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

[Cosmacelf]

GM ending production of Bolt... Warning CNBS.

GM to end production of electric Chevy Bolt, its first mass-market EV, later this year

The Chevy Bolt EV and EUV, a larger version of the car, make up the vast majority of the company's electric vehicle sales to date.

www.cnbc.com

Which means Tesla will be the low price EV leader in the US…

 

[Gigapress]

GM ending production of Bolt... Warning CNBS.

GM to end production of electric Chevy Bolt, its first mass-market EV, later this year

The Chevy Bolt EV and EUV, a larger version of the car, make up the vast majority of the company's electric vehicle sales to date.

www.cnbc.com

FYI for those who only read the headline: ending the Bolt was only part of GM’s announcement.

Per the article, Mary Barra announced that the Bolt plant in Orion will be retooled for producing their new EV pickup trucks, Silverados and Sierras, with a goal of eventually tripling employment headcount and making 600k trucks per year. That would make this their primary truck manufacturing plant, as they sold 750k trucks in total across the US in 2022.

Additionally, a Chevrolet spokesperson was quoted as saying “Chevrolet will launch several new EVs later this year based on the Ultium platform in key segments, including the Silverado EV, Blazer EV and Equinox EV.”

So the overall announcement is that GM publicly intends to finally begin initial production and deliveries of their next generation of EVs a few quarters from now. Time will tell whether they actually do it and whether it’ll be just minuscule volume like the Hummer has been thus far.

 

[WMTribe90]

Which means Tesla will be the low price EV leader in the US…

I take this as an admission by GM that they had no path to positive margins on the Bolt in the near future. GM is realizing there was a reason Tesla started with high-end, high margin vehicles and worked their way down to the Model 3 and Y. It appears GM will now try to emulate Tesla’s master plan, by focusing on more expensive trucks and large SUVs with the potential for higher margins at lower volumes. Unfortunately for GM, the F-150 Lightening is already available and CT right around the corner. Honestly, at this point they’d probably be better forging ahead with the Bolt and taking the pain. This smacks of desperation.

I live in high EV adoption area. In the last 6 months, I’m now regularly seeing ID4, Ioniq 5, next gen LEAFs, Mach-e, Rivian, and Kia EVs on the road. Not seeing many Bolts at all.

 

[Gigapress]

I take this as an admission by GM that they had no path to positive margins on the Bolt in the near future. GM is realizing there was a reason Tesla started with high-end, high margin vehicles and worked their way down to the Model 3 and Y. It appears GM will now try to emulate Tesla’s master plan, by focusing on more expensive trucks and large SUVs with the potential for higher margins at lower volumes. Unfortunately for GM, the F-150 Lightening is already available and CT right around the corner. Honestly, at this point they’d probably be better forging ahead with the Bolt and taking the pain. This smacks of desperation.

I live in high EV adoption area. In the last 6 months, I’m now regularly seeing ID4, Ioniq 5, next gen LEAFs, Mach-e, Rivian, and Kia EVs on the road. Not seeing many Bolts at all.

But GM announced yesterday that they intend to launch the Equinox later in 2023 and it’s priced only slightly higher than the Bolt despite being substantially larger. If GM has not majorly improved the EV technology then their gross margins on Equinoxes will be about equally as atrocious as the Bolt’s margins have been.

 

[Krugerrand]

If you count number of plug-ins, home wins by a large margin. If you count miles--not so much. App shows for a year: 63% SC, 34% home, 3% other (SC location out of service so destination charging). SC charging is 100% trips, and with no commute there are few non-trip miles.

Certainly if you’re a tripper/Willie type person than SC is a thing for you. And it’s pretty easy to rack up travel miles vs local miles if you trip across the country once a year and only drive 10 miles to and from work and a few more miles running errands/dropping off kids.

I’ve actually found that I’ve been destination charging a lot more now that that’s becoming more widely available.

 

[unk45]

If you count number of plug-ins, home wins by a large margin. If you count miles--not so much. App shows for a year: 63% SC, 34% home, 3% other (SC location out of service so destination charging). SC charging is 100% trips, and with no commute there are few non-trip miles.

Indeed. I'm reminded of small airplane extra tanks, bought quite often, used much less, but people tend to want to be able to do something they rarely do. One of my two BEVs has never been outside the city in which I live, a very large one, one one that could easily be serviced with a less capable car. BEV is one of the rare circumstances in which extra range costs more to buy and more to operate. Still, people who can probably buy more range than they need.

It's exactly that that makes 'Free Supercharging' very appealing even if it will rarely be used.
The only problem with that is those few who will drive 100,000km in a year and/or charge locally to get 'Free'. I personally habituate a shopping center to get 'Free' charging, even though the purchases I make a more expensive there making my choice irrational economically.

Tesla has experimented with multiple variants around the world is just tried again with X and Y. I admit I'm tempted to trade my Plaid for a new one, knowing absolutely that this is a poor economic choice. That, in my opinion, is quite clever on Tesla's part, since buyers in that category will almost all know better and choose to do it anyway.

We'll see.

 

[Mike Smith]

I predict GM and Ford's CEOs both retire within a year. They'll take a massive retirement payout and congratulate themselves for puttng their companies on a clear path to an all electric future. A job well done, but now it's time to step aside and let a new leadership team execute on the plan (you know, that final stage where you actually have to do everything).

 

[bkp_duke]

• These earlier S&X vehicles that have gone 200k miles have much more primitive battery management systems and thermal management systems than later generations of vehicles

Just a note - don't agree with this part.

The BMS on all Tesla vehicles is fully programmable, and has been upgraded and changed multiple times with new algos for even the oldest (2012 / 2013) S cars.

If anything, there are "issues" with the 3/Y having worse (but still good by industry standards) degradation curves than the S/X.

 

[Krugerrand]

FYI for those who only read the headline: ending the Bolt was only part of GM’s announcement.

Per the article, Mary Barra announced that the Bolt plant in Orion will be retooled for producing their new EV pickup trucks, Silverados and Sierras, with a goal of eventually tripling employment headcount and making 600k trucks per year. That would make this their primary truck manufacturing plant, as they sold 750k trucks in total across the US in 2022.

Additionally, a Chevrolet spokesperson was quoted as saying “Chevrolet will launch several new EVs later this year based on the Ultium platform in key segments, including the Silverado EV, Blazer EV and Equinox EV.”

So the overall announcement is that GM publicly intends to finally begin initial production and deliveries of their next generation of EVs a few quarters from now. Time will tell whether they actually do it and whether it’ll be just minuscule volume like the Hummer has been thus far.

Pardon me if I’m not convinced and will require proof before believing anything coming out your mouth, Mary.

 

[unk45]

I predict GM and Ford's CEOs both retire within a year. They'll take a massive retirement payout and congratulate themselves for puting their companies on a clear path to an all electric future. A job well done, but now it's time to step aside and let a new leadership team execute on the plan (you know, that final stage where you actually have to do everything).

Maybe they might hire the author of the Bed, Bath and Beyond recovery strategy, Mark Tritton. He's available. /s

 

[PlaidCPA]

Inventory (S3XY) seems to be creeping up again. Model Y RWD now costs $759 less than the average amount paid for a car or truck in the US. (Before any EV incentives) Just a few month ago I would have never believed this could happen.

 

[insaneoctane]

GM ending production of Bolt... Warning CNBS.

GM to end production of electric Chevy Bolt, its first mass-market EV, later this year

The Chevy Bolt EV and EUV, a larger version of the car, make up the vast majority of the company's electric vehicle sales to date.

www.cnbc.com

Are they going to crush them too?

 

[rallykeeper]

The IRA reductions wouldn’t touch the EV battery stuff.

“Republicans now want to rescind key aspects of the law that were designed to combat climate change, including provisions establishing a high-efficiency electric home rebate program and home energy efficiency contractor training grants.”

Won't make political predictions here to stay within the rules.

However, to be clear, the Republican majority in the House has proposed to reverse or eliminate all the EV, solar and battery credits. If passed, this would adversely impact Tesla's U.S. margins (as noted in the 10-Q) and presumably have some impact on U.S. demand.

Here's the bill for all you masochists: https://www.speaker.gov/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/LSGA_xml.pdf. In short, if this bill were to become law:

- standalone residential batteries would no longer be eligible for the 30% credit;
- solar tax credits would continue to phase out and be eliminated by 2026; and
- 3750/7500 tax credits would be eliminated after cumulative 200,000 sales (so Tesla would be out).

I didn't bother to personally confirm the others, but they appear to also be there, including Semi tax credit, Megapack enhanced utility credits, battery production credits, etc...

(If someone wants to check me on that, feel free -- it's a dense piece of legislation and you have to read it side-by-side with existing law to track it all).

 

[insaneoctane]

Seriously, it seemed a good idea and was, but Free incentivized unnecessary use, now they're toying with, and testing several alternatives around the world and already have Tesla/non-Tesla price variants. Sooner or later we'll see more iterations IMHO.

I would be interested in seeing Tesla's margins and detailed costs for Superchargers and Supercharging. Unlike most here, I'm skeptical about anything other than razor thin margins as long as Tesla must purchase power from the local grid and pay power rate-based "demand" fees in some locales, which can be quite ridiculous.

 

[ItsNotAboutTheMoney]

I take this as an admission by GM that they had no path to positive margins on the Bolt in the near future. GM is realizing there was a reason Tesla started with high-end, high margin vehicles and worked their way down to the Model 3 and Y. It appears GM will now try to emulate Tesla’s master plan, by focusing on more expensive trucks and large SUVs with the potential for higher margins at lower volumes. Unfortunately for GM, the F-150 Lightening is already available and CT right around the corner. Honestly, at this point they’d probably be better forging ahead with the Bolt and taking the pain. This smacks of desperation.

I live in high EV adoption area. In the last 6 months, I’m now regularly seeing ID4, Ioniq 5, next gen LEAFs, Mach-e, Rivian, and Kia EVs on the road. Not seeing many Bolts at all.

Could be lack of Bolt supply. A colleague had a deposit on an EUV refunded because the dealer wasn't getting them. They were told then by the dealer that production of the Bolt was stopping in the fall.

As far as I know Chevrolet still hasn't completed the battery recall on the Bolt so they'll still some batteries for that and any warranty replacements.

The Equinox is coming in the fall. Unlike the Bolt it will have AWD available.

Unfortunately, though, the Equinox is yet another vehicle suffering from large-wheel syndrome with 19" being the smallest size.

 

[Ogre]

GM ending production of Bolt... Warning CNBS.

GM to end production of electric Chevy Bolt, its first mass-market EV, later this year

The Chevy Bolt EV and EUV, a larger version of the car, make up the vast majority of the company's electric vehicle sales to date.

www.cnbc.com

Whoah.

So we'll roll into 2024 and GM will very likely still be selling less than ~100,000 EVs/ year. Gonna be tough to beat Tesla at this rate.

Makes sense for them to shutter this unappealing, ancient product they were likely losing money on. It's just their inability to deliver their next gen platform prior to shuttering it which is striking.

 

[GOVA]

Are you claiming Tesla hasn't improved cell chemistry over time?

No, not at all. Also, 'improvement' might not be a good description after reaching certain level of development per usage scenario. What I mean is that the desired outcome might be the decrease of total cost of production per unit. This will yield what they've been after, changing chemistry included, but might not mean improvement in terms of storage capacity increase per volume.

The only analogy I can think of is the SSD (memory) development. SLC, MLC, TLC and QLC. Each has its own purpose and differs in price providing particular benefits/cost ratio. There is a reason one can purchase 4TB SSD for ~$200, but it is not the same SLC/MLC from 10 years ago.

Has the chemistry changed? - for sure. Yet, that 20(?) PWh will not happen with the most expensive chemistry that we know.

 

[Ogre]

Lol, I guess that's 30 29 different EV models from GM by 2025.

"Competition is coming... going, going, gone."​

Cheers!

Didn't they count the Bolt EUV as a separate model on the way up?

They were supposed to be releasing 9 new models this year seems unlikely. It's possible they end the year with fewer models than they started.

My guess is the Silverado and maybe the Blazer is it.

 

[thx1139]

Tesla should probably already start offering Drivelress rides in restricted areas like Waymo does, and iron out the kinks of those use cases.

They could also run a Tesla infomercial for the passengers during the ride

Concerning advertising-seems like I read that GM alone spends somewhere on the order of $1500 per vehicle sold, just on marketing. Now, let me ask-if Tesla were to spend $1500 per vehicle, would you spend it there?

Or would you invest it in design/manufacturing improvements to reduce manufacturing costs and allow lower sales prices?

Or spend it to upgrade standard features that most cars in the price range of a 3/Y already have as standard. Things like vented seats, Homelink and a HUD (you could likely do all 3 for less than $1500).

Or maybe offer different paint or interior colors without jacking up the price?

Or build out the charging network even faster?


I think people already know about Teslas, and understand their technological advantages. But still question the price (you can still get a Rav-4, CRV or Equinox for a MSRP <$30k) and many that live outside of major metros still don't have DCFC anywhere near conveniently located. Until DCFCs are as common as gas pumps, that will be an issue for some buyers, and rightly so. The average user of this site likely has a far higher discretionary income than the average vehicle buyer-for a great many buyers, value is a major factor-what vehicle serves their needs for the lowest cost. They don't care about virtue signaling or climate change; they worry about basic transportation, putting food on the table and a roof over their heads. Advertising dollars don't change that. Now you can argue that there are a lot of people spending even more on high-end pickups and SUVs...but those aren't necessarily the same people buying compact CUVs and compact sedans.

Notice you didnt mention reduce price by $1500

 

[insaneoctane]

Just a note - don't agree with this part.

The BMS on all Tesla vehicles is fully programmable, and has been upgraded and changed multiple times with new algos for even the oldest (2012 / 2013) S cars.

If anything, there are "issues" with the 3/Y having worse (but still good by industry standards) degradation curves than the S/X.

Aren't you really debating whether 2170 or 18650 have better longevity?