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

[lascavarian]

Looks like max pain continues to move up. Looking like 725 to start the morning.

 

[DragonWatch]

Forward Observing

Vehicle service. An excessive amount of time is wasted by soldiers performing maintenance.

Most humans that own a fossil fuel car pay to have their car serviced; depending on driving habits; two to four times a year. Few think like me, I never wanted to have a family member broken down along the highway. Unfortunately, there are those that barely could afford a car let alone service it. We stopped buying Volvo (owned 3 ~ all new) when I realized it cost me $2K every other year for service once beyond the warranty ~ back in 1999.

Quite a different world not having to waste time and money on service.

 

[Artful Dodger]

Meanwhile (in the "not-a-service" thread), Tesla and BYD have begun to collect 100s of millions of dollars in China's National Carbon Trading Scheme: (from protocol.com)

The end of August marked the end of an annual trading window in China: For the past two months, carmakers have been trading their "New Energy Vehicle" credits in the dark. Leading electric vehicle companies like Tesla and BYD were making hundreds of millions, thanks to a three-year-old quasi-carbon market set up to boost the EV industry's growth.

China is gradually phasing out its direct subsidy program, and moving to a market-based regulation scheme. As a result, the purchase price of NEV credits is increasing steadily.

Cheers!

 

[Artful Dodger]

TSLA Pre-Market Quotes Live​

This page refreshes every 30 seconds.
Data last updated Sep 07, 2021 08:02 AM ET.

Consolidated Last Sale	$736.67 +3.10 (+0.42%)
Pre-Market Volume	92,464
Pre-Market High	$739 (04:01:59 AM)
Pre-Market Low	$735 (05:50:33 AM)

 

[Don TLR]

No demand they say, happy market open Tuesday..

https://twitter.com/x/status/1435082761329524744

 

[2daMoon]

A video from SMR on how Tesla Robots will lead to prosperity, Universal Basic Income, and, (essentially) world domination ... for humans.

oh, yeah, and help toward avoiding that whole "potential for extinction of the human race" thingy that looms over us.

 

[CLK350]

Good write up, from the UK press.

‘The smartest person in any room anywhere’: in defence of Elon Musk, by Douglas Coupland

He’s the Silicon Valley Übermensch who wants us to colonise Mars and who can wipe out billions of dollars with a single tweet. So what’s not to love?

www.theguardian.com

Ah .. that explains it Who owns the Guardian? Our unique independent structure " Guardian News & Media (GNM) is one of the world’s leading news media organisations, creating honest, fearless journalism free from commercial or political interference since our foundation in 1821. "

Fun quote from the article: "

But I hear he treats his employees badly​

First, we already discussed this: he can be a dick, so don’t be surprised when he is. Second, people know they’re going to be working with Elon Musk, so they can’t play woe is me if he goes Elon on them. And third, he’s incredibly smart and is used to working with the world’s smartest and most accomplished people, so if you don’t cut the mustard then you didn’t cut the mustard. And here’s something funny he actually said to someone who was pissing him off in the Tesla factory: “You know, I could be drinking mai tais with naked supermodels, but instead I’m here with you.” He has a point. "

 

[Drezil]

TSLA is already @740 and rising.

Premarket looks pretty hot with a lot of minutes with over 20k traded shares.

 

[2daMoon]

Tesla Economist offers results of his research which supports a compelling argument that there is more than a chip shortage behind Legacy OEMs recent woes.

 

[AquaY]

Obvious?

Somebody needs a car.
They know the price of EVs is high but falling. Supply is limited and there’s a wait list for Teslas.
They consider new ICE, but are fearful it will have no resale value. Besides, buying a new ICE makes them look like a dick or a Luddite when amongst EV owners.
Best option, buy a used car to tide them over for a couple of years till EVs are more affordable.

Result. Used ICE car prices rise.

I’m happy with this trend. Every new ICE sold adds to the climate threat for a decade.

I think the pandemic and chip shortage have more to do with it than EVs


"Used automobile prices are especially hard hit since rental car corporations, confronting a pause in supply last year, sold off around 1/3rd of their cars to raise enough money to withstand the pandemic. Last spring’s sales frenzy pushed secondhand car prices down, explaining the huge percentage rises in the 12-month comparisons.

Due to recent increase in travel, rental automobile firms are suddenly running out of automobiles to rent & are not selling what they have, despite an increased demand. This year, thousands of people have found work and thousands more who were operating from home are moving to the workplace, fueling the need for automobiles.

Many people are increasingly buying cars nowadays since they had to postpone their purchases in the last year due to the global pandemic. As per JD Power, new automobile sales to US customers surpassed 7 million cars in the first half of the year, setting a new high.

In June, used car values continued to rise as a result of the international microprocessor shortage, as fewer individuals traded in their old automobiles due to limited new car availability. Used car values have risen as a result of the combination of reduced availability and higher demand.

Used car values have jumped 32.7 %, in June. It happens progressively over year, a month ago the prices jumped to 26.4% and in one month approximately 7% increase has occurred in automobile prices. The microprocessor shortage has resulted in exceptional price rises, for used automobiles to the point, where certain slightly used cars are now more costly than new vehicles. While used car prices are projected to remain high for the near future, we are expecting to see if they will continue to rise or begin to return to pre-microchip scarcity levels."

Why Are Used Car Prices So High? (2021 Guide) | BumbleAuto

The used car prices are increasing rapidly since the used automobile business is booming all around the world.

bumbleauto.com

 

[ZachF]

I recall that in a really good podcast interview last year Elon mentioned the enormous amount of profits made by established auto manufactures that come from the vast majority of its user base driving out of warranty cars and how that benefit was still to come for Tesla (as almost all of Tesla’s user base was/is still driving cars under warranty). It was said in a manner implying that Tesla will also enjoy that highly profitable revenue stream as well when the out of warranty fleet starts increasing by the millions each year (which I guess really starts adding up around mid decade).

EV maintenance costs are a fraction that of ICE, so that revenue stream of parts will never really materialize the way it does for ICE cars.

 

[Paracelsus]

Agreed - we shouldn't focus on service revenue but design a good car - but there is no maintenance free car possible.

I can't stand this "EVs need no service" - every thing on wheels needs suspension components that have bearings and dampening components that wear out naturally.


Or the "first principle view" on it:
There is no such thing as meintenance free anything on earth - time == entropy - and we need to constantly fight entropy - especially on any moving parts.


So imho Tesla used the "no maintenance checks needed for warranty" as a marketing plot - but it makes no sense going forward to not tell your customers when to maintain which part on the car as any other manufacturer - Tesla should (does) know when aprox. components wear out and should at least inspected (i.e. bearings, dampers and such) and replaced (i.e. break fluid every 2 years).

I am very comfortable telling people that our Tesla needs maintenance. I am also very comfortable telling them that the amount of maintenance required is perhaps an order of magnitude less than other vehicles we have owned, including our Mercedes Sprinter van, which ranks absolute worst on our list of ‘service as a ripoff’ experiences.

You are correct that ‘time =entropy’ is of course true. And maybe we should be clear that metric is also proportional to the number of moving parts in the vehicle. We should also be clear that ‘maintenance experiences’ required of any vehicle owner are also dependent upon the amount of designed obsolescence in each vehicle, they are dependent upon the less-than-necessary frequencies that manufacturers recommend performing vehicle maintenance to help support their dealership’s maintenance profit centers, and for more gullible vehicle owners the frequencies of those experiences can even be influenced by high pressure sales scams that include money-back limited time service ‘sales’ from ICE manufacturers to encourage owners to take vehicles in for service and ‘inspections’ - the later of course being an effort to find even more opportunities under the hood. Our mailbox routinely gets $250-off service flyers from Mercedes, which we find both insulting and infuriating given the service experiences we have had on our Sprinter van.

So before you attempt to so neatly sweep this all under a ‘time=entropy’ conclusion, I suggest we roll that up to a far more inclusive and far more impactful ‘customer focused’ metric…

time=money

And that includes every time service is needed, every effort by the owner to schedule and take in/pick up the vehicle from service, every insulting conversation with a service representative describing all the costs & efforts of that service and the lengthy list of new recommended services as a result of that visit, and even all the time spent throwing away $250-off service specials that continue to waste trees and have an unaccounted carbon footprint by ICE dealerships……….none of which we experience with our Tesla. Nor do we experience wasting time cleaning up oil leaks on our driveway either. In fact, maybe I should consider telling people how much money we save, how much smaller our carbon footprint is, and how much less stomach acid is generated with each Tesla service experience as compared to our Mercedes Sprinter.

For those old enough to remember Slim Pickins and the movie Rancho Deluxe, there was a scene where they shot up a car out in a Montana field with an old Sharps rifle. Our bucket list includes the day where Tesla finally makes a Sprinter van equivalent - (or partners with someone on that project), and we can make a quantum leap forward in RV technology to acquire one to replace our ‘service as a rip-off’ van. Then we can take her out to the back of our farm where we can put her to sleep……..Slim Pickins style. It would be bad karma on us to pass along that Blue Def-burning service experience to anyone else, and bad for the environment to let it live any longer than necessary. I might go pick up another box of 45-70 shells just thinking about it.

 

[Artful Dodger]

Market opens in 1 minute

THE SERVICE THREAD IS NOW CLOSED.

Part-time Mod: I agree. --ggr

 

[TheTalkingMule]

Funny thought just ran through my head....."TSLA is up $7B in the pre-market." Lol

Gonna be a wild few weeks as folks come back from their cocaine and prostitutes in the Hamptons, looking to set up trading strategy heading into the year-end. How many will want to get well out in front of 3Q & 4Q? We shall see!

 

[Unpilot]

Looks like we will break a million shares traded in the first 10 Minutes.

 

[TheTalkingMule]

Blasted right through $750. Looks like volume has instantly snapped out of "summer mode" and the rest of the market just stayed the same. Really speaks to the power of MM's being able to "moderate" SP in a low volume(read: not hedge fund) environment.

 

[Artful Dodger]

Upper-BB is at 755.61 as of 09:40 ET

Gapped up this a.m but only vs Friday (no Gap to Thursday's intraday range).

GLTA!

 

[aubreymcfato]

Good write up, from the UK press.

‘The smartest person in any room anywhere’: in defence of Elon Musk, by Douglas Coupland

He’s the Silicon Valley Übermensch who wants us to colonise Mars and who can wipe out billions of dollars with a single tweet. So what’s not to love?

www.theguardian.com

Ah .. that explains it Who owns the Guardian? Our unique independent structure " Guardian News & Media (GNM) is one of the world’s leading news media organisations, creating honest, fearless journalism free from commercial or political interference since our foundation in 1821. "

Fun quote from the article: "

But I hear he treats his employees badly​

First, we already discussed this: he can be a dick, so don’t be surprised when he is. Second, people know they’re going to be working with Elon Musk, so they can’t play woe is me if he goes Elon on them. And third, he’s incredibly smart and is used to working with the world’s smartest and most accomplished people, so if you don’t cut the mustard then you didn’t cut the mustard. And here’s something funny he actually said to someone who was pissing him off in the Tesla factory: “You know, I could be drinking mai tais with naked supermodels, but instead I’m here with you.” He has a point. "

It's a shame that Douglas Coupland doesn't know that employees have stock, it's probably the single most important difference between Tesla and other big automakers all around the world, and it changes everything about the money the workforce makes.

 

[jhm]

The Tesla Economist provides a useful presentation for why "market share" is irrelevant when measuring Tesla against others.

Makes a lot of good points, but this does not mean the market share is "irrelevant." Certainly, in the short run market share is about both supply and demand. While Tesla may be presently supply constrained, they do in fact compete with other that are demand constrained. This is all fair criticism to point out the specific reasons why each competitor is limit to the share they've got, but it does not mean that market share is an "irrelevant" metric. In the longer run, Tesla will expand its production capacity to gain share, while excess supply piling up on dealer lots will bring a crashing halt to competitor attempts to oversupply the market. Indeed, competitors may well be coerced to cut prices to clear excess supply. We should also be clear about why competitor are willing to put themselves into a position where they may need to cut prices. I believe much of it is simply because they are still producing EVs as compliance vehicles. Certainly in the EU regulations are pushing them to produces more EVs. The alternative is to buy more reg credits from Tesla. Thus, they may be willing to take a loss on building EVs in excess of market demand than to effectively hand cash to Tesla. Who could blame them? But does this mean that market share is "irrelevant"? Certainly not. Just to have a more informed conversation about the state of competition in the EV market, we need to know the score; we need to know market share. Whether any competitor can sustain or grow market share over the long run is the key question. So the real criticism should be leveled at traditional automaker getting over their skiis with more EV market share than they can sustain. The criticism should be direct to the real weaknesses competitors rather than to market share as a metric.

 

[Chunky Jr.]

Looks like we will break a million shares traded in the first 10 Minutes.

I wonder if that guy on Twitter that said he was buying a million shares actually bought them, or started buying them.