TSLA Market Action: 2018 Investor Roundtable

[Esme Es Mejor]

I will not try to predict Ford's stock price, I really don't care about it. But if I try to predict Ford's business future, it doesn't look good. They can't compete with Tesla for electric trucks.

Ford doesn’t need to outcompete Tesla; they just need to outcompete the other truck makers. Tesla trucks are going take a lot of sales from ICE truck makers, but whichever ICE trucks are best will hang on to their sales the longest.

If Ford were smart (I wouldn’t bet on it) and if Tesla has the spare battery capacity (don’t know that they do), they’d buy EV drivetrains from Tesla & offer them as an option package in their high-end trucks. Throw in Supercharging (which Ford would have to buy in to) & I think they’d have a lot of interest.

 

[HG Wells]

Ford doesn’t need to outcompete Tesla; they just need to outcompete the other truck makers. Tesla trucks are going take a lot of sales from ICE truck makers, but whichever ICE trucks are best will hang on to their sales the longest.

If Ford were smart (I wouldn’t bet on it) and if Tesla has the spare battery capacity (don’t know that they do), they’d buy EV drivetrains from Tesla & offer them as an option package in their high-end trucks. Throw in Supercharging (which Ford would have to buy in to) & I think they’d have a lot of interest.

Now if this happened what would it do to tesla share price ?
Could this be the short burn of the century ?

 

[ggr]

Correction: Ford was trading at these levels way back in July 1997. That is a 21 year low. Ford's best days are behind us.
F Interactive Stock Chart | Ford Motor Company Stock - Yahoo Finance

Ford was trading at $9.xx in August 2012. If you're saying that it was higher 21 years ago, you're right, but that isn't what people mean when they say "n year low". They mean it is the lowest it has been in n years. It has been 6 years since it was this low.

 

[Boomer19]

Ford was trading at $9.xx in August 2012. If you're saying that it was higher 21 years ago, you're right, but that isn't what people mean when they say "n year low". They mean it is the lowest it has been in n years. It has been 6 years since it was this low.

for some reason my IB chart says 52wk low for F says 9.74. intraday? either way, not looking good for them.

 

[luvb2b]

edit - just realized i am posting weeks after op... sorry.

just to be clear:

the way the calculation works is exchanges report total short sales (in shares) and total volume in shares. different exchanges and trade venues report differently.

to the best of my knowledge it's not possible to capture 100% of the volume this way since not all exchanges report (again, bomk).

but taking the largest most active exchange, one could take short sale volume / total volume to get an estimate of % of day's sales attributed to short sales.

or: by taking multiple exchanges and calculating (sum of short sale volume / sum of total volume) you can also get an estimate of the % of day's sales attributed to short sales.

you should expect when the collection/calculation is done correctly that the reported volume the calculation is based on is less than total volume that day: each exchange is only a sample of the whole.

short volume being high doesn't necessarily mean short interest increases. in one perverse example of how this happens, let's say on balance there's a natural buyer of 1 million shares and a natural seller of 1 million shares on a given day. however: the buyer will buy only in the morning and the seller will only sell in the afternoon. without a natural seller in the morning the market makers end up net short 1 million shares to the buyer, which they don't like, so they are constantly working to cover and get flat. in the course of that market maker trading the short position gets distributed across many more market makers. but maybe the 1 million shares had to change hands twice to do it, meaning 2 million in additional volume, all of that (plus original 1 million) is short sales. however the net short interest change thus far in the day is only 1 million. now late in the day comes the real seller, and the market makers who wanted to get flat cover against his real sales of 1 million shares. the market makers go home flat, the buyer and seller have bought / sold 1 million shares each.

in total volume of 4 million shares, 3 million shares were sold short. short volume is reported at 75%, but net short interest doesn't change.

my point is simply that it's nearly impossible to correlate high daily short volume % with changes in net short interest.

OK, followup.. this is getting weird. Shortvolume.com has the *same short sale volume* reported as Fintel. It has *different total volume*.

Huh. So I look up the volume on Tradingview for July 5, and I get roughly 17 million. Fintel thinks it's 34 million. This is suspiciously twice as large, meaning I think Fintel is counting buys and sells separately (i.e. doubling the volume, since every trade is a buy and a sell). But then shortvolume.com thinks total volume is 9 million, which seems suspiciously like half of 17 million.

So I check Yahoo for volume, which agrees with Tradingview.

So it turns out shortvolume and fintel are both wrong. Shortvolume has the short percentage twice as high as it really is, and fintel has is HALF as high as it really is. So for yesterday, 7/10/2018, shortvolume said 61.4%, Fintel said 15.3%, and it's actually 30.6%.

Thanks for leading to this useful piece of detective work!

 

[Bet TSLA]

Do you big swingers (@Bet TSLA & @Richgoogol ) have deposits on the roadster founders edition? Are you getting the SpaceX option package?

How about a reservation for the Tesla semi. I heard they have great potential as an RV.

I do not have a deposit on the new roadster in any form, but I do have an investment earmarked for buying one -- I wrote 35 Jan '20 470 puts. I'm currently down $118K on that bet, but I imagine I'll be up enough to buy a new roadster by the time it's available. Of course, being a relatively sane person, I have no idea what I would do with said roadster. Driving such a car properly is way beyond my skill level, and I don't have any great desire to learn. And I suspect the SpaceX option package will cost more than my bet can possibly return (given taxes).

Buying a semi and attaching an electric mobile home to it seems like a much more useful thing to do, but I do not have a bet targeted for buying a semi. Who knows how the future will actually turn out?...

 

[jhm]

At this point would you agree that there could be a vast gap in terms of years, between the tipping point of over 50% demand for EVs and the tipping point of over 50% supply?

I still see that gap likely to be a decade, possibly longer, as discussed in the thread below.

Do you see a multi year gap as likely too?

How about the chances of a decade or longer gap?

At this point what year would you estimate EVs passing 50% of the global production of consumer vehicles?

The Fractured Tipping Point Moat

My own modeling suggests that plugins will reach 50% of the new auto market by about 2027. Already more than 80% of Aussies are interested in an EV. So is this the gap you are thinking about.

Specifically, my modeling suggest that 50% BEV will happen about 2028, which compares with about 40% of Aussie wanting a BEV now.

I think the gap between wanting a plugin vs a BEV comes down to the range of EVs and availability of rapid charging. I think the Model 3 LR with more like 335 mile range and the buildout of Superchargers will substantially close this gap within a few years. I think by 2020 some 80% of car buyers will be interested in buying a BEV, but, yeah, it will take another 10 years to satisfy this appetite for BEVs.

I lot of folks will be stuck driving old gasmobiles for years dreaming of the day when they can finally drive electric.

 

[elasalle]

My own modeling suggests that plugins will reach 50% of the new auto market by about 2027. Already more than 80% of Aussies are interested in an EV. So is this the gap you are thinking about.

Specifically, my modeling suggest that 50% BEV will happen about 2028, which compares with about 40% of Aussie wanting a BEV now.

I think the gap between wanting a plugin vs a BEV comes down to the range of EVs and availability of rapid charging. I think the Model 3 LR with more like 335 mile range and the buildout of Superchargers will substantially close this gap within a few years. I think by 2020 some 80% of car buyers will be interested in buying a BEV, but, yeah, it will take another 10 years to satisfy this appetite for BEVs.

I lot of folks will be stuck driving old gasmobiles for years dreaming of the day when they can finally drive electric.

Basically Japan, Germany out, China In ... Tesla should have a good market share

 

[RobStark]

Already more than 80% of Aussies are interested in an EV.

which compares with about 40% of Aussie wanting a BEV now.

What percentage of people say they will vote for President, what percentage actually place a vote for President, and what percentage say they voted for President? The number in the middle is always the lowest.

Point is what people say in a survey and what they actually do is not necessarily the same.

Many people say they will buy an EV at their next car purchase. Because that is the socially responsible thing to do. And say. And that is half the battle. Convincing people that it is the socially responsible thing to do.

But charge is hard and scary. And many will chicken out when the rubber hits the road. And some never had the intention of buying an EV.

 

[mltv]

What percentage of people say they will vote for President, what percentage actually place a vote for President, and what percentage say they voted for President? The number in the middle is always the lowest.

Point is what people say in a survey and what they actually do is not necessarily the same.

Many people say they will buy an EV at their next car purchase. Because that is the socially responsible thing to do. And say. And that is half the battle. Convincing people that it is the socially responsible thing to do.

But charge is hard and scary. And many will chicken out when the rubber hits the road. And some never had the intention of buying an EV.

I'm kind of a newbie here, I bought my M3 not because I am socially responsible. I am not responsible for anything, I just love the car. I think more and more new Tesla owners will not be doing the responsible thing. Just buy the car because it is better.

 

[RobStark]

I'm kind of a newbie here, I bought my M3 not because I am socially responsible. I am not responsible for anything, I just love the car. I think more and more new Tesla owners will not be doing the responsible thing. Just buy the car because it is better.

Cool that you don't give a *sugar* about anything but yourself. And that you project that attitude on more and more people.

But not talking about Tesla or Model 3 in particular.

But EVs in general and what people say in surveys.

 

[jhm]

What percentage of people say they will vote for President, what percentage actually place a vote for President, and what percentage say they voted for President? The number in the middle is always the lowest.

Point is what people say in a survey and what they actually do is not necessarily the same.

Many people say they will buy an EV at their next car purchase. Because that is the socially responsible thing to do. And say. And that is half the battle. Convincing people that it is the socially responsible thing to do.

But charge is hard and scary. And many will chicken out when the rubber hits the road. And some never had the intention of buying an EV.

Yes, this is survey based market research, which is often quite difficult to calibrate with actual consumer behavior. That is why I tend to call this an appetite for and EV than actual demand. As an appetite it simply means the consumer might consider and EV in their next purchase. Marketers work very hard to get into a consumers consideration set, the short list of products or companies that you'd consider shopping. If you're not in the consideration set, you won't get the sale. So the problem for a company Jaguar is that they don't want Tesla to be in their customer's consideration set. So they need to know who is considering EVs. Beyond that they need to offer a few EV product just to keep Jaguar within the consideration set of someone who is becoming interested in EVs. I suspect that Jaguar's marketers are figuring out that if they don't market EVs they are going miss out on ICE sales. This may sound counterintuitive, but if Jaguar fall out of consumers' consideration sets they miss out on selling any vehicle.

So yeah, saying you are interested in an EV does not mean that your next car will be electric, but it does mean that your consideration set is shifting, and that's a big problem for OEM marketers. As Tesla slides into consideration for a person, a couple of OEMs will likely slide out of consideration.

 

[bdy0627]

I'm kind of a newbie here, I bought my M3 not because I am socially responsible. I am not responsible for anything, I just love the car. I think more and more new Tesla owners will not be doing the responsible thing. Just buy the car because it is better.

I think this is getting much more common. People I know in my area are getting more and more curious about Tesla simply because it is "high tech" and has "high performance." Many just don't evidently care about the gas part.

 

[Richard007]

It’s a generational shift anyone under 25 years old will only consider an electric car specifically anyone under 18 years old when will buy an electric car.

The young people don’t answer surveys.

I think Tesla is going to have to build maybe a dozen factories....

Either way I think what we all care about is the stock price which in 2020 will be higher than we ever thought possible.

These are really exciting days.

 

[defc0n]

i thought i was smart buying in at ~310 and ~320. felt like an idiot when it went below 300.

that said, i now think a lot of FUD will be thrown at the company in next week or month that could sink it solidly below 300 a bit. we'll see.

I was lucky enough to buy at 250 and sell at 300 not long ago. But now I bought at 350 pre short explosion that didn’t happen and have no idea what’s going on anymore. Also questioning myself what I’m going to do now for Q2 earnings.

 

[RobStark]

The young people don’t answer surveys.

Yes, they do.

They just don't answer landline surveys. Because they don't answer landline phones.

 

[generalenthu]

So SpaceX launch and recovery happens this morning and this got posted on CNN. Wonderful.

 

[mltv]

Cool that you don't give a *sugar* about anything but yourself. And that you project that attitude on more and more people.

But not talking about Tesla or Model 3 in particular.

But EVs in general and what people say in surveys.

In all respect Rob. I have no problem you call me that. But, EV are and will make better cars. Some have mission to save the world, I admit that is more noble than what I do. And I do respect that. I won't pretend I am one but I do back your mission.

 

[Cosmacelf]

So SpaceX launch and recovery happens this morning and this got posted on CNN. Wonderful.

View attachment 320362

Everyone’s tagging this post as “funny”. It isn’t satire, CNN actually posted that headline. The article’s current headline is toned down slightly to: SpaceX’s latest rocket recovery gambit misses.

Real journalism is just dead, dead, dead, if it ever was alive. If all the news you know about is reported with such slanted coverage, you can be pretty sure the rest of the news is the same.

 

[generalenthu]

Everyone’s tagging this post as “funny”. It isn’t satire, CNN actually posted that headline. The article’s current headline is toned down slightly to: SpaceX’s latest rocket recovery gambit misses.

Real journalism is just dead, dead, dead, if it ever was alive. If all the news you know about is reported with such slanted coverage, you can be pretty sure the rest of the news is the same.

Yeah, news rooms used to pride themselves in their credibility. So sad that they just care about clicks.

Is it just them holding a mirror to the society at large? I wish we went back to advertising light, subscription based journalism models.