TSLA Market Action: 2018 Investor Roundtable

[wipster]

Touting Tesla Energy when they're struggling to get enough cells to make Model 3s?

Come on Panasonic, ball's in your court

You mean cajones, right ;-)

 

[M3Rider]

"According to the analysts, Tesla head of investor relations Martin Viecha noted that upgrades from Grohmann, which are set to be sent to Gigafactory 1 by the end of Q3 or the beginning of Q4, would help module production become three times faster and three times cheaper."​

That's battery pack lines on the Tesla side.

The 10+3 lines are in the Panasonic area, producing raw 2170 cells. This is the primary bottleneck currently.

Fine. www.bloomberg.com/amp/news/articles/2018-09-26/tesla-gets-panasonic-s-help-with-ahead-of-schedule-battery-plant

The three new lines will bring the total to 13 with a combined capacity of 35 gigawatt hours at the Gigafactory, (Yoshio) Ito said.

 

[anthonyj]

I don’t think there is any news that could propel this stock higher. Media and analysts just turn it negative every time. Simply a swing stock now

 

[Fact Checking]

Thank you for linking to that. It clears up a mystery for me with regard to the math. And here is a more recent comment from carsonight that is on point.

"Someone who works those machines and sounds like he knows what he is talking about claims that these new lines are something special, and will be able to produce more cells per machine then previous ones. If true these three new lines could produce as many as 2000 additional Model 3s per week."​

That improves the cell output numbers with 13 lines by the end of 2018 massively:

• 7,700 LR/week, or
• 11,200 SR/week, or
• 9,800/week with a 50%/50% SR/LR mix

So Gigafactory could reach the promised 10k/week rate by end of 2018 already!

 

[MP3Mike]

"Someone who works those machines and sounds like he knows what he is talking about claims that these new lines are something special, and will be able to produce more cells per machine then previous ones. If true these three new lines could produce as many as 2000 additional Model 3s per week."​

That improves the cell output numbers with 13 lines by the end of 2018 massively:

• 7,700 LR/week, or
• 11,200 SR/week, or
• 9,800/week with a 50%/50% SR/LR mix

So Gigafactory could reach the promised 10k/week rate by end of 2018 already!

How do you figure that the current ~4,400-5,000/week plus ~2,000/week = 7,700 week?

 

[Esme Es Mejor]

?

I notice the Model X has been outselling the Model S recently... according to the estimates anyway.

Is this because the Model X is finally coming into its own and occupying its rightful place at the top? (since SUVs sell more)

Or is it because there is now another, less expensive Tesla sedan that we can now choose? Surely that will impact the Model S some.

I would like to think it's a combination of both. I don't think it's fair to say there is zero cannibalisation.

$292. BAH... wish I had some dry powder

Since both S & X are made on the same line, all that matters is how many total are sold. An increasing % of X actually helps a little because of the higher ASP.

Financially, Tesla should actually want some high-end 3s to cannibalize low-end S sales, since the margin on a Performance+ 3 is higher than on a 75D.

 

[Krugerrand]

GF1? Is it pretty much assumed they’re building semi at GF1?

What is the lead time on a stamping machine? Are these stock items? What about an autoclave?

They also need a stamping machine for GF3. Probably get an order for one of those soon. Perhaps the same one that they put in 2 years ago at Fremont?

Depends. Can they find a used one that’ll work? Or do they need Schuler to custom build again?

They’ll need multiple press lines for GF3 depending on how many parts they want to do themselves.

Die sets take a year to build, validate and get to run rate if they are from new designs. Less time if they are simply making copies of existing ones.

 

[mongo]

So my impression is the following: they reduced capex guidance once, in May, when they slashed or delayed all discretionary capex after the Moody's downgrade - in an effort to reach Q3 and Q4 positive cash flow.

What remained was mandatory capex: already contracted for orders, and installments of existing new equipment.

This is why they built the Sprung Tent early June: they had zero free capex, so they reused the automated Model 3 parts conveyance system which didn't work out.

Q1 and Q2 capex outflow was $655m, $620m, with $650m/$650m remaining for Q3 and Q4 (note, the split is unknown).

And that's why I think it's not Semi, Y or GF3, those were highly discretionary back in April/May.

All my opionion, of course:

The tent was a case of how do we hit this target sooner than we can get parts to build a line.

They lowered CapEx in the Q1 letter from >3.4 to <3. Then again in the Q2 letter to <2.5 ...
So it seems like there was progressive change.

Think it may revise again (though that is basically just saying what q4 will be)

 

[Joe F]

NOT a TSLA Market Action post:

So the negative talking points on CNBC continue. This time from an X GE exec. Wait, where's GE's stock at today? Right.

CNBC's Fast Money on Twitter

DAMN it, I picked the wrong video. Sigh.


This one's better I hope:

CNBC's Fast Money on Twitter

 

[RobStark]

Holy crap is gas really that expensive in LA right now?!

That is the Beverly Hills price.

 

[tander]

Worked after 1Q13, not so much after 3Q16.

Yeah, it's got to be enough "weight" to tip the scale. 13' was a lot more than just profitability, the company was expected to file bankruptcy soon, oil prices were high, short interest was high, and tsla was much simpler. If q318' is profitable w/o much zev, then that's pretty big. If big improvements in autopilot, q4 increases profits, payoff debt early...then the scales tip more.

 

[oneday]

So here we are still bent over behind the woodshed, not having a good time.

TMC post of the week!

 

[MTL_HABS1909]

Americans complaining about high gas prices LOL

 

[HG Wells]

Americans complaining about high gas prices LOL

Only when visiting Europe.

 

[KarenRei]

Americans complaining about high gas prices LOL

Canadians thinking that their gas prices are high

(Our gas prices here are equivalent to over $8 USD per gal / $2 USD per litre)

 

[Pras]

Not sure how this works but could it be possible that all shorts coordinate together an decide the market movement? Do they talk among themselves?

 

[Xpert]

As much as I <heart> JB Straubel, he's best left as CTO.

Tesla has its next CEO in Jerome Guillen. He's already been promoted to head automotive from his previous position as Head of Playing With Trucks. He left for a break and came back. I think his Daimler and broader Tesla experience makes him a much better fit.

can they make Jerome chairman for 3 years while keeping what he's doing currently?

 

[FirebirdAlpha]

Not sure how this works but could it be possible that all shorts coordinate together an decide the market movement? Do they talk among themselves?

Definitely. TeslaCharts, Dana Hull (Bloomberg), Charley Grant (WSJ), Linetta Lopez (Business Insider), and the Editor-in-Chief of CNBC all hang out with prominent shorts like Chanos on Slack. They've been experimenting for months, debating if they should just lay out all the harsh news in one go (like this week) or let it drip-drip-drip (like they did to get it down off the rally in late June / early July). They've also become increasingly active in deploying people like Mark Spiegel and "Montana Skeptic" onto TV shows, podcasts, etc.

There's no other explanation. None. It must be the shorts.

Tesla may be the most valuable automaker in America, but it's the brilliant coordination campaign by the shorts that keeps it from being the most valuable company in the world.

 

[SpaceCash]

Definitely. TeslaCharts, Dana Hull (Bloomberg), Charley Grant (WSJ), Linetta Lopez (Business Insider), and the Editor-in-Chief of CNBC all hang out with prominent shorts like Chanos on Slack. They've been experimenting for months, debating if they should just lay out all the harsh news in one go (like this week) or let it drip-drip-drip (like they did to get it down off the rally in late June / early July). They've also become increasingly active in deploying people like Mark Spiegel and "Montana Skeptic" onto TV shows, podcasts, etc.

There's no other explanation. None. It must be the shorts.

Tesla may be the most valuable automaker in America, but it's the brilliant coordination campaign by the shorts that keeps it from being the most valuable company in the world.

lmaoooooo you guys are getting really creative. This is some CIA level psyops. Nice.

 

[Intl Professor]

Communism: they want to own Tesla and it is not theirs, and Tesla supports USA, something most communists try to destroy or weaken. They are busy trying to stuff the Board of Directors of Tesla with pro-communists, but they're not done yet, so they keep going. The latest is that they got 2 more board members and a chairman, but this time they owe the criminals at the Securities and Exchange Commission, so you can bet SEC and NYT are corrupt enough for that right now. I'm surprised, considering Trump's interests in cleaning up the government. However, if you look at the bedfellows your comparison implies, it seems like NYT has an inside road into corrupt connections at SEC. My hope is that someone gets a hand in during the selection process for the 2 new board members and chairman and totally thwarts them, Supreme-Court-nominee style.

I have bouyied the idea that this was in response to some recent decisions that Elon may have made that thwarted some inside negotiations the Trump administration has been doing to fight evil, but that doesn't seem to really make a lot of sense right now; that sort of petty reaction isn't obviously happening like it did in the previous administration (except for real threats), and Elon has been mostly smart enough not to be a real threat to Trump, however I have a few questions about that to be certain, but generally the relationship looks good.

What has fit more for me is that this is all an intentionally harried up busy news distraction being used by and possibly even caused by the Trump administration for deeper things they are doing quietly that they don't want to get much pushback. The new trade agreements with Canada, Mexico, South Korea, and others benefit USA, Canada, Mexico, South Korea, and help to bring peace to Korea. Communists worked very hard to set up awful trade deals between all of those nations that hurt them all, including USA hugely, that Trump is systematically destroying. RobStark recently posted some evidence that the recent trade deals avoid hurting Tesla, but also give it guidance on how to proceed in a better way for our country.

Due to consistent and more bold censorship at Twitter, I'm unable to know some of the more recent details about what is going on, so these have been reduced to impressions. "Newspapers" are completely dead for information, and online censorship is at its highest, so what little we can gleen is all we get. It's the least information we've ever had, without being present or having contacts with those who are present in industries.

Surely not the Bolshevik version of communism. Sounds like Nietzsche on acid. Are you a sociologist? That might explain the style. I heard Henry Kissinger tell a joke about the German language so influential on sociologists. "Anatol France was once asked, 'do you know Kant's philosophy?' He replied, 'I don't know, I've read nine volumes, they tell me the verb is in the tenth.'"