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

[Usain]

This is a fantastic idea for lowering the cost of auto loans to Tesla customers. Sounds like Tesla will originate the loan and then that loan will be purchased by this credit union. That way, customers can get credit union rates without belonging to a credit union.

Brilliant.

Tesla partners with Origence for credit union-based financing program

Tesla car buyers will now have access to credit union rates through a new partnership with Origence.

www.teslarati.com

 

[cliff harris]

Ramp now is 40 CTs per day (probably)

https://twitter.com/x/status/1737506727854055588

Q1 is going to be pretty cool .

 

[EQC_]

Would this recent data of at minimum 2M (per Franz), and maybe 3M CT reservations lend support to the concept of how it could easily be many, many years (4+) before someone making a reservation today receives their CT?

It definnitely *could* be years. But, I have vague memories that for every major Tesla launch involving a big back-log of reservations, there is always frustration that some people "jumped the line" and others "had to wait" when it came time for actual orders and deliveries.

I would be willing to bet that *some* people who make a reservation this month might get their Cybertruck in 2024. I also think it's quite logical that many people making a reservation this month would be waiting years.

We know Tesla doesn't offer actual order slots or deliver cars based strictly on when somebody joined the reservation list. Tesla sorts things out based on some metrics we do know (ie: location of the likely delivery and other logistics-type concerns) and many things we don't know. However the decision is made, Tesla has done some analysis and determined what is best for business goals.

My own hypothetical: some folks who made their reservation in early 2020 did so based on the lower reveal prices and different specs (6 seats, 3500 lb payload, etc.). It's logical that Tesla might assume some of those would be dissuaded by the current prices, or the lack of 6 seats, or any other changes. So, for some of them, *perhaps* Tesla might determine it's better to let them hang tight, and stay on the list without any pressure, until production is up, prices are down, and perhaps more options are available. On the other hand, anybody reserving this month seems to have announced that they do, in fact, think the current prices and features work for them. Perhaps, among whatever other metrics Tesla uses, it does then make sense to offer earlier delivery to some of the recent reservationists...

 

[EQC_]

Ramp now is 40 CTs per day (probably)

https://twitter.com/x/status/1737506727854055588

Q1 is going to be pretty cool .

I'm having memories of when folks used to stalk the Fremont factory and we had daily counts of how many Model 3's were in the lot, and how many car carriers were lined up and how often they were leaving.

Likely unimportant note: many of the trucks pictured are missing the plastic bed rail covers. Several of the ones lined up against the fence are missing the plastic rail covers, along with a couple of the ones at the supercharger ...

*Edited to add photo for clarity on what I mean. NOT the tonneau cover, just the black trim on top of the sail pillars

 

[ByeByeJohnny]

This is a fantastic idea for lowering the cost of auto loans to Tesla customers. Sounds like Tesla will originate the loan and then that loan will be purchased by this credit union. That way, customers can get credit union rates without belonging to a credit union.

Brilliant.

Tesla partners with Origence for credit union-based financing program

Tesla car buyers will now have access to credit union rates through a new partnership with Origence.

www.teslarati.com

Apparently sometimes a union is a good thing

Mods, you can ban me now.

 

[RHJP]

Italian design legend Giorgetto Giugiaro says he thinks Tesla's Cybertruck is a masterpiece.

The Delorean designer was speaking to an Italian newspaper la Repubblica, where he gushed about the Cybertruck. Giugiaro said he expects the vehicle to be "hugely successful because people want to stand out."

DeLorean designer says Tesla's Cybertruck is the 'Picasso of automobiles'

Giorgetto Giugiaro says he expects the vehicle to be "hugely successful because people want to stand out."

www.businessinsider.com

 

[Carl Raymond]

I mostly agree with what you said, but this is not like robotaxi at all. While I don't think mass production of Optimus is imminent, it will go from concept to reality much, much faster than robotaxi.

The reason is because Optimus has the potential to replace so many different human tasks without the safety concerns of robotaxi. So the threshold to achieve usefulness is orders of magnitude lower for Optimus.

Tesla just needs to perfect one or two economically valuable use cases to get started with mass production. The chances of that happening relatively soon is pretty high. Maybe not "mass production in 2024" high. But high nonetheless.

What Usain said, with one more critical difference between Robotaxi and Bot - the overnight proof of concept.

Robotaxi cannot blindside an observant investor. The proof it works will always be months or seasons in duration. Even if shown to work in one city, there will be doubts, people sitting on hands waiting for a cruise like mishap.

Optimus however can blindside. If Tesla put bots to work on a production line, with a film crew, then run the line successfully for a week around the clock, that footage is dynamite. If the line in question is the bot assembly line, with new bots walking off the end of the line, and the video is released early on a weekend…wow, what a delicious moment.

 

[Atomsla]

What Usain said, with one more critical difference between Robotaxi and Bot - the overnight proof of concept.

Robotaxi cannot blindside an observant investor. The proof it works will always be months or seasons in duration. Even if shown to work in one city, there will be doubts, people sitting on hands waiting for a cruise like mishap.

Optimus however can blindside. If Tesla put bots to work on a production line, with a film crew, then run the line successfully for a week around the clock, that footage is dynamite. If the line in question is the bot assembly line, with new bots walking off the end of the line, and the video is released early on a weekend…wow, what a delicious moment.

Or a Skynet moment. But yeah, I'd eat it up.

 

[Buckminster]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1737536790729232698

 

[Mengy]

Reuters is out with a "special investigation" this morning:

Tesla blamed drivers for failures of parts it long knew were defective​

"Wheels falling off cars at speed. Suspensions collapsing on brand-new vehicles. Axles breaking under acceleration. Tens of thousands of customers told Tesla about a host of part failures on low-mileage cars. The automaker sought to blame drivers for vehicle ‘abuse,’ but Tesla documents show it had tracked the chronic ‘flaws’ and ‘failures’ for years."

I'm seeing this FUD article all over the internet today, and all the Tesla haters are piling on about how this proves Tesla cars are piles of junk.

Think I'll go for a long drive in my awesome Model Y to clear my head about it!

 

[cliff harris]

Just imagine how high Tesla's demand will be when all this nonsense FUD actually completely stops working. We are definitely near the point where everyone knows someone who has driven a Tesla. Its hard to maintain the FUD in the Prescence of people you know who actually own one.
At some point, news outlets will realize that the destruction of their credibility is not worth the trivial amount of goodwill they earn from ICE advertisers by bashing Tesla. It will probably coincide with the first huge bankruptcies of the ICE laggards who can suddenly no longer sell their new cars.

 

[Rarity]

I mostly agree with what you said, but this is not like robotaxi at all. While I don't think mass production of Optimus is imminent, it will go from concept to reality much, much faster than robotaxi.

The reason is because Optimus has the potential to replace so many different human tasks without the safety concerns of robotaxi. So the threshold to achieve usefulness is orders of magnitude lower for Optimus.

Tesla just needs to perfect one or two economically valuable use cases to get started with mass production. The chances of that happening relatively soon is pretty high. Maybe not "mass production in 2024" high. But high nonetheless.

Both Optimus and FSD are constrained by the amount of training compute that Tesla is willing and able to devote to each effort. For much of next year, it seems likely that FSD will be prioritized for these scarce resources.

That said, Tesla is spending a huge amount on new computing resources. It is showing up on Tesla's cash flow statements and is significant, although we don't know the precise amount going to this effort. It is what Musk and the former CEO were talking about when they mentioned that Tesla was managing operations such that the company remained free cash flow positive despite margins declining.

 

[UkNorthampton]

Oil shill writes/pays to publish Forbes article, mangled by Electrek, repeated by mass media

 

[SO16]

FWIW I’ve worked with both of these great guys. Matt hosted one of my shows back in the day, Garage419. I haven’t listened to the interview yet but Matt, who is generally awesome, has long been a vocal anti-Tesla guy and consumer of FUD. Some of the East coast journalists eventually flipped, myself included, but last I checked he still was an ardent nonbeliever. Just know that going into this.

I’m very excited to listen to this as Jason is as great as it gets and always sees through the FUD but doesn’t put a blindfold on to actual Tesla/Elon negatives….not that any members in this forum do that in any way no no no no.

I watched the whole thing.

Jason did an outstanding job responding with FACTS and Matt did an outstanding job being a man and taking it and apologizing.

A few observations:

1. Matt’s issues to almost every topic was “I think” or “my opinion” while Jason responded with facts the vast majority of time. Extremely telling with how Tesla haters are often simply emotional and not willing to really dig into the situation in regards to Tesla.

2. Matt’s hatred of Elon runs so deep that he really has a difficult time acknowledging credit to Elon where it really is warranted. He basically scoffs at the million reservations as if it’s nothing due to low barrier to entry. But as Jason pointed out, that’s a big number no matter what. Both have merit but I think Jason is more correct.

3. Matt’s “mistrust” of drive by wire is simply opinion and he does acknowledge that. Jason did respond that he does trust it. I would have also asked Matt “what would it take you to trust it?” I feel as though this “mistrust” is natural with anything new to a person. Even riding a bike. So that’s an unfair criticism to Tesla.

4. Matt did bring up a point that when people say Ford and VW did shady things in the past, that was 80 years ago. And Jason did bring up the fact how VW was started by Nazis but Matt responded with being a long time ago. I just wish Jason would have brought up Dieselgate.

5. Matt is so concerned about how FSD could run him over and how unsafe it is. I wish Jason could have responded with “in aggregate, FSD is probably preventing more incidents than causing”. So many people fail to think about (perhaps on purpose) how many distracted drivers there are.

6. Matt mentioned Edward Neidermeyer at least once (I think as a source). You know, the guy with the Tesla death clock website.

7. At the end, Matt did say that he needs to spend more time researching before creating a video and how YouTube rewards video quantity over quality. I hope Matt takes that to heart.

Definitely worth the watch. Not really for new facts that we don’t know about, but to see how Jason was able to refute so much of Matt’s “opinions”. Jason and Matt still have their biases with Elon but it seems Jason can objectively look past that. Matt DEFINITELY tries to find every bit of negative angle on Tesla. It truly is astonishing how much he hates the company and Elon.

Lots more stuff in the video. These are just things that stuck with me.

*edited for typos/wording.

 

[Usain]

Ramp now is 40 CTs per day (probably)

https://twitter.com/x/status/1737506727854055588

Q1 is going to be pretty cool .

40 CTs per day. That's already more than double the US sales rate of all Lucid's models combined. And we are just getting started...

Tesla Cybertruck 40 per day rate:
40 per day * 365 = 14,600 per year

Extrapolated Lucid 2023 sales:
(Q1+Q2) * 2 = 3191 * 2 = 6,382 per year

Source: https://www.visualcapitalist.com/visualizing-u-s-ev-sales-in-h1-2023/

 

[Usain]

Just imagine how high Tesla's demand will be when all this nonsense FUD actually completely stops working. We are definitely near the point where everyone knows someone who has driven a Tesla. Its hard to maintain the FUD in the Prescence of people you know who actually own one.
At some point, news outlets will realize that the destruction of their credibility is not worth the trivial amount of goodwill they earn from ICE advertisers by bashing Tesla. It will probably coincide with the first huge bankruptcies of the ICE laggards who can suddenly no longer sell their new cars.

Not just that, but people get tired of being bombarded with negative spin about something. Eventually, they stop listening to the spin and realize they are being spun.

 

[Usain]

Both Optimus and FSD are constrained by the amount of training compute that Tesla is willing and able to devote to each effort. For much of next year, it seems likely that FSD will be prioritized for these scarce resources.

That said, Tesla is spending a huge amount on new computing resources. It is showing up on Tesla's cash flow statements and is significant, although we don't know the precise amount going to this effort. It is what Musk and the former CEO were talking about when they mentioned that Tesla was managing operations such that the company remained free cash flow positive despite margins declining.

You may be right about that. I could see Tesla thinking their time is well spent refining the hardware and figuring out how the bot will be trained rather than spending lots of compute on the training itself.

On the other hand, we don't know how much compute is required to train the bot for one economically useful task. So maybe it won't be so much of a tradeoff after all.

 

[gaswalla]

TSLA just took a nosedive - any news?

 

[growler23]

Both Optimus and FSD are constrained by the amount of training compute that Tesla is willing and able to devote to each effort. For much of next year, it seems likely that FSD will be prioritized for these scarce resources.

That said, Tesla is spending a huge amount on new computing resources. It is showing up on Tesla's cash flow statements and is significant, although we don't know the precise amount going to this effort.

I saw an interesting point in the Optimus discussions related to this. Although Bot training seems easier, there are way more degrees of freedom to control as outputs. Think of it this way: Optimus deciding where to move is roughly same complexity as FSD. But once it arrives and starts a task, the Optimus has to decide how to move the left arm shoulder joint for the task in front of it, then the left elbow, then ... how far to rotate the left wrist? When does the index finger get involved? How much pressure until it stops squeezing? Then answer all those questions for the right arm... then the neck twist... you get the idea.
In short, isn't the phase space of Optimus' existence an order or two of magnitude larger than that of a car running FSD? Does or doesn't that mean Bot training will suck a LOT more compute cycles?
Not an AI expert, but asking for one now!!!

 

[SO16]

TSLA just took a nosedive - any news?

So did NVDA.