I may not agree with your logic but I agree with your ASP conclusion.
1. Remember Cybertruck? If they sell even at F-150 Lighting levels they'll contribute to maintaining ASP.
2. Remember Model Y? It is at the highest volume category for many countries and production capacity will at least triple within the next year.
3. S and X are not disappearing. Almost every one of those has an ASP of US$100,000 or more.
4. Then there will be the odd Semi or Roadster. Not many but very much useful for raising average ASP.
So there will be at least the $50,000 average ASP even with high volumes of new small vehicles. but...
5. Every small vehicle will have a Performance or other high spec version, yielding higher average ASP.
We need to speculate about FSD or Robotaxi. Those may happen but there is no clear notion of timing. Still,
many all of us seem fixated on ASP when the real issue is Gross Margin and Capex. Here we have evidence:
6. Capex is entirely funded from cash flow. This in a company growing at >50% per annum. The operative word is "unprecedented".
7. Manufacturing innovation is progressing at an "unprecedented" rate, and is actually allowing the antiquated Fremont factory to keep increasing production and Shanghai to exceed planned production capacity and keep growing.
All of the above points have been made repeatedly but it is difficult to absorb their totality. We try, but it's difficult. We strive for analogies, but really there aren't good ones. The Thomases (Edison and Crapper) the Henry's (Firestone and Ford), James Watt, Cyrus McCormick, Karl Benz, Isaac Singer, Edwin Land and so on, show people who have revolutionized the industrial world. Some became legendary. But...
In Elon Musk we have someone who has revolutionized consumer banking, rocketry, automobiles and more but he actually has contributed the most by building factories. SpaceX and Tesla achieve most of their success because they both build things so well. Skipping the hyperbole, the point of this all is that ASP is irrelevant, Cash Flow is relevant. SpaceX would not exist were it not for reusable rockets, and that was manufacturing innovation. Tesla would have died had it not been for the BMS and continuous manufacturing improvement.
So, ASP is a red herring! Cash flow rules! Elon Musk describes things in other terms, mostly. He repeats the mantra of manufacturing innovation, FAST cash conversion cycle and product innovation for cost reduction.
None of those famous people have combined these elements in just this way. That is why we have no useful precedent.
None of those people, have cultivated excellent and passionate people is quite the way he has done.
Most of the world tends to see his flaws and think TSLA shares his flaws. Mostly TSLA does not have those flaws. Probably one: a tendency to ignore some important parts of buyer support. I think they'll grow out of that one.
This diatribe courtesy of my brother-in-law and his spouse, who yesterday spent hours grilling me on these and related points.
