China Market situation and outlook

[maoing]

Elon's tweets reaffirms my China bottom call. https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/582581865682350080

More importantly Elon realized that how important is to maintain good government relationship before get success in China business. This is exactly what I pointed out yesterday from Elon's China trip.

Great trip to China seeing President Xi and many senior members of the govt.

 

[maoing]

China March Sales up 130-150% from Feb.

Xinhuanet, Beijing, March 30-co-founder, CEO and product architect of Tesla Elon Musk before attending the Boao Forum for Asia 2015 told the media that during the annual session: Tesla's March sales in China surge compared to February, an increase of 130%~150%, this shows that more and more Chinese owners to accept and endorse the Tesla.

Original chinese link: http://news.xinhuanet.com/auto/2015-03/30/c_127638594.htm
Bing Translation link: http://www.microsofttranslator.com/...xinhuanet.com/auto/2015-03/30/c_127638594.htm

TSLA has been doomed by China weakness since Jan., this is a further proof that China has turned around. So will SP in short term.

 

[eepic]

China March Sales up 130-150% from Feb.

Original chinese link: http://news.xinhuanet.com/auto/2015-03/30/c_127638594.htm
Bing Translation link: http://www.microsofttranslator.com/...xinhuanet.com/auto/2015-03/30/c_127638594.htm

TSLA has been doomed by China weakness since Jan., this is a further proof that China has turned around. So will SP in short term.

Well, the headline numbers have had the fun of "Tesla China sales drop X% last month", its time for that to flip around! Hope this is a nice steady pickup into nice consistent quarterly orders

 

[Ingenieur]

We dont know how much February was, maybe it was lower then Jan due to 2 Weeks of Holiday, so 100% from 100 is still just 200

My source in China sees 2015 sales at 3000 or 4000 (if there are improvements to demand)

So would be a monthly run rate of 250-350 cars, vs 130 in January (highest Grossing Store in Beijing had less then 30 orders in that Month)

But future is subject to be changed

P.S: Also End of February saw the start massive discounts on Old Stock orphaned cars (20%), which should be mostly reflected in March increase.

 

[hobbes]

China March Sales up 130-150% from Feb.

Cool, good news finally. I´d like to turn that into actual numbers though...

JL Warren Capital says 260 Model S sedans were registered in China last month, down from 469 in January.

from Musk Reboots Tesla's China Strategy - Bloomberg Business

Correct me if anyone has better data. Anyway, using those I get 598-650 for February which is also significantly above the January numbers, but on the other hand within the typical month-to month fluctuations in other markets (quarter ends are stronger everywhere, but at least we know demand is not collapsing in China as some people seemed to think). I only start to believe in a trend statistically if there is at least quarter over quarter increases or even yoy.

 

[sundaymorning]

We dont know how much February was, maybe it was lower then Jan due to 2 Weeks of Holiday, so 100% from 100 is still just 200

My source in China sees 2015 sales at 3000 or 4000 (if there are improvements to demand)

So would be a monthly run rate of 250-350 cars, vs 130 in January (highest Grossing Store in Beijing had less then 30 orders in that Month)

But future is subject to be changed

P.S: Also End of February saw the start massive discounts on Old Stock orphaned cars (20%), which should be mostly reflected in March increase.

Fair assumption, as a bull I can accept this. Good luck if your sources are wrong.

 

[schonelucht]

Correct me if anyone has better data. Anyway, using those I get 598-650 for February which is also significantly above the January numbers, but on the other hand within the typical month-to month fluctuations in other markets (quarter ends are stronger everywhere, but at least we know demand is not collapsing in China as some people seemed to think). I only start to believe in a trend statistically if there is at least quarter over quarter increases or even yoy.

Maoing spoke about sales, not about deliveries. The former aren't subject to end-of-quarter scheduling.

 

[bluenation]

i hate it when ppl care so much about % figures when the absolute numbers start so low.

anyways

i just saw elon's recent tweet on china. Happy that he is trying to learn from earlier errors, as opposed to finger-point consumer ignorance/"bias". Very constructive, hopefully that will translate to miuch better sales.

 

[eloder]

i hate it when ppl care so much about % figures when the absolute numbers start so low.

anyways

i just saw elon's recent tweet on china. Happy that he is trying to learn from earlier errors, as opposed to finger-point consumer ignorance/"bias". Very constructive, hopefully that will translate to miuch better sales.

Agreed. I can only imagine that this will help his image in China as well.

 

[32no]

The news flow from China about Tesla imports and registrations and the subsequent reactions of the stock shows the market completely misunderstands the situation. High Registrations does not necessarily mean that Tesla will recognize revenues from those cars. Scalpers hold many of the unregistered cars in China, and once they sell a car it is also registered. None of us know how many cars Tesla is or was holding in inventory in China, so we cannot tell how many newly registered cars were purchased from Tesla vs. scalpers (who are probably discounting at this point and either making no profit or negative profit).

 

[JRP3]

Scalpers hold many of the unregistered cars in China ...

They do? I thought the whole point was that the scalpers did not take delivery, so Tesla was stuck with them.

 

[MikeC]

They do? I thought the whole point was that the scalpers did not take delivery, so Tesla was stuck with them.

That's what I thought, too. And the China news was that Elon was reporting that sales increased 130-150%, not that registrations had increased.

 

[Auzie]

The news flow from China about Tesla imports and registrations and the subsequent reactions of the stock shows the market completely misunderstands the situation.

I think market saw business weakness rather than specific China weakness, it is just that the business weakness was highlighted in handling China situation.

The number of cars sold in China is not that relevant, at least not to me and not from quarter to quarter, for as long as Tesla is production constrained. It is too early to say how Europe, China, Asia markets will go with Tesla sales. I think all markets will eventually pick up, it is just a matter of time.

Counting sales from quarter to quarter this early in the expansion outside of US is not a very reliable business metric at this stage, imho.

It is difficult to expand to China and market would overlook small sales this early. Being misinformed, over hiring, right hiring = not being in control of one's business. That is harder to overlook.

I am glad that the captain is where the problem is, taking care of business.

 

[ev-enthusiast]

Current delivery estimate for China for Q1 (January and February numbers from JL-Warren):
- January: 469
- February: 260
- March: 624 (estimate as +140% from Feb (see tweet from Elon))
Total: 1353 vehicles delivered in China in Q1

 

[hobbes]

Current delivery estimate for China for Q1:
- January: 469
- February: 260
- March: 550 (estimate as +140% from Feb (see tweet from Elon))
Total: 1279 vehicles delivered in China

The 469 and 260 numbers are registrations, I had made the same mistake in my post #1205.
The increase Elon twittered is in sales.

However, if we assume that Tesla is making sure they don´t sell to scalpers any more - shouldn´t sales, deliveries and registrations be pretty close in time? A sale is when they collect the money, right? (not when the car is ordered) So that is just before delivery, and unless some speculator keeps the car without registering it, that should also happen pretty soon... Unless the new owner has to wait for a license plate which seems to be common in China from what I understand (except for some cities having exceptions for EVs). How long do owners typically wait for a registration in China?

 

[bonaire]

Sometimes, the discussion of a "sale" is based on an order booked rather than delivery. Is the discussion of what sales are actual deliveries? Perhaps due to the notes about deep discounts of up to 20% off, that someone mentioned. That is somewhat attractive to a potential customer.

 

[hobbes]

Perhaps due to the notes about deep discounts of up to 20% off, that someone mentioned. That is somewhat attractive to a potential customer.

True. Still better than if Tesla keeps them sitting around. Also, if they sell cars produced last quarter, it adds to the money they make from cars produced this quarter (assuming production constrained for all regions combined).

 

[ev-enthusiast]

The 469 and 260 numbers are registrations, I had made the same mistake in my post #1205.
The increase Elon twittered is in sales.

However, if we assume that Tesla is making sure they don´t sell to scalpers any more - shouldn´t sales, deliveries and registrations be pretty close in time? A sale is when they collect the money, right? (not when the car is ordered) So that is just before delivery, and unless some speculator keeps the car without registering it, that should also happen pretty soon... Unless the new owner has to wait for a license plate which seems to be common in China from what I understand (except for some cities having exceptions for EVs). How long do owners typically wait for a registration in China?

Ok, thanks for pointing that out.
Anyway these numbers should approximate the delivery numbers.

To my opinion, the big question is:
How many vehicles are still at the scalpers (have been delivered to the scalpers during the last weeks) but have not been registered yet by an end customer?
This sum of vehicles at the scalpers is the max that could reduce the registration number for Tesla Motors.

Does anybody have a better idea to estimate Q1 deliveries in China?

 

[maoing]

chinese link:
Beijing: imports of pure electric cars are expected to get the new energy licenses
Tesla and other imported electric car is expected to get Beijing's new energy vehicle license

Not there yet. But likely to happen in April.

 

[FredTMC]

chinese link:
Beijing: imports of pure electric cars are expected to get the new energy licenses
Tesla and other imported electric car is expected to get Beijing's new energy vehicle license

Not there yet. But likely to happen in April.

Wow. What exactly does this mean? Is this a cost incentive to customers or that you'll get a car license quickly instead of waiting for license to be issued. I've heard takes a long time to get a car license for Beijing