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Tesla, TSLA & the Investment World: the Perpetual Investors' Roundtable
- Thread starter AudubonB
- Start date
Stock market psychology is so interesting
Were folks really happy when they paid $68k for the MY which is now closer to ~$35k (w/tax credit for cheapest one I saw)? I think the EV competition is what helped pricing, as much as people here will never buy another EV brand, they/everyone got to benefit from legacy OEMs having some products when there was none 5 years ago. Same for $15k FSD. Competition helps/forces Tesla to do better which is a benefit to everyone here especially.
Unlike 2020/2021, there are still lots of EVs in inventory sitting for all car makers (Tesla included, the list always sits at 200 for me).
This is what I could find, but the number isn't split out for FSD and other items:
Revenue recognized from the deferred revenue balances as of December 31, 2023 and 2022 was $281 million and $134 million for the three months ended March 31, 2024 and 2023, respectively.
Model 3 and Y with zero down payment available in China:
cnevpost.com
Tesla launches 0 down payment option in China to boost sales
Tesla had launched a 0 down payment option in November 2021, but canceled it after just 3 days due to a surge in orders.
cnevpost.com
There is no way to know the exact amount. I suspect it was fairly minimal as it was mainly for the Autopark capabilities for vehicles without USS in North America:
But overall deferred revenue for FSD/etc. decreased by $40M in the quarter:
Some of the decrease could even be from people taking advantage of the FSD/Supercharging transfer programs during Q1. (Since the transfer could end up with more restrictions on it, and therefore less deferred revenue linked to it.)
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2daMoon
Mostly Harmless
This brought to mind how a business needing to deliver something could call a Robotaxi and put both their goods and a delivery person on board. The RT could be programmed for multiple stops and a return to origin.
Everyone gets their pizza, or Amazon order, or whatever, the business has lowered their delivery costs, and the problem of getting from the RT to specific apartments, offices, etc. is solved with use of a low wage employee.
A Tesla ought to really look as if it is a Tesla (or Cyber) to promote brand awareness. If it looks very different, then more education will be required. The more people see Teslas on the road, the more they will consider getting one.
There are plenty of use cases that will probably always need a human. Some Uber riders need luggage assistance and request it when booking a ride. That’s obviously not going to happen with robotaxi.
As a car enthusiast and seeing the latest news through that lens, it now makes sense.
1. Lars came from Honda, so it makes sense they chose the Civic to tear down. The Civic is based on Honda's Global Platform. All of Honda cars excluding the North American Pilot, Ridgeline, Odyssey, and Passport are built on this platform. The CRV, HRV, (North American and ROW), Civic, Accord, and other vehicles sold out of North America are built on this Global Platform. That is where R&D money goes into, the platform and components. Those volume nameplates share many components under the skin. All manufacturers do this, Toyota has its TNG platform with 4/5ths of its products built on it.
2. So Reuters was right, the NV whatever was cancelled, but Reuters was wrong in that Tesla was abandoning that segment. I bet Lars has been developing a smaller vehicle based on the Y platform for some time. It's the platform and components underneath the skin that are key. Just as you can shrink a platform, one can enlarge it too, as again, automakers are doing now. It keeps Capex down. The new vehicle does not have to look like the Y or 3 to share the same line. Other automakers do this all the time. I bet the autobiographer was not at this meeting to use the present platform.
3. These decisions were made a year or two ago. IMO, explains the Model Y delay. Lars had stated in an interview to do a 48V architecture, one had to start with a new platform. If Tesla updates their highest seller, the Y to 48V architecture, and tweaks the platform, that immediately makes the CT more profitable per unit because the 48V unit prices will drop significantly. Its been stated on the Munro show the Cyber Truck is using a heavily updated Y chassis and components. It also makes the new lower price Tesla and RT cheaper to make using 48V components.
4. And remember the pics of covered chassis seen in Austin and Fremont? We were wondering if it was a Model Y or not? No, were not looking at the RT new gen chassis, but it could have been the new cheaper Tesla in development. Which has been described as a smaller Y.
1. Lars came from Honda, so it makes sense they chose the Civic to tear down. The Civic is based on Honda's Global Platform. All of Honda cars excluding the North American Pilot, Ridgeline, Odyssey, and Passport are built on this platform. The CRV, HRV, (North American and ROW), Civic, Accord, and other vehicles sold out of North America are built on this Global Platform. That is where R&D money goes into, the platform and components. Those volume nameplates share many components under the skin. All manufacturers do this, Toyota has its TNG platform with 4/5ths of its products built on it.
2. So Reuters was right, the NV whatever was cancelled, but Reuters was wrong in that Tesla was abandoning that segment. I bet Lars has been developing a smaller vehicle based on the Y platform for some time. It's the platform and components underneath the skin that are key. Just as you can shrink a platform, one can enlarge it too, as again, automakers are doing now. It keeps Capex down. The new vehicle does not have to look like the Y or 3 to share the same line. Other automakers do this all the time. I bet the autobiographer was not at this meeting to use the present platform.
3. These decisions were made a year or two ago. IMO, explains the Model Y delay. Lars had stated in an interview to do a 48V architecture, one had to start with a new platform. If Tesla updates their highest seller, the Y to 48V architecture, and tweaks the platform, that immediately makes the CT more profitable per unit because the 48V unit prices will drop significantly. Its been stated on the Munro show the Cyber Truck is using a heavily updated Y chassis and components. It also makes the new lower price Tesla and RT cheaper to make using 48V components.
4. And remember the pics of covered chassis seen in Austin and Fremont? We were wondering if it was a Model Y or not? No, were not looking at the RT new gen chassis, but it could have been the new cheaper Tesla in development. Which has been described as a smaller Y.
The other good thing is that FSD won't get get annoyed when cyclists pull the stunts in this video... drift back and forth across the line in to your lane, don't signal when doing so, make a left from the right lane, turn left in front of you when originally behind and you had next right of way...
COVID induced short term vehicle price movements have nothing to do with my point ... legacy going back ICE /Hybrids due to need for short term profits ....and after all ot them claiming pivot to BEV the past few years .. hence the dilemma ... they don't make any profit on BEV ... so they pivot back to profitable ICE/Hybrid in short term ... this vicious cycle continues until they are bankrupt
Krugerrand
Meow
Have you conversed with present BYD owners? I rode in an Uber this morning in a BYD Dolphin. The new owner gushed about regenerative braking (apparently not as good as Tesla's), cheap electricity compared with gasoline in his previous Chevrolet, no maintenance schedule and, above all according to him, quiet!
Once an Ev driver, it seems almost everyone wants to stay an EV driver. Mr. Chu, a Chinese immigrant to Brazil, says his Uber associates aer clamoring to buy BYD.
For experienced EV drivers only, the BMW brand is regarded as expensive to buy, expensive to maintain and not really better, at least in my circles, limited as they are to UK, US and Brazil. OTOH among my UK associates several have bought used Jaguar I-Pace or Model Y.
That is all anecdotal, but the sales figures indicate BYD is doing quite well head to head and their best selling models are not always the cheapest. Tesla affordability to nearing that of any competitor so the future may not be crystal clear. One thing is certain BYD is NOT the cheapest necessarily, although their Seagull always features cheap price, but buyers come for Seagull as a cheap urban runabout, and then, like my next door neighbor, buy a new Seal instead. I asked, since he already has two Volvo EV's why a Seal? Said he: "it looked so nice, drove so well, was even more attractive than my Volvo's so instead of a Dolphin Mini (Seagull name in Brazil), I bought the Seal for me and give the XC40 Recharge to my son. This even happened less than a week ago.
We tesla active in these equations I'm curious what the answers might've been.
2daMoon
Mostly Harmless
Cybertruck, doesn't have a T or "Tesla" on it and it is successfully providing a brand education simply by looking different.
I'm of the camp that Tesla can make statements in their design choices that will paint that picture well. Even if it is "different" from what folks are used to, it will soon become common knowledge that it is a Tesla.
It might get to the point that people assume by default that anything different is a Tesla. Thus making innovation more challenging for the late comers to the party from among the legacy players.
GhostSkater
Member
One more point to that
We've seen one picture (which I won't be able right now) of a Model 3 front wheel drive with the wheels not aligned to the wheel well, that could have been a test vehicle for this middle cheaper vehicle we'll see
FWD drive makes total sense in lower power and cheaper vehicle since you can focus all the complexity on the front, no HV, control, cooling lines running front to back
You don’t take into account the 2 most important reasons why free cash flow was negative:
- $2.7B growth in inventory, which was confirmed on the CC to be sold during Q2
- $1B AI infrastructure capex.
These 2 items were choices done by the Tesla management team. They could have chosen differently.
Capex was $2773M, that is hundreds of millions more than the highest amount in the previous 4 quarters, Q1 23 was only $2072M.
The inventory build will be gone next quarter.
The AI capex will probably remain elevated because Tesla wants to go from 35000 H100 equivalent to 85000 by the end of the year.
Tesla has apparently decided to focus on investing in AI infra the previous and also the coming quarters. We already knew this from Elons tweets, but now we see this in the quarter results.
The FSD push is probably already enough risk for the cash balance, resulting in a more conservative capacity increase (delaying or minimizing the unboxed production lines), also in the light of a (hopefully temporarily) softer demand (for all EVs).
This is like Intel investing big time during semiconductor down periods, because they could and the competition couldn’t.
That really might work! There are even services, like nurses, labs doing medical sampling house calls, every kind of skilled delivery. They would not need to dive, but could solve the 'last mile' problem, with a little help.
smart idea!
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