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

[Tachyon]

Government approves E- Vehicle policy to promote India as a manufacturing destination for EVs

The Union Government has approved a scheme to promote India as a manufacturing destination so that e

pib.gov.in

EV policy as approved by Govt of India .

Government approves E- Vehicle policy to promote India as a manufacturing destination for EVs​

Minimum Investment Rs 4150 Cr required with no cap on maximum Investment

3 years timeline for setting up manufacturing facilities in India, and start commercial production of EVs; 50% domestic value addition to be reached within 5 years at the maximum

Companies setting up manufacturing facilities for EVs to be allowed limited imports of cars at lower custom duty.​

 

[Tachyon]

Summarizing
-That’s minimum investment of $ 500 million USD in local manufacturing facilities
- to reach commercial production within 3 yrs
-A localization level of 25% by the 3rd year and 50% by the 5thyear will have to be achieved
- in the interim allowed to import upto 8000 Evs per year for total 40,000 EVs over 5 yrs with a lowered import duty tax at 15% ( currently this stands at 70%)

 

[Mengy]

Has anyone seen anything on V12.3 that suggests we won't be rich (again..) this year?

I might need to keep these threads warm:
Tesla Network prerequisites

Tesla Network / Robotaxi Business Model

Tesla to license Autopilot / FSD

Yes FSD v12.3 is looking very nice right now, but it isn't there yet. There is still a long ways to go before it's "robotaxi ready".

I doubt FSD sales will improve much in 2024 and contribute to our bottom line. I think it's much more likely to happen in 2025 or 2026 though. It's getting so close now that Level 5 does finally seem reasonably within reach.

 

[Cult Member]

Yes FSD v12.3 is looking very nice right now, but it isn't there yet. There is still a long ways to go before it's "robotaxi ready".

I doubt FSD sales will improve much in 2024 and contribute to our bottom line. I think it's much more likely to happen in 2025 or 2026 though. It's getting so close now that Level 5 does finally seem reasonably within reach.

Never underestimate exponential growth. One limiting factor was computer power (Dojo). We will soon have more than enough of it and with other millions of miles driven by Teslas around the word the perfect data source - us TESLA drivers - you can imagine. The big steps we already see from FSD should result in a wide rollout across North America before summer. Followed by parts of Europe at the end of 2024.
The "Robotaxi" function should be right on time when the first cars designed for it roll out Gigafactory Austin next year.

WE ARE THE FUTURE

 

[Max Plaid]

I’m pretty sure the performance version of the Model 2 will have a very high demand in Europe. Mainly people that have a much bigger budget, but no desire to have a car the size of the Model 3.
Price is not the only reason to buy a car. Some people have hard limits on how much to spend on a car, and they will love the Model 2 (although somebody may need to calculate the TCO for them).
And my Model S already charges at 200 miles in 15 minutes, there’s no real reason why the Model 2 would charge slower.

I'd buy a Model 2 hot-hatch, in addition to our current Tesla fleet... would be perfect for city driving and weekly grocery shop, going to gigs, etc.

Has to be a hatch though, hopefully Tesla aren't so abysmally stupid to make a sedan again...

 

[jschwefel]

Describing Tesla's Q1 deliveries as "light" would be an understatement. Here is data I use to calculate deliveries:

China: Weekly insurance numbers. This data is very reliable. In addition to that, we also get monthly China domestic sales numbers from CPCA (China Passenger Car Association), and historically, the two data sources have been always very close when we look at quarterly sales.

Europe: Each country in Europe releases its own monthly registration numbers. You can see these here. Many countries also release data before the month is over. The data quality is excellent.

US: There is no official sales data for the entire US. We never find out the actual numbers. The best way to calculate US sales after the quarter is over is to calculate Tesla sales in all other countries in the world and then subtract that number from the global number released by Tesla. That's what I do. The best way to calculate US sales during the quarter is to calculate inventory carried over from the last quarter to the current quarter, plus, all production in the US in this quarter, minus, estimated inventory at the end of this quarter. This calculation is complicated. I don't want to share the latest data I have but to give you an idea, here is what my inventory calculation looks like excluding this quarter and the last one:

My method relies on calculating production from VIN data reasonably accurately. Unfortunately, Tesla doesn't release production by factory. They only release the global production number. In addition, we get China production numbers from CPCA. That means I need to calculate production for Fremont, Giga Texas and Giga Berlin. I use VIN data to do that. Normally, we never find out the actual numbers for any of these factories but in the last shareholder letter, Tesla mentioned an important number. They said, "in 2023, the Tesla Fremont factory produced nearly 560,000 vehicles".

Tesla released the shareholder letter on January 24, 2024. Therefore we can go back and check what my number was before that. Here is the production table that I tweeted on January 3, 2024. I was calculating 558,838 for Fremont, pretty much in line with Tesla's "nearly 560,000" statement. This suggests my calculations for Giga Texas and Giga Berlin should be reasonably accurate too. I use VIN data for those factories too.

Thanks Troy. I appreciate the response and the work you do to understand production and delivery numbers.

Suffice it to say I simply don’t understand why we’d be down so much. China is down to Q4 ‘23, but up slightly YOY. Granted some of this is seasonal, but since China is an export hub, it seems likely some of the difference is due to exports (i.e. Korea and Malaysia,…). However, the ship numbers don’t support that. Is there missing data in the ship count? Shanghai production hasn’t slowed, has it?

Europe through February is similar to China, up YOY, but down to Q4. March is typically a big month and with Berlin being down about a week, there will be some impact. But that may hit more in April since I’m guessing most March deliveries are cars produced in February.

Then you have the US market. I don’t have any real data on production or deliveries, but Fremont and Austin seem to be cranking, the economy is still strong and the $7500 tax credit at the point of sale is likely to provide some tailwind, not to mention the publicity of the Cybertruck.

Anyway…I don’t know, but March can still be a big month and make for a good Q1. I don’t see Tesla giving up on the mission, and true to form, they continue to make things interesting.

Cheers!

 

[saniflash]

Never underestimate exponential growth.

As someone working in AI since ~10 years, I can say that this is the right point of view: never underestimate exponential growth. Anyone predicting that anything in AI "is at least n years out" is thinking linearly, not geometrically.

We as humans simply lack any intuition whatsoever how geometric growth/progress behaves, so I would be very careful with such statements

 

[replicant]

That bottom one is a price chart? No dividends, so less useful.

Only because S&P 500 Total Return doesn't have a 5 years history (see S&P 500 (TR) Price, Real-time Quote & News - Google Finance and S&P 500 (TR) (^SP500TR) Charts, Data & News - Yahoo Finance).

But the diverging trend would be starker since Tesla doesn't issue dividends.

 

[geometro]

Only because S&P 500 Total Return doesn't have a 5 years history (see S&P 500 (TR) Price, Real-time Quote & News - Google Finance and S&P 500 (TR) (^SP500TR) Charts, Data & News - Yahoo Finance).

But the diverging trend would be starker since Tesla doesn't issue dividends.

Yes, it would be (is) worse bc of that. Still not a fan.

 

[Tiger]

I don't get your math, taking into account inflation the 64k would be even less in 2019 Euros

Maybe it's the model 3 that has inflated, not the money

 

[cliff harris]

Summarizing
-That’s minimum investment of $ 500 million USD in local manufacturing facilities
- to reach commercial production within 3 yrs
-A localization level of 25% by the 3rd year and 50% by the 5thyear will have to be achieved
- in the interim allowed to import upto 8000 Evs per year for total 40,000 EVs over 5 yrs with a lowered import duty tax at 15% ( currently this stands at 70%)

I'm not that bullish on India, although I have some cash in an indian stocks ETF...but frankly 500m is pocket change for Tesla right now. I think now is maybe the time to make a step into that market. There is a limit to how big Tesla can grow while ignoring India, Africa and S America. Also India can potentially become a good location for solar power. When you can offer cheap solar power along with a no-maintenance EV, I think there is (in the long term) a good market there.
Given it takes 3 years to produce anything, I'd be happy for Tesla to announce a gigafactory in India this year. They have to do SOMETHING with that cash pile!

 

[Chartered321]

It's now crystal clear $TSLA is being systematically manipulated downwards by the market makers, with the help of Elon and his no / gloomy guidance which allowed the stock to trade sidelines for quarters. Maybe he wanted to grab some cheap shares too. I think the bottom is around. I'm buying every share I could because it seems everyone secretly wants a piece of it... Not a financial advice

 

[Mengy]

Never underestimate exponential growth. One limiting factor was computer power (Dojo). We will soon have more than enough of it and with other millions of miles driven by Teslas around the word the perfect data source - us TESLA drivers - you can imagine. The big steps we already see from FSD should result in a wide rollout across North America before summer. Followed by parts of Europe at the end of 2024.
The "Robotaxi" function should be right on time when the first cars designed for it roll out Gigafactory Austin next year.

Yep, agreed. FSD progress for the past few years has been slow and steady, so most people (myself included) expect (assume) the same rate of improvement from 12.3 on.

BUT things have changed. FSD being end to end now is a game changer when it comes to iteration times, that coupled with compute power being a non factor in the very near future (soon) could enable FSD to improve at a much faster rate from here on out. The difference between 12.2 and 12.3 seems to show that.

This is why FSD could potentially be a huge surprise to the upside in the near future, possibly even this year. I'm still skeptical because its taken so long to get here that I'm used to being pessimistic on FSD, but I feel its also important to realize things have changed regarding FSD improvements too.

I also agree with you on the Robotaxi timing. Gen 3 is slated to start production late next year, about a year and a half from today. If FSD keeps improving like it has been recently then I shudder to imagine how good it will be by then!

 

[aubreymcfato]

Yes FSD v12.3 is looking very nice right now, but it isn't there yet. There is still a long ways to go before it's "robotaxi ready".

I doubt FSD sales will improve much in 2024 and contribute to our bottom line. I think it's much more likely to happen in 2025 or 2026 though. It's getting so close now that Level 5 does finally seem reasonably within reach.

I can agree that V.12.3 is not ready (didn't try, cannot judge), but I also think Tesla has a lot of levers to pull.
Right now, FSD is available in North America only, but when you have a good enough product, that you are comfortable to put in every people's hands and not just hardcore Tesla fans, then it's a matter of pricing.

Tesla could do a campaign for easing trials for FSD: *everyone* gets a free trial of 1-week, than it's just a monthly subscription. Or you can purchase 50€ weekend-packages or 100€ road-trip packages. I mean, this is just software pricing, right?
You can bundle things easy, and change stuff in different markets. People just need to but it on the Tesla app the night before, drinking beers and watching the game on the sofa. They don't need to do anything: I bet kinda all customers would love to try FSD at least once for 100€. That would be a couple hundreds of millions (for China and Europe) almost for free.

Once the product is right, there a lot of very low hanging fruits for Tesla to pick, and easy revenue to make at ~100% margin.

 

[Doit]

Summarizing
-That’s minimum investment of $ 500 million USD in local manufacturing facilities
- to reach commercial production within 3 yrs
-A localization level of 25% by the 3rd year and 50% by the 5thyear will have to be achieved
- in the interim allowed to import upto 8000 Evs per year for total 40,000 EVs over 5 yrs with a lowered import duty tax at 15% ( currently this stands at 70%)

Up to 40,000 EVs over 5 years is comical considering India's >1.4 billion population. Tesla sold somewhere 500,000 last year in China (quick googling shows either 603k or 456k). No doubt India consumers have less overall purchasing power, but less than 10% in five years than what's sold in China in one year?

Can't say that "generous" EV import allowance would make any difference to any automaker.

 

[Unpilot]

I can agree that V.12.3 is not ready (didn't try, cannot judge),

And yet you do

 

[Knightshade]

Europe through February is similar to China, up YOY, but down to Q4. March is typically a big month and with Berlin being down about a week, there will be some impact. But that may hit more in April since I’m guessing most March deliveries are cars produced in February.

This has been explained to you multiple times at this point.

In Q1 2023 Tesla was still doing wave deliveries in the EU-- 2/3rds of all Q1 cars were delivered in March.

That type of choppy delivery ended halfway through 2023 and no longer exists-- so you're not going to see that massive 2x Jan/Feb combined number this March in Europe....instead you'd expect to see about the SAME as the avg of Jan/Feb in March-- meaning declining YoY Q1 EU deliveries.

Then you have the US market. I don’t have any real data on production or deliveries, but Fremont and Austin seem to be cranking

On the contrary Troy has been calling out since start of production that the highland ramp in the US is going quite slowly for unknown reasons based on VIN data, and that Y inventory hasn't been shrinking either (possilby why we're seeing so many different incentives piled on at once, FUSC and FSD transfers PLUS free paint/interior color PLUS 10k free supercharging miles, etc).

the $7500 tax credit at the point of sale

For Y, but not for any currently sold version of 3- whereas last year it was available for both.

 

[Unpilot]

Looks like 5 days in a row TSLA takes a dive right after open....@Papafox

 

[Drax7]

Has anybody ever made money in India?

 

[2daMoon]

I also agree with you on the Robotaxi timing. Gen 3 is slated to start production late next year, about a year and a half from today. If FSD keeps improving like it has been recently then I shudder to imagine how good it will be by then!

This leaves me thinking of Elon's desire to avoid the Gen3 and go straight to Robotaxi manufacturing. He's had a clear vision of sudden, rapid development on the FSD front all along.

Still, I like the idea of the Gen3 vehicle, and would like to own one with the option of autonomy on the table for it as well. Choice is better than no choice.

It is also evident that the Robotaxi will be a game-changer for urban environs to a greater degree than for rural folk. Merely based on logistics and population density the utility of a Robotaxi for city-dwellers will be a significant money maker. Rural use will be popular too, and with a low-cost vehicle it should provide a needed service, though I expect there will be more miles traveled empty as the logistics and population density will dictate, and profit might be less, though still, a profit. Owning an autonomous Gen3 vehicle in a rural area will be a good fit, especially if it can be integrated into the Robotaxi network as the owner may dictate.