know for sure there is enough Model 3 demand for the entire quarter? I guess I missed that memo?

Just the sheer math on delivery estimates times for China, US, and Europe make it very hard to see Tesla not selling every car they make this quarter at Q4 production rates, probably even slightly higher production numbers thanks to Giga3.

I think last I saw, the shortest delivery time was like 6 or 7 weeks and the longer delivery estimate times are 8 to 10 weeks. At this point, even a 6 week delivery from today's date pretty much means they are sold out.....unless you think they literally will not get any more orders starting from today's date.

 

[StealthP3D]

Is Q1 production really sold out? Do we know for sure there is enough Model 3 demand for the entire quarter? I guess I missed that memo?

It depends on what you mean by "for sure". But, yeah, I agree, all the signs point to Tesla being able to sell as many Model 3's as they can make without any issues other than the usual leftover "tailings" at the very end of the quarter.

 

[Tim S]

That plus ASP in Q1 will be significantly higher because of tesla stock rich buyers and upgraders

This is a real thing. Tesla stockholders will buy all of the options with their newly found wealth. ASP will increase significantly.

 

[TradingInvest]

Is Q1 production really sold out? Do we know for sure there is enough Model 3 demand for the entire quarter? I guess I missed that memo?

Not sold out already, if you look at the delivery dates, they are pretty close to the quarter end. Some people reported when they asked Tesla when they can get P3D, they said in April. China pushed to Q3 delivery for AWD and P.

 

[Sparky]

Today was a good day. My wife's new shirt arrived (ordered 2 weeks ago)...

Mine also arrived! Celebrated the CyTruckload of $TSLA gains today by taking my phone for a ride on the roof of my X. It made it quite far before disembarking. Even this did not dampen my spirits

Now I have an ensemble.

 

[mrdoubleb]

Waking up in Europe, it is such a beautiful morning...

 

[Artful Dodger]

View attachment 505757

I love a man that grins when he fights.

Winston Churchill

"Some chicken. Some neck".
- Ibid.

 

[EV forever]

Whenever I'm torn I split the difference.

I have Feb 7th 600s. I'm waiting and Selling on Wednesday. I do believe we are about to witness the beginning of a short squeeze.

Based on EvNow's (I think?) spreadsheets posted a bit earlier today, the average time to the low after an ER is a couple days. The average time to a high was something closer to a week or two. I'm guessing those are localized minima/maxima, not sure where the line was draw, but that would lead me to think the worst timing would be to sell them this week and likely better late next week.

I'm in the same boat on both sides. Some 2/7 $650s I bought late today and some _sold_ $520s expiring Friday I sold about 3 weeks ago. Trying to figure out the best time to get out of each. Based on those spreadsheets, probably end of day tomorrow for the $520 sold calls or Friday, then sometime late next week to get out of the $650 bought calls. Nothing is guaranteed, but under the theory the future is more likely then not to mirror the past, I guess that's my strategy.

So yeah, first of all this is not an advice, purely my opinion and what I'm going to do tomorrow. I could be very, very wrong. No one can accurately predict a top.

I was surprised to see the SP be at $650 after reading the ER, because I thought it was good, but nothing unexpected. I do believe there are funds who have been waiting to go long and shorts who have been waiting to cover, because they thought Q3 might've been a one-time fluke. On the other hand, there should also be a lot of swing traders that might be looking to take profits.

All in all, I don't expect a crazy run up in the coming 1-2 months, but then again I did not expect this crazy run up when we were at $420, so who knows. There are likely still funds and shorts on the sideline waiting to see how Q1 pans out before buying, especially in light of cautionary guidance on Q1 during the call. If Q1 is equally 'solid' as Q4, I would expect another (likely bigger) bump. But until then, I don't think Q4 was mind-blowing enough, nor guidance for 2020 strong enough to warrant $800+ in the next 1-2 months.

Add onto that macro risks, and I think I'll be selling all or most of my 21 Feb $800 calls tomorrow, likely a large chunk right at open. I'd be more tempted to hold onto some 7 Feb $650s a little bit, because your IV crunch won't be as bad as mine, but I will definitely be looking to take profits on my 21 Feb $800s.

I think we are so well informed here that we forget just how badly informed everyone else is. They get taken by surprise every time something like today happens to them. I don't even mean $TSLAQ, I just mean the average individual investor or car buyer.

Well said @ggr. I am thinking along the same lines.
Also, thanks to @ckessel, @Nocturnal, @ZenMan and @FrankSG for their replies.

I have seen many folks on forums here suggest that the ER was good, but nothing spectacular. I think the only reason we feel that way is because of the education we have received from the excellent folks on these forums. Thinking from the perspective of common investors without the collective knowledge of this forum, the current ER would have been a total and complete surprise. Taking myself as an example, if I was only reading the nonsense articles on the various financial publications or listening to the junk on CNBC, I would have not known that Tesla was at a turning point. I am highly educated, but I am not and engineer and would never have known about the intricacies of technical accomplishments of Tesla or how far ahead of everyone else they are. My knowledge would have been superficial and would have continued thinking that competition is just around the corner.

The ER was good enough for the world to know that Tesla is here to stay, which in itself seems to be a surprise to them. I doubt most folks realize that Tesla has already won the race and other car companies cannot hope to catch up with them. Then there are all the other innovations in FSD, energy business etc, which are not even being discussed in MMM, so each will be a bigger surprise as successes add up. I think we will see a short squeeze, but it will be prolonged and continue throughout 2020

For my situation specifically, I have decided to hold till next week for the Feb 7 options with strike prices of @650 and @420. I considered the $650 options as lottery tickets and the $420 option was simply for good luck .

In addition, I also have 2/21 $470 which were purchased back in Oct for $5.36, and a few others for Mar, July, and Sept. I am going to continue holding those as well for now, will decide as they get closer to expiry when to sell these.

 

[Artful Dodger]

We are now smarter. We are launching 2 vehicles now (Model Y and Model 3 shanghai I presume).

FTFY. Model Y Shanghai is slated for 2021 launch.

 

[FrankSG]

I think we are so well informed here that we forget just how badly informed everyone else is. They get taken by surprise every time something like today happens to them. I don't even mean $TSLAQ, I just mean the average individual investor or car buyer.

After listening to the CNBC coverage on YouTube, I think this might be exactly why I was so surprised by the move to $650. With regards to the 500k 2020 deliveries forecast, I'm believe that's a big under-promise, and I still expect at least 550k+ this year as long as battery supply is not an issue. But judging from the news coverage, the "comfortably exceed 500k" came as a huge positive surprise to people, as well as the progress with MY ramp.

Again, I don't think these results are good enough for a further explosive near term run up, and suspect it to be more gradual. But I'm not selling a single long term (18-30 months) call, and obviously I'm not selling a single share either, so it'd be a fun surprise if a big buyer or two wake up, get FOMO, and decide to accumulate a large position in Q1 based on this ER.

 

[lklundin]

Good morning.

The very small German MM Lang & Schwarz with its very extended trading hours had a morning trade (9 shares...) at 520.20 Euro (ca. 573 $), bid-ask is 517.10 - 520.20.

Frankfurt will open in about 15 minutes.

PS. Frankfurt has opened, trading at just over 520€.

Good morning!

Just now at Lang & Schwarz TSLA is trading at 585€ (ca. 647$). Frankfurt will open in about 15 minutes.

 

[Artful Dodger]

400-mile Model S coming very soon. and he's not talking about a "double-stacked" battery. sounds like from the existing 18650 100kwh battery.

Possibly even via on OTA Update. GF1/Sparks switched to a new rev. of bty chemisty last fall, so no reason not to do so in Japan at the same time.

TL;dr S/X cars sold since Fall 2019 may already HAVE the larger capacity pack, running in S/W limited mode to avoid osborning exising S/X inventory. When that's all cleared out, look for a "sale price" on extra range for the S/X already parked in your garage the last few months...

Cheers!

 

[Bet TSLA]

Listening to call now - "feature complete" now means an above zero chance of getting you from home to work without intervention.

Feature complete means this is true for any Tesla on any trip from home to work. That's a pretty reasonable definition of feature complete. But getting it to 100% will take at least a year after that point. TACC is relatively simple and is still being fine-tuned five years after being "feature complete".

 

[Bet TSLA]

Elon: we'll just use 4G/5G. No real need for gigabit. So I guess it could be OK. But we really aren't thinking about it.

I don't believe him. I think it's obvious that Starlink will be used by Tesla vehicles eventually. They'll need universal connectivity for level 4 FSD for quite a while. There will be "driver centers" with Tesla people ready to take over in situations the vehicles can't deal with. Examples include such things as law enforcement wanting to talk to the driver, total obstruction of sensors rendering self-driving impossible, severe damage to the vehicle.

Laws (at least in some places) will require that action can be taken under such circumstances and Tesla will have to have some way of connecting to the vehicle. Starlink solves the problem and will be comparatively cheap for Tesla. You don't need lots of bandwidth, just a connection. And that means you can get away with a smaller antenna if you want.

 

[Bet TSLA]

Doesn't sound like Level 4/5 fully autonomous Robotaxi fleet is around the corner.

What I heard sounded an awful lot like @neroden was right. Tesla is just getting to the point where they can start doing the hard stuff. It may be a long time before we see even a good level 4 system. Elon is back to hoping and saying the problem is much harder than he thought. I continue to be disappointed with autonomy progress.

Of course there's no way to evaluate where things are at now until we get to see a firmware release that's meant for HW3 only. I look forward to that and I intend to be optimistic until proven that things are otherwise.