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

[hobbes]

Seems the Cybertruck VIN tracker is down.. Can anyone else still reach it? Are there alternative sources?

Cybertruck VIN Tracker

 

[2Pearls]

Ohhh "alledged" performance issues...


Seriously? Combining "fact" and "may"? Are they or aren't they? Here's a hint, the majority board has been in place over 12 months other than with JB replacing Hiro last year.

Want to research yourself (something WSJ seems to have not bothered to do since they can't tell if Tesla is compliant):
The Board: Corporate Governance | Tesla Investor Relations
The Rules: Nasdaq Listing Center

I think the point is that this is, yet another WSJ FUD hit piece that all can view, and most viewing do not have the same level of information that we have. This piece is filled with misinformation, “sources” as well as “alleged” and puts Musk and his board in a very bad place. WSJ has lost all journalistic integrity, if they ever had any...
It would be nice if Tesla came out to challenge this BS and set the record straight. This should be a defamation of character Lawsuit.

 

[jerry33]

How about if the "geofence" was really really huge? Like say the first fence is the 5 lowest population density states (skipping Alaska for now)

• Wyoming
• Montana
• North Dakota
• South Dakota
• New Mexico

Plus any interstate or highway section in other states that are in a cell that has population density less than North Dakota's average (would open up the entire interstate highway system outside of cities in several other states).

And of course for those northern states have the AI not willing to take over when there are unplowed roads in snow season.

Then later add the next 4 lowest population dense states and any cells in states not already added that are lower population density than Kansas average (again adding cells in several other states)

• Idaho
• Nebraska
• Nevada
• Kansas

and move on in waves of geofencing like that?

I don't see how that could do anything but slow implementation.

 

[spacerfc]

It affects TSLA (and probably Tesla, indirectly) if is feeds the next news cycles... Without go into the details of what he says, we should at least acknowledge that the simple facts he's expressing political views ferquently and doing polls about impeachment of any political reps does affects his image to people all around the world. Or you don't think that this things are being translated like everywhere? Sometimes I find Musk in the local newspaper, for whatever thing he has done lately. If people think that his tweets are just a thing on X they are delusional. This is 2024, everything percolates everywhere, without context, and badly translated.

Well if you haven't noticed, immigration is a huge concern for the majority of the country, it's currently the #1 concern among voters, 81% of Republicans, 68% of independents and 45% of Democrats say conditions at the border are worsening. So Elon is not expressing some controversial view here, his tweets are in broad agreement with the sentiment of most Americans.

 

[elasalle]

This link for me at least gave free access to the whole article:

https://www.wsj.com/tech/elon-musk-tesla-money-drugs-board-61af9ac4

Really piling on the scrutiny of the “independent directors” and alleged lack of proper board performance.

- Details incidents where board members were doing illegal drugs with Musk.

- fleshes out more personal and business relationships between the independent directors and Musk.

- Also Larry Ellison and others suggested to Musk that he go into rehab in 2022 after his drug use got worse (timing seems to coincide with his “change” in twitter posting behavior).

- Also introduces the fact that Tesla May be in breach of NASDAQ listing requirements due to lack in the number of independent directors. If they were to receive a breach notice from NASDAQ, Tesla would still have 12 months to rectify the situation before potential delisting.

- identifies two board members who left for dissatisfaction from unsatisfactory board oversight, and their attempts to rectify were rebuffed.

I guess they forgot to mention that he got tested for illegal substances by NASA/US govt once again…

 

[Snerruc]

Not sure if it varies by region, but this sounds like something that could (mostly) be solved by adjusting the settings: Minimize lane changes, chill mode for FSD's aggressiveness setting, etc. Mine still sometimes makes illogical lane changes, but on the highway it will run in the middle lanes when that makes sense based on traffic and speed settings...

Set on chill with minimum lane changes. I can’t find anything that controls this. I flip it on and screen immediately says changing to left most lane.

 

[Snerruc]

The European mind cannot comprehend this.

And I’m a pre WW2 baby.

 

[Webeevdrivers]

Some alternative threads

EV and Battery Credits MY for $36k with FSD transfer and before state credits

Project Redwood (Compact Crossover)

Project Dojo - the SaaS Product?

Need for Tesla Advertising / PR Now advertising on X for the first time (Japan)

Elon Compensation Package

Tesla Optimus Sub-Prime Robot

FSD V12 (end to end AI) Actually Smart Summon coming?

Tesla VR / AR Karpathy provides his Vision Pro blessing

FSD Transfer Confirmed

Delaware to Texas Incorporation

V2G in a robotaxi world CT VPP

4680 cell design, chassis integration & factory discussion for investors CATL equipmemt

https://twitter.com/x/status/1754010017320301035

Healthiest Elon has looked for years?

Yah. Might be just the light but the whole fatty neck thing that was obvious a year or so ago is not evident in this pic.

 

[Usain]

Geofencing like this can also cause issues. A potential issue:
right now EM already has mentioned that the training data is over-engineered for SF and needs more training data in a rainy env. Geo fencing will cause similar training data issues. Most of the platform for universal training has already been established. All that is needed is v12 needs to be rolled out to a wider audience and training will grow organically across the US.
Another issue could be that once a behavior is "learned" by the AI/NNs for a given geo-fenced area, we don't know the impact of unlearning it or re-learning it when more areas w/ diff rules are added.
I feel that its best to apply the learning for an area all at once.

Others have been geofencing because that is the only way they can solve this problem via coding/heuristics. They are not using NNs. So by geo-fencing, they are limiting the rules & scope and thus the coding effort to get something running so 'show' progress. But scaling beyond the geo-fenced areas will increasing become an intractable and exponentially complex problem.

That's not the way it works. Learning is cumulative. Just because FSD is better in San Francisco does not make it worse somewhere else.

FSD V12 needs more training in rainy areas because it needs more training in rainy areas. Once that happens, V12 will get better at driving in the rain. But that won't make it worse in San Francisco.

If you oversample in a geofenced area, the FSD will get really good at driving in that area. But that won't make it worse anywhere else. And while it is getting good at driving in the geofenced area it will still get better driving other places as more and more training data is used from those other places.

I think we need to understand that geofencing is the only way to get started with a robotaxi service. There are lots of reasons that should be obvious. If you want, we can do a longer discussion.

Eventually, FSD will be good enough everywhere that you can start a robotaxi service anywhere. But that day is far from now and the logistics of such a universal service can not be put into place quickly. It will need to grow organically over a longish period of time.

Or think of this. Uber started out geofenced and it still is as it is not available everywhere. But at the start, it was only available in certain cities. And Uber didn't have to solve FSD. It was geofenced because of logistics. The same will be true when Tesla starts its robotaxi service. You have to start somewhere, not everywhere.

 

[Krugerrand]

It affects TSLA (and probably Tesla, indirectly) if is feeds the next news cycles...

You don’t say. News to me.

Without go into the details of what he says, we should at least acknowledge that the simple facts he's expressing political views ferquently and doing polls about impeachment of any political reps does affects his image to people all around the world.

Ok. Acknowledged 10 years ago, 9 years and 364 days ago, 9 years and 363 days ago, 9 years and 362 days ago, 9 years and 361 days ago… every bloody single day, multiple times a day, up to and including last Sunday, the day after last Sunday, last Tuesday, last Wednesday, last Thursday while enjoying a brisk walk in the rain, Friday during backgammon, yesterday while making duck a l’orange, today before caffeine.

Suffice it to say it’s been acknowledged every bloody second of TSLA’s existence.

Can we move the fritter on now? Or must we we turn the stale fritter into bread crumbs, add seasoning and some spice, pop it in the oven to crisp it up, and top our Chilean Sea Bass with it?

Or you don't think that this things are being translated like everywhere?

Who cares? Mary led anyway.

Sometimes I find Musk in the local newspaper, for whatever thing he has done lately. If people think that his tweets are just a thing on X they are delusional.

You still read a newspaper? To clip coupons? To get the ‘truth’? Or just to look at the pictures?

 

[2daMoon]

Set on chill with minimum lane changes. I can’t find anything that controls this. I flip it on and screen immediately says changing to left most lane.

This almost sounds as if the training data has a disproportionate number of drivers who don't subscribe to the "keep right except to pass" mentality. Which may actually match reality.

From experience, there seem to be more drivers who get in the left lane of a multi-lane traffic highway and stay there. Particularly on urban highways, "keep right" behavior seems to be more adhered to in rural areas in my experience. Often, these left lane preference drivers will drive there without awareness for accommodating faster traffic approaching from behind by moving to the right.

It is difficult to imagine the training data being different from this reality without there being a significant effort on the part of those tasked with filtering for data showing drivers with the desired behavior. It is sort of like the "rolling stop" behavior that took much effort to isolate those examples to prevent FSD from doing what most people actually do.

 

[unk45]

"Tesla opens it's first store in South America, but not in Brazil"

Tesla inaugura sua 1ª loja na América do Sul, mas não é no Brasil

Tesla escolhe país da América do Sul para inaugurar sua primeira loja física no continente; veja onde fica.

multiversonoticias.com.br

in Portuguese, choose your favorite translator.
'The gist is that here in Brazil we're anxious and slightly dismayed to see our nice little neighbor get preference to our huge, automating, raw material plentiful selves. Frankly we are jealous!
Just to ensure that the message is clear to Tesla, BYD is not ignoring us because they now have solar panels, busses, batteries all made here, and soon BYD will open that giant Bahia factory they bought from Ford, after which they will produce large numbers of electric cars.' I did not make quotation marks on this extract since it summarizes TV commentators, press reports and personal comment made to me from interested friends.

When considering that early 2024 results in Europe show ~9% of sales from new countries, mostly small ones, we might expect that might well be true in other places too. Chile is narrow and very long, so Supercharger coverage can be national, North to South with extra coverage for Santiago de Chile, Valparaiso and Concepción, the three significant cities..with ~30 Supercharger locations, or even fewer, especially with a scattering of Destination chargers. Consider also that Chile makes no cars. Then, if the decide to Really do it well, they could ship Tesla Energy products plus cars and a handful of Destination chargers to Isla de Pascoa (Easter Island) where a total Tesla Energy solution would save large amounts of shipping of fossil fuel to that remote picturesque tourist destination.

Without belaboring the specifics of Chile, the inevitable comparisons to many other remote islands show just how easy it can be to solve huge expense problems for fuel imports as well as generating useful income and, in many cases, huge publicity from tourist exposure.

Then, for those who haven't noticed, here is an unexpected prospect:
Just for clarity, here is the Clean Technica version :

All EVs In Ethiopia Now Exempted From VAT, Surtax, & Excise Tax - CleanTechnica

Sign up for daily news updates from CleanTechnica on email. Or follow us on Google News! A number of countries in Africa depend on fossil fuel imports to meet their energy requirements in the transport sector. These fossil fuel imports constitute a good chunk of the total import bill, draining...

cleantechnica.com

For those unfamiliar:

Ethiopia travel

Explore Ethiopia holidays and discover the best time and places to visit.

www.lonelyplanet.com

Making a serious effort to supply both Tesla Energy and Auto to Ethiopia would have large benefit, not least by leading Kenya and Tanzania, to name two, to adopt similar policies. As a relevant aside, all of East Africa has been a traditional destination for used cars, and BEV need be no exception. Of course there are LHD and RHD markets, and Singapore, Japan and the UK are all suppliers fo used cars for these markets.

Of course Elon is more familiar than most with South Africa, another much larger opportunity.

Now that European smaller markets are proving successful and Chile is setting the Mercosur stage it seems inevitable that integrated Tesla Energy and automotive moves in much of Africa and many Pacific islands, perhaps starting with Chile and the French islands, where regulation and homologation are already done on the mainland. Tahiti and Bora Bora, like others, would save giant expenses with total electrification.

Check with Larry Ellison for references

 

[Krugerrand]

This link for me at least gave free access to the whole article:

https://www.wsj.com/tech/elon-musk-tesla-money-drugs-board-61af9ac4

Really piling on the scrutiny of the “independent directors” and alleged lack of proper board performance.

- Details incidents where board members were doing illegal drugs with Musk.

- fleshes out more personal and business relationships between the independent directors and Musk.

- Also Larry Ellison and others suggested to Musk that he go into rehab in 2022 after his drug use got worse (timing seems to coincide with his “change” in twitter posting behavior).

- Also introduces the fact that Tesla May be in breach of NASDAQ listing requirements due to lack in the number of independent directors. If they were to receive a breach notice from NASDAQ, Tesla would still have 12 months to rectify the situation before potential delisting.

- identifies two board members who left for dissatisfaction from unsatisfactory board oversight, and their attempts to rectify were rebuffed.

Will you look at that. WSJ giving The National Enquirer a run for its money. I can’t believe they forgot to include the alien baby’s role in the fiasco.

Edit: And we have our first winner of the day. A supporter, a true believer in the WSJ, and its historical role in making the world a better place.

 

[FireMedic]

Weekend OT.

I’ll try to make this brief since it’s really just one person‘s experience but my son sent me this video, and then came home and him and his three friends just couldn’t shut up about how this guy let them open the tonneau cover, stand on the cover, sit inside… As he called, it do the wiggle waggle with the 4 wheel steering. As you can see from the video; roman and his little homies are NOT the only ones fascinated by it!

My investor hat on now; I think this thing is gonna sell WAY MORE than 250k/year. Just my gut hunch.

 

[Ellec]

Hit pieces ramping up in the traditional media about Elon and Tesla are usually a sign that someone wants the stock price lowered for some reason. One reason could be they want to force weak handed retail investors to give up their shares, it could get a lot worse but if you believe in the company long term it should be a case of observing it and keeping focused on the facts. Facts are not usually present in any of these articles or if they are they are spun more than your pants on laundry day.

 

[Ellec]

Weekend OT.

I’ll try to make this brief since it’s really just one person‘s experience but my son sent me this video, and then came home and him and his three friends just couldn’t shut up about how this guy let them open the tonneau cover, stand on the cover, sit inside… As he called, it do the wiggle waggle with the 4 wheel steering. As you can see from the video; roman and his little homies are NOT the only ones fascinated by it!

My investor hat on now; I think this thing is gonna sell WAY MORE than 250k/year. Just my gut hunch.

I would think 250k is the initial target in the US, add Asia and Europe and seeing them everywhere, then lower prices as it scales and I think a million globally is possible.

 

[Krugerrand]

"Tesla opens it's first store in South America, but not in Brazil"

Tesla inaugura sua 1ª loja na América do Sul, mas não é no Brasil

Tesla escolhe país da América do Sul para inaugurar sua primeira loja física no continente; veja onde fica.

multiversonoticias.com.br

in Portuguese, choose your favorite translator.
'The gist is that here in Brazil we're anxious and slightly dismayed to see our nice little neighbor get preference to our huge, automating, raw material plentiful selves. Frankly we are jealous!
Just to ensure that the message is clear to Tesla, BYD is not ignoring us because they now have solar panels, busses, batteries all made here, and soon BYD will open that giant Bahia factory they bought from Ford, after which they will produce large numbers of electric cars.' I did not make quotation marks on this extract since it summarizes TV commentators, press reports and personal comment made to me from interested friends.

When considering that early 2024 results in Europe show ~9% of sales from new countries, mostly small ones, we might expect that might well be true in other places too. Chile is narrow and very long, so Supercharger coverage can be national, North to South with extra coverage for Santiago de Chile, Valparaiso and Concepción, the three significant cities..with ~30 Supercharger locations, or even fewer, especially with a scattering of Destination chargers. Consider also that Chile makes no cars. Then, if the decide to Really do it well, they could ship Tesla Energy products plus cars and a handful of Destination chargers to Isla de Pascoa (Easter Island) where a total Tesla Energy solution would save large amounts of shipping of fossil fuel to that remote picturesque tourist destination.

Without belaboring the specifics of Chile, the inevitable comparisons to many other remote islands show just how easy it can be to solve huge expense problems for fuel imports as well as generating useful income and, in many cases, huge publicity from tourist exposure.

Then, for those who haven't noticed, here is an unexpected prospect:
Just for clarity, here is the Clean Technica version :

All EVs In Ethiopia Now Exempted From VAT, Surtax, & Excise Tax - CleanTechnica

Sign up for daily news updates from CleanTechnica on email. Or follow us on Google News! A number of countries in Africa depend on fossil fuel imports to meet their energy requirements in the transport sector. These fossil fuel imports constitute a good chunk of the total import bill, draining...

cleantechnica.com

For those unfamiliar:

Ethiopia travel

Explore Ethiopia holidays and discover the best time and places to visit.

www.lonelyplanet.com

Making a serious effort to supply both Tesla Energy and Auto to Ethiopia would have large benefit, not least by leading Kenya and Tanzania, to name two, to adopt similar policies. As a relevant aside, all of East Africa has been a traditional destination for used cars, and BEV need be no exception. Of course there are LHD and RHD markets, and Singapore, Japan and the UK are all suppliers fo used cars for these markets.

Of course Elon is more familiar than most with South Africa, another much larger opportunity.

Now that European smaller markets are proving successful and Chile is setting the Mercosur stage it seems inevitable that integrated Tesla Energy and automotive moves in much of Africa and many Pacific islands, perhaps starting with Chile and the French islands, where regulation and homologation are already done on the mainland. Tahiti and Bora Bora, like others, would save giant expenses with total electrification.

Check with Larry Ellison for references

Will someone get this man a Tesla for his Brazilian hideaway already! And one for his Brazilian mistress and her mother. And his own Brazil Is The Bomb forum thread.

 

[Krugerrand]

Weekend OT.

I’ll try to make this brief since it’s really just one person‘s experience but my son sent me this video, and then came home and him and his three friends just couldn’t shut up about how this guy let them open the tonneau cover, stand on the cover, sit inside… As he called, it do the wiggle waggle with the 4 wheel steering. As you can see from the video; roman and his little homies are NOT the only ones fascinated by it!

My investor hat on now; I think this thing is gonna sell WAY MORE than 250k/year. Just my gut hunch.

I love how everyone is standing one full parking space away from it. I may not need that pitbull afterall.

 

[Krugerrand]

Hit pieces ramping up in the traditional media about Elon and Tesla are usually a sign that someone wants the stock price lowered for some reason. One reason could be they want to force weak handed retail investors to give up their shares, it could get a lot worse but if you believe in the company long term it should be a case of observing it and keeping focused on the facts. Facts are not usually present in any of these articles or if they are they are spun more than your pants on laundry day.

At this point, I think it goes way beyond artificially depressing the SP to buy shares on the cheap. Indeed, I don’t think it’s that at all. I won’t bore people with my conspiracy theory.

My father is really, really, really considering his first EV. It’ll be the last vehicle he buys in this lifetime. As a mechanic his whole life, he’s been having a real hard time undoing decades of ICE knowledge and expertise. I keep having to tell him, ‘Dad, it doesn’t work that way with a Tesla.’ (Absolutely I will not allow him to buy anything but a Tesla.)

As I eluded to recently, I had a several hour conversation (read spirited debate)with him the other day about many things Tesla related that he’d learned by listening/reading news/media and the like.

He’s not a gullible man. He’s not slow witted. He has a healthy amount of skepticism regarding the media, but even with all that I had to set him straight on a few matters.

Now the typical reaction to that is ‘Tesla, needs to do this or that to educate people, rebut the media, yadda, yadda, yadda.’

Meh. It wouldn’t make a significant difference overall. Linking people to Tesla produced information (like their blog, impact reports etc) doesn’t suddenly make people believe. Indeed, they can often think the company is lying because company’s do often lie, so for them ‘what makes Tesla different in that regard?’. In many cases an ‘independent’ source is more believable to them.

*This* has to run its course. The good, the bad, and the ugly of it all. People as a whole have to arrive at the right answer on their own, in their own way, or it means nothing will change, nothing can change for the better of mankind.

I feel despair for Elon, his companies, all the employees, all who are working so very hard to help us all and who are constantly being spit upon. It’s classic good vs evil. I believe the good win this time, though, not without a lot of casualties along the way.

 

[Mardak]

The recent guidance for IRA's modified Alternative Fuel Vehicle Refueling Property Credit (§30C) should mean Superchargers now gets 30% tax credit when installed in non-urban or low-income community areas. The IRS page for the credit links to a mapping tool that shows the newly spotted "IRA" supercharger cabinet in Verdi, NV is in an eligible census tract.

A quick recap of IRA changes to §30C:

• restores credit that expired in 2021
• increases credit from $30k per location to $100k per single item
• 30% credit only for eligible locations (dropping to 6% other locations)
• clarified vehicles that support bi-directional don't disqualify

Have people noticed more upcoming Superchargers in these eligible areas? Does the "single item" change effectively make basically the whole Supercharger cost (e.g., cabinets, stalls/posts, other equipment) eligible for the credit?