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

[Artful Dodger]

I am still fighting for my voting rights in Switzerland, does anyone know if a "confirmation of holding" has ever sufficed to vote, and if so, how did you execute the vote?

I recommend following Alexandra Merz @TeslaBoomerMama on X. She's working on this right now. She may not know who has this information, but by God she'll run them down and beat it out of them. Guaranteed.

 

[GhostSkater]

My only small worry is that these new lower-cost models might have the same exterior appearance as Model 3 and Y. Otherwise how will they build them on the same assembly line? Problem would be that they Osborne the existing lineup. I hope my fears are unfounded.

X and S are run on the same line. Same line doesn't mean the whole line is the same happening at the same time, for example, body shop will alternate between them, stamping already change dies all the time, general assembly with people doing the work (for now) it's not a problem

While it will take more space since you have to store all the jigs, carriers, etc of each Model, it's tiny compared to a whole new line

So we will likely see batches of each model, maybe a few days apart

 

[cliff harris]

Something occurred to me when I woke up after this call...
Tesla's 'competitors' are currently doing three things to help Tesla:

• Switching away from EVs so Tesla can build even more market share
• Making hybrids so they have to give Tesla more money in regulatory credits
• Reducing demand for batteries, so that Tesla's COG per vehicle go down.

Big shout out to the ICE developers who are working around the clock to improve Tesla's financials .

 

[CitizenKane]

The difference is volume, they only sold around 15k of their EX model in Q1.

View attachment 1041206


Polestar which is their EV brand had a terrible Q1.

Polestar EV sales fall 40% in Q1 2024

FYI, Polestar will not be part of Volvo anymore: Volvo Cars publishes information brochure relating to the proposed distribution of its shareholding in Polestar

 

[Ellec]

Of course, that's why I'm here, in a chat with long time investors, to get angles that I might have overlooked and to offer angles that they might have overlooked. I'm getting tired at how many times I have to repeat this I've liquidated my short position with an average price of 153$, so pretty happy with the results (started shorting at 240$) and now have a small long position, but that's more of a trade.

I'm not saying a dedicated platform wouldn't help. What I'm saying is that having a car that drives itself is such a huge competitive advantage that it genuinely doesn't matter what platform you put it on initially. Especially when they have the Model 3/Y which has a great compromise between cost, storage space and room for 4 passengers to ride in. There's a reason why it's called London Cab and not just Cab. Although it provides an improvement over normal vehicles, it's not a big enough differentiator for people to care.

Apologies, but I have Ark's 2024 Tesla's valuation model (created in 2020) in front of me and I can't take anything they say seriously. It's hilariously bad in its core principles.

I noticed never told us you liquidated your short position at the time but after the SP spiked 10%

 

[hobbes]

As a cyclist, love to see this, impressive. One advantage of AI over humans: It is always patient.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1782555812843688301

 

[Featsbeyond50]

I don't follow him, but I did listen to him, Bruce, and others who struck it big tell others to go get margin accounts and tell everyone about which firms had the best rates.

I meant, do you agree with what he said in that tweet about the Chancery court? You seem to be discounting the tweet due to the way he plays tesla stock.

 

[Maarten]

I never thought about this. But Tesla is clearly building a ride hailing app that is competitor to Uber. It announced it at earnings call.
Tech stack of a ride hailing app is easy/Okay level of difficulty to create. But operations is tricky to get right. Takes some effort to get the operations right.

Total Market Cap of Public Ride-Hailing Companies: $192 billionPrivate Ride-Hailing Companies (last known valuations as of August 2023):

1. Ola Cabs (India) - Last Known Valuation: $7.3 billion
2. Gojek (Indonesia) - Last Known Valuation: $10 billion
3. Bolt (Estonia) - Last Known Valuation: $4.75 billion
4. inDriver (USA) - Last Known Valuation: $1.23 billion
5. Cabify (Spain) - Last Known Valuation: $1.4 billion
   6. FREE NOW (Europe) - Last Known Valuation ±$1 billion

Total Ride Hailing Market Cap ±220 B.

The important question is, What percentage of Ride Hailing valuation could Tesla capture soon?

Those are interesting facts, thank you.
A tidbit about Gojek: we use that a lot in Bali, easily done with our phone.
However, the public ride-hailing is only a part of what they are offering, so that will be a lot less than $10 billion.
The photo shows some of the in total 17 services they offer.
3 In Food Delivery and Shopping, 6 in Transport and Logistics, 7 in Payments and 1 in Environmental Products.
All very easy to use and cheap. For example: during Covid Gojek delivered the virus tests to our front door.

​

 

[raffiniert]

So you expect sales growth in 2024 over 2023? Friendly wager for 50 EUR that there will be YoY decline in deliveries? Charity of winner's choice.

Let's not play games. USDequiv of 10 shares per end of year closing?

 

[unk45]

@unk45 I think you had stated, before you became concerned about advertising, that FCF would be the metric you watched. I suppose this is not surprising but...it sure went south quickly.

Of the items that triggered my review the dissolution of the advertising department was a positive. I never in my nightmares imagines negative cash flow. Never. The sudden layoffs make more sense, although most fundamentals deteriorated.

If the bet on Robotaxi works out there will be a swift recovery.

This is sad, but not totally bad. It without question forced attention to many neglected topics and caused Elon to be more focussed than he had been for many past quarterly reports.

 

[hobbes]

And semi. But, as we learned from the call, the semi assembly line is still quite a ways off, so no need to ramp up 4680 any faster. As Elon explained, a big reason for 4680 was cost. Other manufacturers were placing HUGE battery orders, making cells from everyone so expensive. But, now that the legacy manufacturers have backed off EV production there is a glut of batteries to be bought on the cheap, so the cost reductions from the 4680 format aren't as important right now.

I totally get the reasoning Elon presented, but at battery day they also talked about performance improvements through the new form factor. Would be great if at the next call someone could ask if these didn´t turn out as planned or if price is just more important at the moment.

 

[Todd Burch]

Reuter's lies, but here's their take (on whether it's a totally new manufacturing process for cost reductions. This might not be a BAD idea since EV growth has slowed and who wants to compete at lower price points now:

https://www.reuters.com/business/autos-transportation/teslas-quarterly-revenue-falls-first-time-since-2020-2024-04-23/

I’ve been around EVs and relentlessly watching Tesla for 15 years now, so you may have missed this.

EV growth didn’t slow as a sector because OEMs suddenly realized in the last year that EVs don’t work. Anyone who’s owned one for the last few years already knows that EVs out on the roads are superior to ICE vehicles for the majority of drivers in nearly every way.

The reason other OEMs have basically abandoned EVs is because they realized they haven’t figured out how to make money on them like Tesla has.

When interest rates went up, and then Tesla lowered their prices, they basically gave up. Ford, VW, and the rest couldn’t make money at the higher price points. So how are they going to compete after Tesla lowered prices dramatically and is still making 18.5% gross margins on vehicles?

What we saw in the last year was capitulation by the traditional OEMs.

That won’t hurt Ford or VW yet. It actually improves their bottom line. They think short term, so this will help them continue to be profitable while interest rates are high.

But when rates come back down, and the cost of gas/petrol takes another leg up, the OEMs will get caught again with their pants down.

They will have wasted another X years not innovating in the EV space, while Tesla continues nose to the grindstone.

I actually see what’s happening right now with other OEMs as stage 3 of their own demise.

Stage 1 was “Ignore Tesla.” They pretended like Tesla was a fad.

Stage 2 was “The competition is coming.” OEMs gave their best shot, put out some EVs. But they were mediocre and unprofitable. Then interest rates shot up and Tesla dropped prices, so they want back to their core business (ICE) because that’s where they were profitable.

Stage 3 is “Ignore the elephant in the room.” Again pretend Tesla’s not there, focus on short term profits, and get past this period of higher interest rates.

Stage 4 is going to be ugly for them.

The winners are the ones who prepare for the future. The rest of the OEMs are doing a great job preparing for the now.

 

[Robertj]

Of the items that triggered my review the dissolution of the advertising department was a positive. I never in my nightmares imagines negative cash flow. Never. The sudden layoffs make more sense, although most fundamentals deteriorated.

If the bet on Robotaxi works out there will be a swift recovery.

This is sad, but not totally bad. It without question forced attention to many neglected topics and caused Elon to be more focusses than he had been for many past quarterly reports.

There was positive free cash flow for the quarter from operations $250m before capex 0f $2.5b

Adjusted EBITDA of $3.3 b

 

[Todd Burch]

So, FSD licencing to other manufacturers, when? It's Ford, isn't it? Some pressures in other companies? I guess Tesla can't develop FSD hardware and software at once with many partners.

I’d put my money on Ford.

I think FSD licensing will turn out just like the North American Charging Standard. Ford *kinda* has their head out of their ass enough to see the future, so they license FSD.

Then the other automakers, realizing their cars can’t drive their elderly owners or busy businessmen to the grocery store or airport, reluctantly drag their feet and license FSD too.

Then Todd profits and retires.

 

[Artful Dodger]

I totally get the reasoning Elon presented, but at battery day they also talked about performance improvements through the new form factor. Would be great if at the next call someone could ask if these didn´t turn out as planned or if price is just more important at the moment.

The Tesla battery cell project was always about two things:

1. Securing sufficient volume for Tesla's needs, and
2. Getting the cost per kilowatt hour down.

So far, the project is meeting its goals. As Elon said during the call there will be times of feast and famine in the battery cell future, but having their own organic cell manufacturing capability hedges their risks.

 

[Todd Burch]

There was positive free cash flow for the quarter from operations $250m before capex 0f $2.5b

This I think is one of the main reasons why TSLA went up after the financials went out.

Terrible quarter, terrorist attack, shipping blockades, two new products ramping, poor sales, inventory buildup, and MASSIVE AI infrastructure capex and Tesla is STILL printing money. All while their big moneymaking businesses are either still growing (energy) or haven’t even started to grow yet.

Do people understand why Tesla is not just an automaker yet?

 

[samppa]

Cybertruck has arrived in Europe.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1782844635993211214

 

[mongo]

Of the items that triggered my review the dissolution of the advertising department was a positive. I never in my nightmares imagines negative cash flow. Never. The sudden layoffs make more sense, although most fundamentals deteriorated.

If the bet on Robotaxi works out there will be a swift recovery.

This is sad, but not totally bad. It without question forced attention to many neglected topics and caused Elon to be more focusses than he had been for many past quarterly reports.

You didn't see the produced vs delivered vehicle differential and think to yourself, "That inventory cost has to come from somewhere? "
Using Q4 average vehicle costs: 46.5k vehicles @ 36k average COGS = $1.7B. 2023 had the same combined negative flows across Q1,Q2,Q3 with only Q4 having a positive $482M "Changes in operating assets and liabilities" entry. This should boost Q2s numbers.

The $1B in AI compute did make CapEx higher than predicted on a yearly/4 basis. $2.773B annualized is $11B. This is also likely lumpy.

 

[Usain]

Always like the Cat's take.

Me too.

It is fascinating how after this conference call it seems like a cloud has been lifted.

While these past few weeks have been trying, nobody has been more steady and reassuring than @Krugerrand. He is one cool cat.

 

[alexxs88]

I noticed never told us you liquidated your short position at the time but after the SP spiked 10%

I get it's a public forum and there are all kinds of trolls and FUDsters around, but I'm not sure what I'd accomplish by lying about such an inconsequential fact. Let's say I didn't liquidate the position (happy to send proof via PM if you want), I can liquidate it now at the same price at which the stock was trading only 9 days ago.