TSLA Market Action: 2018 Investor Roundtable

[Fact Checking]

@Fact Checking i find this video quite useful and informative. If you have some time, can you take a look at it and let us know what you think the major takeaways are? It was posted by a very notable member from Tesla Moro’s Club:

It’s definitely worth your time if anyone here is interested in disecting Q3 numbers.

Very nice video!

I agree with everything in it. I'd add the following bits as well:

• Price/Earnings metrics are significantly distorted by the ongoing investment cycle of Tesla.
• Even some of the cash flow metrics are distorted, due to $500-600m cash outflow in Q3 (which will continue in Q4)
• Tesla's Q3 results were literally breathtaking in their perfection, as I posted it within an hour after the Q3 update letter was realeased.
• Tesla ended up opting a 50%/50% cash/stock settlement for the convertible notes - which still has the anti-dilutive effects mentioned in the video.
• Q4 results are a big question - the delivery report due in about 5 days will bring some clarity.

 

[avoigt]

Year to date Tesla #1

Sixt und Tesla vs. Lion E-Mobility und Toyota Motor Corp. – kommentierter KW 52 Peer Group Watch Auto, Motor und Zulieferer | boerse-social.com

 

[JRP3]

Red semi, comments suggest it's just a paint job/wrap of one of the existing units

Red Tesla Semi on 405 in LA!! : teslamotors

 

[Fact Checking]

I highly doubt it. Remember, this is an annual filing that needs to have audited financials. It takes longer than a Q so I wouldn't expect anything until *at least* mid/late Feb.

Note that there are three upcoming Q4 events:

• 8-K: Q4 delivery report, due around Jan 3.
• 8-K: Q4 update letter and earnings call, due around Feb 7
• 10-K: 2018 annual report, due around Feb 23

Notes:

• The due dates are based on Q4/2017, but note that 2017 reporting was complicated by the Solar City acquisition, which was executed in Q4/2017 - so Q4/2018 could be done faster.
• Companies routinely report results earlier if the results are good - so that they are not overshadowed by any bad news. Tesla did this in Q3.
• Q4 results will be 99% clear with the update letter, which is a quarterly report. It will include all the key financial metrics that are important to valuation. The full, audited, annual 10-K report is not nearly as important to the stock price. (Unless it contains some bad news, which is rare.)

So we don't have to wait for end of February to see Q4 financials.

 

[Johnny Ma]

Red semi, comments suggest it's just a paint job/wrap of one of the existing units

Yes, appears to be wrap: Tesla wraps matte black Semi prototype in stunning red amid continued road tests

Same license plate as the black semi.

 

[Troy]

Somebody gave me a downvote because I said I can differentiate between days off and full production. Check out the data yourself. See if you can tell whether 30 Sep Sunday was off or 7 Oct Sun was full production.

Here is what I exactly said:

@BioSehnsucht, see my message here. Looking at the data, I can differentiate between day offs and full work days and sometimes half work days too but I don't know the details about how they are arranging shifts. Also, I don't have precise production numbers for each day. I only have a rough idea about how a day compares to other days or a week to another week.

 

[Papafox]

Regarding excess Model 3s in a few locations, I can report that here in Hawaii deliveries are ongoing at a furious pace and that all Model 3s in the state, even those used as demonstrators in stores, have been sold for 2018 delivery. I think Hawaii is more the norm than the exception, but it would be good to hear about other locations so we can get a bigger sampling.

 

[ggr]

BTW, you should really read comments from those days on twitter (end of Jan '17) - people who liked Elon suddenly turned hostile.

Some. Certainly not all.

 

[ggr]

I highly doubt it. Remember, this is an annual filing that needs to have audited financials. It takes longer than a Q so I wouldn't expect anything until *at least* mid/late Feb.

The annual presentations have all been early February except for the one immediately after the Solar City acquisition, and one long ago was even in January (2014).

 

[tsunamiofhurt]

The annual presentations have all been early February except for the one immediately after the Solar City acquisition, and one long ago was even in January (2014).

Touché

 

[AcesDealt]

Tesla produced 53k model 3s in q3, and I think it is fairly certain they could blow that out of the water in q4 if they chose to. I am substantially unclear about why they did not pull more demand levers, particularly leasing, in order to produce and sell somewhere closer to 65k this quarter. If they come out under 60k I am going to be puzzled by the decision to do so.

My estimate is basically 4.5k * 8weeks + 6k * 4 weeks with the rest idle time, or 60k. While it makes for better quarterly numbers to deliberately reduce inventory it really isn't rational to optimize in such a manner, particularly since any excess inventory can fill in for demand early in q1 while they pipe all new production outside of n. America.

 

[lklundin]

Also, many of them will home charge 99% of the time. So Porsche might be using 350kW charging as a marketing gimmick.

Good point.

Unlike Tesla, Porsche has clearly stated that they will offer charging stations specifically for the purpose of making a profit, so their charging stations may very well be less interesting to visit.

 

[saniflash]

unlike Tesla, Porsche has clearly stated that they will offer charging stations specifically for the purpose of making a profit, so their charging stations may very well be less interesting to visit.

very helpful comment: they could use the price to actively deter drivers from using the charging station (though I'd assume most Porsche drivers are rather price insensitive), and/or finance any overproportionate battery degradation for the specific car by using parts of the proceeds for each charging of a specific vehicle to pay for a "battery replacement under warranty".

 

[TheTalkingMule]

I’m at the Paramus NJ Tesla showroom. They have maybe 60+ Model 3 available for sale, and that’s just one of their lots

Except that's not how ordering and deliveries work at Tesla. They don't pump a bunch of cars to a dealership to be sold, there are no dealerships.

As with every other parking lot shocker of the past year, those are likely just cars awaiting delivery/pickup.

 

[RonJoven]

Cats and politics!.. PLEASE, can we focus on TESLA? I live TESLA every day. We have an S P90D and I drive a 3. Once you drive them there is no turning back. I live in La Mesa and we never drive into the village without seeing at least 6 or seven of varying models. We are far away from Silicon Valley and Malibu. Just a small podunk town.

 

[Cherry Wine]

Tesla produced 53k model 3s in q3, and I think it is fairly certain they could blow that out of the water in q4 if they chose to. I am substantially unclear about why they did not pull more demand levers, particularly leasing, in order to produce and sell somewhere closer to 65k this quarter. If they come out under 60k I am going to be puzzled by the decision to do so.

My estimate is basically 4.5k * 8weeks + 6k * 4 weeks with the rest idle time, or 60k. While it makes for better quarterly numbers to deliberately reduce inventory it really isn't rational to optimize in such a manner, particularly since any excess inventory can fill in for demand early in q1 while they pipe all new production outside of n. America.

What makes you think they were producing at 6k / week sustainably during Q4? That seems optimistic to me unfortunately. Just want to make sure I’m not missing something, as the only indication I’ve seen of production being that high were the paint shop tweets.

 

[MP3Mike]

So maybe Porsche is betting that owners of the Taycan will not mind the more frequent replacements (or upgrades) of the battery pack...

Or maybe they don't expect the cars to be driven much.

 

[winfield100]

About 1.5 hrs ago saw this VIN
183,926, Rockville Maryland USA

 

[M3Rider]

Except that's not how ordering and deliveries work at Tesla. They don't pump a bunch of cars to a dealership to be sold, there are no dealerships.

As with every other parking lot shocker of the past year, those are likely just cars awaiting delivery/pickup.

Except Elon stated that there will be inventory at the stores:

 

[NicoV]

Didn’t see this link here yet: Tesla Model 3: EU Bestellungen/Orders

It’s a list of European reservations. Based on the invoice number (seems to be a sequence number per country) for the 3K euro deposit, there are currently about 12K firm orders from Europe. Probably not much more can be delivered in Q1 2019.
Assuming most of these are from people that already payed the 1K long ago, this is about 24M euro worth of deposits.