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

[thx1139]

Having both HQ and the largest factory in Austin probably means that the share of other employment in Austin will probably grow too. They may not fully move their dev/software/engineering teams there, but the growth will probably be such that eventually the Austin locations become larger and eventually become the primary locations. Tesla can just persuade people to move if they want by offering higher wages in the Austin locations of top of the COL.

Could do that anyway and the HQ remain in Palo Alto. Tesla has engineering and software development people all over the country. My son gave his resume to a Tesla software local in Chicago. Tesla recruiting took to long to contact him and he ended up taking a Software Engineering job with M1Finance. Funny thing is my son has since moved to Austin. We will follow one of our kids once they get settled, but no way no how will I move to Texas.

 

[ZachF]

Tesla seems to open it’s Grunheide kimono very widely.

As we speak, VW is preparing an assembly to prepare for a meeting of all it's 2.335x10^23 middle managers to form an outline for a meeting designed to prepare a discussion to compete with this.

 

[mongo]

As we speak, VW is preparing an assembly to prepare for a meeting of all it's 2.335x10^23 middle managers to form an outline for a meeting designed to prepare a discussion to compete with this.

Apparently, you half a mole at VW.

 

[Don TLR]

They got quite the treat in Berlin to get an actual tour, and wow look at all those parts ready to go.

 

[uujjj2]

California labor law has these two provisions.

First, section 2870 of the labor code:

2870. ​

(a) Any provision in an employment agreement which provides that an employee shall assign, or offer to assign, any of his or her rights in an invention to his or her employer shall not apply to an invention that the employee developed entirely on his or her own time without using the employer’s equipment, supplies, facilities, or trade secret information except for those inventions that either:

(1) Relate at the time of conception or reduction to practice of the invention to the employer’s business, or actual or demonstrably anticipated research or development of the employer; or

(2) Result from any work performed by the employee for the employer.

(b) To the extent a provision in an employment agreement purports to require an employee to assign an invention otherwise excluded from being required to be assigned under subdivision (a), the provision is against the public policy of this state and is unenforceable.

This prevents companies from stealing anything you invent on your own.

Second, section 16600 of the business code:

16600. ​

Except as provided in this chapter, every contract by which anyone is restrained from engaging in a lawful profession, trade, or business of any kind is to that extent void.

This prevents companies from locking their employees into non-compete agreements.

Together, these two provisions, unique to California, are like the Bill of Rights for technology workers. Silicon Valley was built on these rights. Pioneering and iconic Silicon Valley companies like Fairchild, Intel, Apple, and Nvidia are the direct result of workers and entrepreneurs exercising these rights.

It's also why Texas can attract so many great companies but can't seem to create any on its own. Big, established companies don't really want their workers to have these rights.

Abortion rights, while important, don't really affect tech workers. These are the rights that directly affect tech workers. Just something to keep in mind if you're being tempted to swap your 3-bedroom in San Jose for a McMansion in Austin.

 

[woodisgood]

Woke hit piece targeting the opinion of women…sent to me by my wife.

I know we don’t like to post such pieces here but I think it’s important to understand the ways in which Tesla/Elon’s opponents will try to slow the mission. I believe most of them (the journalists that put these pieces together) do not even realize how they are being manipulated.

Elon Musk Decides Now Is a Great Time to Force His Employees to Move to Texas — Vanity Fair

Is Elon Musk the absolute worst? He’s certainly making a strong case for himself!

apple.news

 

[Paul_SF]

Woke hit piece targeting the opinion of women…sent to me by my wife.

I know we don’t like to post such pieces here but I think it’s important to understand the ways in which Tesla/Elon’s opponents will try to slow the mission. I believe most of them (the journalists that put these pieces together) do not even realize how they are being manipulated.

Elon Musk Decides Now Is a Great Time to Force His Employees to Move to Texas — Vanity Fair

Is Elon Musk the absolute worst? He’s certainly making a strong case for himself!

apple.news

So let’s give them a few more hundreds/thousands clicks.

 

[Krugerrand]

Brand new sentence right here folks

Tit for tat rating just because that’s how I’m rolling this morning.

 

[Chenkers]

Gali is at the Giga Berlin County Fair so we should see a few more videos popping up in English.

 

[Krugerrand]

California labor law has these two provisions.

First, section 2870 of the labor code:

This prevents companies from stealing anything you invent on your own.

Second, section 16600 of the business code:

This prevents companies from locking their employees into non-compete agreements.

Together, these two provisions, unique to California, are like the Bill of Rights for technology workers. Silicon Valley was built on these rights. Pioneering and iconic Silicon Valley companies like Fairchild, Intel, Apple, and Nvidia are the direct result of workers and entrepreneurs exercising these rights.

It's also why Texas can attract so many great companies but can't seem to create any on its own. Big, established companies don't really want their workers to have these rights.

Abortion rights, while important, don't really affect tech workers. These are the rights that directly affect tech workers. Just something to keep in mind if you're being tempted to swap your 3-bedroom in San Jose for a McMansion in Austin.

A valid warning but not really high risk since this is Tesla. ‘We will always try to do the right thing,’ Elon Musk

 

[MD70]

Can anyone from Germany comment about the permits? What exactly is needed and what’s the expected date the permits will be granted?

 

[petit_bateau]

tool & die pron

 

[Lessmog]

tool & die pron

IKR, my tool almost died from all that pron

 

[hacer]

That's what several members here experienced as their Brokers did not receive enough TSLA dividend shares from the transfer agent to cover all of their share obligations to their retail customers. I PREDICTED this would happen in advance, and posted that prediction here.

Those Brokers were able to buy their missing shares after Tesla's share offering on Sep 1st, but still did not deliver them to retail Customers until Thu, Sep 3 (or even later in some cases). That's the 2-day settlement rule peeking out its nose.

But my question was why would those brokers bother to buy the missing shares in the first place? If their internal books are cooked, it's just as easy for them to simply split the fake shares. So the brokerage customer who's account said they held 100 shares (but the firm didn't in fact have 100 shares to back it up) on the Ex-D date just says it holds 500 shares, all which also are not actually held by firm. The price will drop a factor of 5 so the dollar risk is the same. This requires no actual buying.

I also predicted (in advance) that Tesla would do a share offering, and what the size of that offering would be, based on early Aug short interest data. This was the "1-2 knock-out punch" Tesla planned for naked shorts. I give full credit to new Tesla Board member Hiro Mizuno for this gambit. It netted Tesla $5B in cash, back when that was a lot of money for Tesla.

There is no doubt that there was very high short interest. Do you think the reported short interest figures included the kited naked shorts or did not include them? A short that was actually borrowed has no problem with the split. The way I read my broker's margin agreement where they can borrow any of my shares subject to margin without notice or compensation does not in any way obligate them to return the shares upon a corporate event, split or dividend. They're even allowed to give me cash in lieu of dividends (which are treated different for tax purposes!!). A share dividend does not force all shorts to cover; if that were the case there would be huge discontinuities in the short interest (and large price runups) of every stock that splits around the time of the split. But that doesn't show up in the data for other stocks.

Another way that Options Market Makers are able to achieve perpetual naked short positions (and avoid the 13-day FTD reporting requirements), is to repeatedly swap their naked shorts with another Options Market Maker. This is separate from retail trading, and has to do with shares shorted in the course of a MMs own proprietary trading. It just takes two to collude.

This method has been discussed both here and in several blog articles on the topic, especially the (now-defunct) website "Counterfeiting Stock 2.0" (still readable through the "Wayback Machine" at archive.org).

The reason this 2nd naked shorting scheme might break down during a share dividend event is unequal short holdings leading to the "hot potato" syndrome: No MM wants to be the one left holding the bag, so they break and cover as rapidly as possible.

I don't see how the "unequal" problem comes about from the split. It is no greater problem to have 5 times more FTDs of a stock at 1/5 the price. If there is any "hot potato" problem in that scheme it exists whether or not there is a share dividend. The FTDs in that case are not hidden, they are "normal" FTDs. The only difference is they are kiting it by constantly resetting the clock.

We did see that Citadel Securities bailed out Melvin Capital back in Jan 2021: (why else would they spend $2.75B other than to keep this scheme private, rather than just letting Melvin fail? The answer is books and record-keeping)

Citadel, Point72 Back Melvin With $2.75 Billion After Losses

Hedge fund titans Ken Griffin and Steve Cohen boosted Gabe Plotkin’s Melvin Capital, injecting a total of $2.75 billion into the firm after it lost about 30% this year.

www.bloomberg.com

That wasn't about TSLA, it was about GME which did not have any stock split, it was just a short squeeze. I think your theory that Citadel bailed out Melvin to keep the books hidden is possible, even likely. But it sheds no light at all on how a stock dividend actually forces short covering.

 

[woodisgood]

So let’s give them a few more hundreds/thousands clicks.

Sure, that’s usually the argument. And while I mostly agree, I think it’s important to have a bird’s eye view of the PR battle. Giving clicks to the usual suspects is unnecessary but noting new suspects and new target audiences is, IMO.

 

[OrthoSurg]

Yes I don’t ever remember my head hitting the pillow anymore. Lol.

Having a strong mental willpower and a positive attitude make the impossible, possible.

I

It's possible. It's also possible that you're ignoring his greatest investment ever. Water. In 2010 he started buying water resources in the West. How well do you think that has worked for him? What sort of analysis let him to say water was grossly undervalued? What's the value of his investment now that the Colorado has basically been sucked dry and San Diego is going to have to ration water unless the drought breaks. I'm not sure of his financial play there but he thought long and hard on it. He was buying Facebook and Google several years ago, they've doubled or more since then.

To say the man is a one trick pony would simply show that one is a poor observer. He may be grossly wrong on Ark and Tesla and interest rates. He maybe completely correct. To my knowledge he's never actually been wrong, ie- never had a year with negative returns. Not is 20 years. Everyone fails at some point but that's a helluva record and better than Cathy Woods.

MB is odd, no doubt about it. He's also unemotional about the investment even if he is emotional about the product (he likes the Tesla mission and did not like the stock price). The one issue with MB is that he's usually far ahead. So, if I had 7-9 figures in Tesla and one of the most insightful guys out there was saying...whoa the horses. I'd at least look at his analysis very carefully. I'd maybe even start carrying a bit of a hedge. I'd maybe buy that mountain or whatever. I'd don't have a horse in the race as all of my resources are actually tied to growing my business. Forum members should understand that he got where he is today not by a single short but by making good investments in growing companies over several years.

The one thing I do not understand is why MB did not invest in TSLA when it was undervalued but he went in a short position when he considered it overvalued.

 

[Krugerrand]

Sure, that’s usually the argument. And while I mostly agree, I think it’s important to have a bird’s eye view of the PR battle. Giving clicks to the usual suspects is unnecessary but noting new suspects and new target audiences is, IMO.

But do we honestly have to see beyond the tittle?! (In this case). There’s no evidence Elon is forcing anyone to move to Austin and that would be counter to: We will always try and do the right thing.

 

[Krugerrand]

Yes I don’t ever remember my head hitting the pillow anymore. Lol.


The one thing I do not understand is why MB did not invest in TSLA when it was undervalued but he went in a short position when he considered it overvalued.

Simple. That’s not what he’s about. He thinks negatively. Thinks about how to make money off the ‘bad’. Thinks he’s some crusader because he got it right once.

Many of us here would never, could never, bet (money) against a company even if we thought the company was going to die at some point. Quite likely even if we knew the exact day it ceased to exist. It’s a principle thing based largely on morals and ethics.

 

[StarFoxisDown!]

That's 500k/year plus significant change

Very impressed by the videos/pictures of the different production processes. Let's hope that the final approvals come through early next month so all of this kit can start churning out MIB model Y before the end of the year.

As far as I've read, approval could come as early as Oct 14th. It could literally get approved the second the 3 week opposition period( or whatever the hell Germany calls the 1,000th approval period ) ends.

 

[SOULPEDL]

Gali is at the Giga Berlin County Fair so we should see a few more videos popping up in English.

Wish I was there!!! It's probably my imagination but are people looking really worried at the fair? Maybe a German thing, but I wonder how many of those folks are in the auto or Tool & Die industry just shaking their heads? Galil's description of how Tesla made it so easy to understand how EVs are made (aluminum, gigapresses, structural packs...).

This region is the tooling capital of the world, and both Tesla and the Italians seem to have outpaced everyone. I think it would hurt a lot if I were in those shoes, trying to figure out your own future and how you might fit in. Naked Tesla in the raw, this is live and a harsh reality for some folks who weren't up to speed. You can't blink, or you'll miss out on a lot. Heck, I can't keep up!