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

[Prunesquallor]

Poof! Gone.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1606996948652900352

 

[TSLA Siempre]

What exactly did Elon do this quarter that shows objectively he is "sleeping at the wheel" -Dan Ive? I still see cost cutting, record production, record deliveries, and record profits.

Tarnishing the brand among a huge swath of its most reliable customers. Has both short term and long term implications. It’s a non zero effect. Perhaps negligible but perhaps substantial. Elon did not provide a satisfactory rebuttal on the twitter spaces. We have seen a few surveys come out already that show it has had an effect. His defiant and dismissive attitude about it is harmful to shareholders.

 

[traxila]

I’m going to disagree because the 1.9m is only very slightly above what we are expecting in Q4 this year on annualized basis.

Car sales don’t drop to zero in a recession. Not even luxury cars. Because EVs are still only a single digit percentage of sales in most markets there is still plenty of room to grow absolute volumes. Especially with the margins that Tesla has.

Plus I can’t follow how this forecasts factors in the IRA. If ave selling price to Tesla is under $40k then the consumer is getting a model Y for $33k? If so the demand in the US alone will be astronomical.

The whole idea of a bear case for me is that it is ugly and pessimistic and should surprise to the upside.

Maybe we should review the bear case we had set up for 2022?

 

[InDaClub]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1607080893952180225

 

[SOULPEDL]

I counted $9M annual savings for Santa to finally make the switch to EVs. The EV standard in the study was a Model S, however this wouldn't take advantage of the future volume needs being met by Semi as this is written.

If Santa worked with a fleet of Semi's and a mix of short/long range Tesla on FSDeer, They could easily quadruple their savings. I think the Santa Shop should put in for a round of funding - the ROI is so obvious, maybe a 10 bagger long term.

Santa Switching to an EV Sleigh Would Save Him Over $8,000

Santa would save 50% in costs by switching to an EV sleigh, if he were using a gasoline model, as opposed to a Tesla.

www.goodnewsnetwork.org

(The comment at bottom... lol, someone actually believes flying reindeer are real. So cute.)

 

[Singuy]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1607080893952180225

Took them over a year to make the first 1M cells. Ready for prime time!

https://twitter.com/x/status/1494754912311418881

 

[traxila]

Happy Holidays to all!

Merry Christmas!

 

[Electroman]

the text of the law doesn't actually mention specifically banning the words Full Self Driving, just has to mislead a "reasonable person: Wonder how "reasonable" is defined in california

This is not a fight worth picking up and fighting for. Just change the damn name and move on. Who cares, at this time everyone one knows TeslaPilot and Tesla ASD (Assisted SD) is the same as Autopilot and Tesla FSD.

 

[anthonyj]

Whom do you admire more, in terms of accomplishments? The career politicians, the celebrities, the media, or Elon Musk?

I want to hear what the smartest person in the world has to say. I do not want him to be silenced by the media or shareholders.

 

[elasalle]

Took them over a year to make the first 1M cells. Ready for prime time!

https://twitter.com/x/status/1494754912311418881

So could inventory reduction be related… Highlander….

 

[Singuy]

Absolutely. And it’s been a way more than a “few things on Twitter”. And the quantity and content he’s been posting has been markedly different in the last 6 months.

Demand has been reduced in the last month in the United States. It’s why they reduced prices substantially. That is a fact. Certainly some of it is tax credit related and some of it is economic slow down and interest rates. That doesn’t preclude that there is a completely unnecessary and irresponsible contribution from Elon’s behavior. We need to have a sense of how much.

Ever since the IRA was announced, people here have speculated some kind of demand cliff before Jan 1st. Many here thought a massive selling to fleet would damper the affect. Not one person said at the time it's Elon's tweet that will cause a demand cliff. So again, you are using correlation to make your argument.

 

[TSLA Siempre]

Maybe. But based on the collapse of inventory levels after the discount this week tells me people want the cars but are price sensitive. In the end it makes no sense to make your purchases based on CEO behavior unless truly extreme, which no, EM does not qualify unless you want to believe the endless hysterical FUD articles.

Yes. This is not a surprise. Demand impairment can be overcome with reduced prices. But we don’t know how much prices would have needed to be lowered in the United States if Elon didn’t act like this. It’s possible Tesla could have gotten away with the $3750 price reduction and cleared their inventory before year end.

People make purchasing decisions based on many factors. Price is one and emotions are another. There are others also. All that affects demand and pricing. So just because tesla can spur sales with reduced prices doesn’t mean that is neither here nor there.

 

[petit_bateau]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1607080893952180225

Good and welcome news.

If the total 4680 production is at 1,000 cars/week that ought to be compared to Austin and Berlin each being at approximately 3,000 cars/week.

Ideally we would have 6x production of the 4680 cells by now. Ideally.

The story of 2022 overall is that LFP cells have been the real enabler for increased Tesla vehicle production.

The ramp rate for 4680 production will need to substantially improve if Austin & Fremont are to be able to access the full US-IRA subsidy, and that is assuming that all the 4680 machinery is prioritised for delivery to USA, and that Germany makes do with LFP for growth.

The Semi will also mop up a fair amount of cells during 2023.

There is a lot of ground to cover such that cell production does not hamper CyberTruck introduction later in 2023. That is supposed to be a high volume product, and each one will be a big cell consumer, especially the launch variants.

It is still all about the cells.

 

[TSLA Siempre]

Ever since the IRA was announced, people here have speculated some kind of demand cliff before Jan 1st. Many here thought a massive selling to fleet would damper the affect. Not one person said at the time it's Elon's tweet that will cause a demand cliff. So again, you are using correlation to make your argument.

Your argument is no more correlation than mine. And while correlation doesn’t prove causation, it is a first and necessary step and does not disprove causation.

Also, we don’t know how much prices would need to have been reduced in advance of the tax credit start. Also, we didn’t know that they would need to kick in free supercharging also.

 

[StealthP3D]

Or maybe not...time will tell. EM think we could have a bone crusher of a recession.

I wish you were having a better Christmas Day that you didn't feel the need to wake up and propagate more misleading statements. Elon clearly said he thinks most likely a moderate recession, but he knows that future economic projections are impossible to predict with any certainty.

Finding only a lump of coal in your stocking does not change anything significantly.

 

[wipster]

@bkp_duke Thought you might be interested... copycat or planned?
More than 7,000 people are without power Sunday morning after two Tacoma Power Utilities substations went down after what they say was a deliberate attack.

Two Tacoma Power substations ‘attacked’ Christmas Day, says utility

More than 7,000 people are without power Sunday morning after two Tacoma Power Utilities substations went down after what they say was a deliberate attack.

www.seattletimes.com

 

[Buckminster]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1607096125567414272

 

[nativewolf]

Since I was quoted I’ll respond. It should be noted there were a few errors in that first pass at estimating the law’s impact.

1) It’s more likely than not that Tesla won’t produce 40 GWh of storage next year. If you’re using my model as a starting point for short term estimates, especially if you think it’s likely Republicans will take over both Congress and the Presidency in 2024 and eliminate the subsidies in 2025, then you’ll probably want to revise those estimates down.

2) I did not account for Model Y initially being the only eligible model due to S/X/3 being excluded due to MSRP limits and the LFP cells being imported from China. The impact of the $7500 credit should therefore be cut approximately in half in the early years compared to my original estimate. Nevertheless I would still assume Tesla will eventually reduce prices and onshore battery production for 3 RWD to gain eligibility and also save costs and environmental damage of long-distance shipping.

3) The lower right corner of the table mistakenly shows a sum of sums for $2,200B total subsidy. $670B was actually the total estimate.

4) The initial estimates were way too conservative about Semi ramp. I didn’t have Tesla making 50k per year until 2030. Since then we’ve gotten guidance for achieving that rate around 2024.

5) Compounding the initial poor guess about Semi ramp is that I didn’t realize the Commercial Clean Vehicles credit would add as much as $40k extra per truck in addition to the $45/kWh for batteries. This approximately doubles the subsidy per truck.

Other notes:

The estimate is mainly a function of the estimates of Tesla’s growth and how much they make when at serious scale after like 2027, and this is inherently very uncertain. I just hypothetically showed what would happen if growth is roughly in line with Tesla’s public goals and if Tesla biases for growing faster here in the United States than elsewhere to capture these benefits that are, as far as I’m aware, uniquely huge compared to other primary EV and battery markets. No matter how I look at it, these subsidies are by themselves worth about as much as Tesla’s current market cap if Tesla can grow production remotely as fast as planned.

This did not encapsulate estimates of the benefits accruing to solar, mining and refining of critical minerals, charging infrastructure, because these are minor in comparison.

Overall, it remains true that the biggest single questions are how fast Tesla will scale in the USA and how long this law will last as-is, especially with most of the expected benefit to Tesla coming 5+ years from now when they’re producing at drastically higher scale than today.

It is quite difficult to get everything in the first try with uncertainty abounding. The model is a great starting point and a super straw man to refer to in the coming months. Thanks

 

[nativewolf]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1607096125567414272

No cats

 

[ggr]

Mod: Just because you think moderators don't feel like doing their job on a holiday, is no reason to start posting politics and twitter stuff again. And baiting moderators about it is worthy of a temporary Darwin Award. 12 deletions, one ban. Bah, humbug. --ggr