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

[CorneliusXX]

Another hit job , they are desperate MSM shooting themselves in the foot

Cancelled my subscription again !!!

Elon Musk Has Used Illegal Drugs, Worrying Leaders at Tesla and SpaceX

Some executives and board members fear the billionaire’s use of drugs—including LSD, cocaine, ecstasy, mushrooms and ketamine—could harm his companies.

www.wsj.com

A sad tale indeed - SpaceX hardly able to launch a rocket while all those other US rocket companies are launching multiple times a week. Same with Tesla, couldn't make an EV to save themselves while Ford and GM are making millions of high quality EVs and expanding their charging networks. All this could have been avoided if that druggy Musk hadn't taken all those drugs. Lucky he still has the Boring Co so he can dig himself an early grave.

 

[Thekiwi]

The article claims Elon Musk repeatedly called BFR "Big F-cking Rocket" in a 2018 SpaceX company meeting, and uses this as evidence that he's on drugs. But everybody in the space community already knows BFR does officially stand for "Big F-cking Rocket", this is a well known fact for more than 10 years, for example from the 2014 article Battle of the Heavyweight Rockets – SLS could face Exploration Class rival:


By 2018 even mainstream media knows this, for example from the article Elon Musk's Victory Lap:


Yet here we're in 2024 and this basic fact is being perverted as "proof" that Elon is on drugs, this is why I don't take any criticism of him seriously, because when I look at the part that I have good knowledge of, it's all outrageous lies like this.

You are grossly misrepresenting that segment of the story. That part wasn’t concerned with the name of the rocket, it was that according to multiple people present Elon arrived an hour late, got on stage and rambled on in an almost incoherent fashion for 15 minutes, before Shotwell had to take over.

 

[cliff harris]

I hate that I clicked on it and read the whole thing too.

Technically it doesn't matter if you click on it. Its actually even better if you then clicked on a bunch of ads but didn't buy anything. In fact doing so (not that I would endorse such behavior) just lowers the ROI for those ad spots and would hurt the WSJ. So obviously don't do that.

 

[spacerfc]

You are grossly misrepresenting that segment of the story. That part wasn’t concerned with the name of the rocket, it was that according to multiple people present Elon arrived an hour late, got on stage and rambled on in an almost incoherent fashion for 15 minutes, before Shotwell had to take over.

No, I didn't, here's the paragraph from the article:

When he finally took the stage, Musk was strangely incomprehensible at times. He slurred his words and rambled for around 15 minutes, according to executives in attendance, and referred repeatedly to SpaceX’s Big Falcon Rocket prototype, which was known as BFR, as “Big F—ing Rocket.”

So yes, the article most definitely did try to make the reference to BFR as "Big F-cking Rocket" as evidence that he's on drugs. The authors thought BFR really means "Big Falcon Rocket" instead of "Big F-cking Rocket", they're offering this as an example of Elon Musk being "incomprehensible", and implies that he - under the influence - used the wrong name for his own company's rocket. What the authors didn't realize is that the F stands for Falcon part is just Gwynne Shotwell's way of avoid saying the F-word during public interviews.

 

[joh01652]

https://x.com/gigafactories/status/1743312868899008954?s=20

Tesla Manufacturing says: "Giga Shanghai operates a 95% automated production line, enabling a cycle time of less than 40 seconds!From taking 2.5 years for the first million cars to be produced, the second million was done in just 12 months."

EDIT: Watch the embedded video in this tweet in slow speed--the worker flips down his safety glasses and they are actually like google smart glasses or something, like having your iPhone screen superimposed in your glasses. Take a look, it's pretty cool if this is technology actually being used in the factories. Yet another way Tesla is using software for efficiency/production gains. I didn't notice this upon first viewing of the video in normal speed.

 

[snellenr]

No, I didn't, here's the paragraph from the article:

So yes, the article most definitely did try to make the reference to BFR as "Big F-cking Rocket" as evidence that he's on drugs. The authors thought BFR really means "Big Falcon Rocket" instead of "Big F-cking Rocket", they're offering this as an example of Elon Musk being "incomprehensible", and implies that he - under the influence - used the wrong name for his own company's rocket. What the authors didn't realize is that the F stands for Falcon part is just Gwynne Shotwell's way of avoid saying the F-word during public interviews.

BFR harks back to the BFG 9000 ultimate weapon in DOOM, which was released in 1993 (!). And if someone tells you that young Elon didn't play DOOM and use one of these while he was at Penn or interning in Silicon Valley around that time, assume that they're an idiot...

(And yes, the canonical expansion of BFG is Big (bad word)ing Gun)

 

[Snerruc]

Having just endured a personal loss, it seems to me that all this scrapping over political, social and financial loss that is happening in this thread lately is so unimportant if you don’t have life.

 

[SO16]

Having just endured a personal loss, it seems to me that all this scrapping over political, social and financial loss that is happening in this thread lately is so unimportant if you don’t have life.

I’m very sorry for your loss. And one should put living life, spending time with loved ones above all other activities if possible.

But no sense on letting fudsters off easy during “filler time”. That can have long term consequences on future human life as well.

 

[Artful Dodger]

By 2018 even mainstream media knows this, for example from the article Elon Musk's Victory Lap: Yet here we're in 2024 and this basic fact is being perverted as "proof" that Elon is on drugs, this is why I don't take any criticism of him seriously, because when I look at the part that I have good knowledge of, it's all outrageous lies like this.

This latest offensive in the multiyear PR campaign targeting Elon began on Nov 12, 2023 when Linette Lopez wrote an (entirely false) article for BusinessInsider titled "Elon Musk started a price war that Tesla can't win". Farzad debunked it on his Youtube channel the next day.

That date, Nov 12, 2023 is notable because it marked the starter's gun for TLSA's "Christmas Rally". Now I'm sure the PR companies are smarting over that one; I hope their checks cleared okay (not).

And here is the deeper point you should be aware of, folks: Tesla's opponents decided years ago (and I wrote as much here back in Aug 2018) that their best bet to defeat Tesla (or at least slow them down) was to attack Elon personally. In some smoky backroom, they decided to "play the man, not the ball".

This was their fundamental mistake, and why this dirty PR campaign is ultimately doomed to fail: Elon's just got bigger balls. Sorry Linette, you're not even playing in the same league. Instead of making better cars, they chose to make more smoke (which ironically, is also the fundamental problem with their ICEcars).

Soon Giga Texas will begin producing the Model 2, eventually 2M per year at that one location. This line will crank out $14B per year in gross profit while adding $4.40 EPS to Tesla's bottom line. They'll promptly clone this production line at least 4 more times: Shanghai, Berlin, and Mexico x 2. This scares the *sugar* out of big auto.

So the secretive sponsors and financial backers of the Anti-Elon campaign have shown us exactly how afraid they are of all these Telsa price cuts. Inadvertently, they've also revealed who's backing this PR campaign: Big Auto, Big Labor, Big Gov't, they're all participants or cheerleaders in the FUD. But it's too late. One man has them surrounded, outnumbered, and outgunned (h/t Uncle Jack)

Fun Fact: HQ for J. D. Power and Associates is located in Troy, Michigan about 20 miles from Detroit. This is Just a Coincidence, folks. Nothing to see here... move along... ICEburg melting...

 

[mongo]

BFR harks back to the BFG 9000 ultimate weapon in DOOM, which was released in 1993 (!). And if someone tells you that young Elon didn't play DOOM and use one of these while he was at Penn or interning in Silicon Valley around that time, assume that they're an idiot...

(And yes, the canonical expansion of BFG is Big (bad word)ing Gun)

View attachment 1006793

Further, Elon was a frequent player on the multi-player Quake (successor to Doom) servers under the name Zip2. (Note: BFG did not appear in Quake AFAIK, was in Q2 and Q3)

 

[GOVA]

2-yr old Tesla Model S Plaid bests $250K Lucid Air Sapphire 3/3 in qtr mile drag races:

Lucid Air SAPPHIRE vs Tesla Plaid! 1234HP vs 1020! 1430 lb-ft vs 1050! 1/4 Mile! 8.9? 3 Races in 4K | Tesla Plaid Channel (3 hrs ago)

Spoiler: Video

Saphire has 1,234 hp but weighs 5,300 lbs. Plaid S beats it out of the hole every time.

Cheers!

Just look at Plaid's stability control during the 'dirty' track start. Lucid was dancing like a lowrider while Plaid destroyed it in first 2-3 seconds.

IMO, he's got the best racing channel.

 

[dhanson865]

Just look at Plaid's stability control during the 'dirty' track start. Lucid was dancing like a lowrider while Plaid destroyed it in first 2-3 seconds.

IMO, he's got the best racing channel.

It sounds like you had the audio turned off during the whole thing or just skipped around. It was discussed several times that they turned off the stability control and traction control for the Lucid on the 2nd run.

 

[Artful Dodger]

Just look at Plaid's stability control during the 'dirty' track start. Lucid was dancing like a lowrider while Plaid destroyed it in first 2-3 seconds.

Yup, it was all over by the 60' marker. Plaid traction control FTW.

 

[2daMoon]

SMR provides an assessment of new data on EV adoption rates, Google scores, and Bloomberg getting it right, for a change.

 

[SOULPEDL]

Teslascope has written a pretty long post regarding FSD v12:

TLDR:

1. Hopeful for FSD v12 Beta release to non-employees by end of Jan
2. As of this weekend, Tesla has begun internal testing of Actually Smart Summon (ASS) on company-owned vehicles based on V12's end-to-end architecture.
3. High likelihood of ASS (Actually Smart Summon) by end of Q1
4. FSD v12 wave 1 (employees) responses are as follows:

View attachment 1006731

https://x.com/teslascope/status/1743839196299894853

Where's the baseline for this data? What, no placebo group?

I would bet that people (employees) think FSD upgrades are better every time no matter what. Tesla should now release the same version and tell them it's way better, see how the scores climb, right? This effect is compounded by the fact that their income may increase with improved FSD performance. I experienced this with FSD myself, as it also affects my portfolio.

Humor me. I'm sure they have actual disengagement data plus any fender bender data beyond how they feel. I am simply pointing out that a L1 Smile Sheet is likely biased here from a legit Equipment Training point of view. But we get the idea and it may actually be improved.

 

[M|S|M MYP]

No, I didn't, here's the paragraph from the article:

When he finally took the stage, Musk was strangely incomprehensible at times. He slurred his words and rambled for around 15 minutes, according to executives in attendance, and referred repeatedly to SpaceX’s Big Falcon Rocket prototype, which was known as BFR, as “Big F—ing Rocket.”

So....Elon comes late, talks about things that 90% of the people have no clue what he is saying for 15 minutes (Rambling on) and he's on drugs?
How is this any different from the Earning Calls, when no one in the media understands what he says until 3 days later?

 

[RubberToe]

First, thank you for the gracious and kind words- and also the same regarding yourself.



I always try to!




This is why I prefer engineering- not marketing. Where one cares about what can actually be done, not what we want to sound like can be done


The S&P estimate you cite breaks it down by region... interestingly their estimate puts (by far) the largest % growth for 2024 in...the US. Which just practically killed federal EV subsidies with the sourcing changes. They predict a 66.4% YoY increase 23->24... AFAIK '23 estimates are around 1.3M sold in the US, meaning they're calling for about 860,000 more EVs to be sold in 2024 in the US alone.

From whom?

With most legacy pulling BACK on scaling production for 2024 (and GM outright killing the only model it sells that anyone really buys), and even the most optimistic such as yourself calling for Tesla to only increase by about 700k worldwide where are those 860k additional BEVs in the US alone coming from?

Look worldwide though- 9.6M this year- 13.3M next year. That's 3.7 million more EVs that someone needs to make. Again assuming your optimistic 700k for Tesla is right, where do the other 3 million come from? BYD was only 1.6M BEVs this year. Even with 50% YoY growth that only gets you 800k of the 3M you need.


So it's not that I think Tesla is going to lose market share-- it's that I find the idea companies who are NOT Tesla are going to magically make 3 million extra EVs next year to be...unlikely?

And once you accept the 13.3M isn't realistic based on the stated near-term intent of nearly every player who isn't Tesla or BYD, you easily reach the set of math where Tesla doesn't lose market share even when they "only" produce a more realistic 2-2.1M for 2024.

Instead I expect EV sales growth to be lower than S&P seems to suggest-- largely because we're finally reaching the point where it's obvious only a very few companies are serious about increasing the supply of them- and even they have certain constraints around pricing and battery sourcing.



BTW for a contrasting prediction on growth-

Ford halves 2024 electric F-150 production plans on slowing demand

Ford is cutting 2024 production goals in half for its F-150 Lightning EV pickup truck on slowing demand for battery-powered models. Read on.

financialpost.com

They cite UBS predicting 2024 US BEV growth at only 11% (and I'd expect most of that to be Tesla- but that won't get you remotely near 700k extra sales)

Here we go:

China Giga-Factory is now running at 1M vehicles per year. The first million cars took 2.5 years to produce, the next million took one year. Presumably they are not sitting on their collective laurels and will be improving on that:

Tesla highlights Giga Shanghai automation and production cycle time

At Tesla's Gigafactory in Shanghai, China, the use of automation has helped the automaker reach impressive production cycle times, as...

www.teslarati.com

Joe Tegtmeyer reports: Model Y production ramp is starting to hit another gear and within this quarter should roughly double production capability. This would be a run rate of roughly 10K per week from last spring’s record 5K per week peak. This is related to the line upgrades in September and added production and assembly capabilities added over the past 6 months. Cybertruck production is expected to ramp faster than the original Model Y ramp at Giga Texas. This is experience, Giga Texas at a more mature state overall, and is related to ongoing efforts to increase the speed of the line from what it is now ~25% to closer to 100% by the start of 2nd Qtr.

Giga Texas & Joe's Last Chance Garage Videos | Patreon

creating Videos of Giga Texas Construction and Joe's Last Chance

www.patreon.com

Model 3 Highland sighted at Fremont, with U.S. production underway and release imminent:

Tesla has a small fleet of updated Model 3s at Fremont Factory

Tesla has a small fleet of the updated "Highland" Model 3 at the Fremont Factory, according to a recent flyover of the plant by a notable drone operator.

www.teslarati.com

There was 57% growth in Europe in 2023. I don't know what the German word for Laurels is, but if I had to guess, I'd think maybe there wasn't one, because that crew in Grunheide isn't going to be resting on them in 2024. Watch what happens when the weather there gets above freezing!

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

Because "secured" is a term of art in SEC land, implying various conditions have been met (like a signed contract). Elon was likely unaware of those technicalities when he posted, using "secured" as an ordinary English word. In any case, he could have easily gotten the money from several...

teslamotorsclub.com

Always skate to the where the puck is going to be, not where it is now, especially when Tesla is shooting the puck...

Enjoy, I'll check back with you in one year on that 2.5M production number that you don't think Tesla is going to make.

RT

 

[JusRelax]

Where's the baseline for this data? What, no placebo group?

I would bet that people think FSD upgrades are better every time no matter what. Tesla should now release the same version and tell them it's way better, see how the scores climb, right? This effect is compounded by the fact that their income may increase with improved FSD performance. I experienced this with FSD myself, as it also affects my portfolio.

View attachment 1006808

Humor me. I'm sure they have actual disengagement data plus any fender bender data beyond how they feel. I am simply pointing out that a L1 Smile Sheet is likely biased here from a legit Equipment Training point of view. But we get the idea and it may actually be improved.

Just to be clear here, the only people that currently have v12 are employees, not shareholders, but your point still stands that they can have a bias towards wanting FSD to improve so that it's one less FUD point for them to have to hear about the company that they work for. The study itself I believe is performed by Teslascope I believe (once again, possible that they could have a bias towards FSD improvement, but not 100% clear), so it could be possible that their questions were phrased in a way to bias the answers toward improvement as well.

I think a safe point that we can garner from these results, however, is that signficantly more of the testers noticed improvement in human-like driving behavior than roundabouts and lane-keeping.

This point seems to align with most of the other anecdotes we've seen on X as well, which seem to all consistently take note of more human-like driving behavior.

 

[2daMoon]

Lars' weekly News show is jam-packed with juicy tidbits for the discriminating HODLer.

Enjoy

 

[Krugerrand]

Has anyone thought about doing some rough calculations how much steel will Tesla need for the next decade/s, if all the new models will use CT style panels?

If, like the CT, the new models will be 30XSS, a lot of SS will be needed. Wondering what is best, buying it from a mill/s or actually buying a producer/s of SS and streamline it for their own use.

Yes, I thought about it when they announced the CT and I actually believe the reason for the lower than expected yearly production estimates from Tesla may in part have to do with how much SS they can get.

Nobody on the planet made SS they wanted in any sort of quantity. If you want metal from a mill or foundry you’re looking at at least a 6 month lead time. For a recipe nobody has/a product nobody makes - add time to it.

There would have been material trials by Tesla and as we know the material changed from originally talked about by Tesla. That means there were a lot of trials and a lot of changes for the foundry/foundries and possible changes at the mill/mills if the recipe got changed.

Mills and foundries aren’t sitting around twiddling their thumbs. They have production schedules so when new recipes and products need to be made, they have to be scheduled in amongst already signed contracts. Then when production of the new product needs to ramp, that has to be scheduled in as well.

Didn’t Elon talk about starting a mill and foundry with regards to SpaceX a number of years ago? Did they follow through or no?