DJ Frustration
Former Model X Sig, Model S, Model 3, Model Y
luvb2b, any thoughts on your post from a couple days ago in light of the sales press release from 3/31?
on who the shorts are, i suspect there are a number of hedge funds and long/short equity funds that are in the name. that's because on fundamental metrics tesla is a disaster. roe is negative, p/e is non-existent, price/book is off the charts, debt/equity is high, revenues had been non-existent. any computer model would look at such a stock and say it's going to be game over there soon. even though the short positions are large relative to the float, 32 million shares at $38 = $1.2 billion. a dozen large hedge funds ($5 billion+) that shorted $100 million of tesla could account for the entire amount and yet maintain less than a 2% portfolio weighting. the short charges will matter to them, but they will probably hope there's some normalization in those high costs.
the short positions are quite logical. especially after the last earnings report. on the last call, production had fallen far short of estimates. margins on the most expensive models were miserable. and we know generally this management has had expectations of production that have always been too optimistic. so when they said, "4500 units, mid-teens gross margin, breakeven non-gaap & cash flow", even i had doubts. heck i can confess to selling part of my position because i couldn't figure out the math they were sharing based on their q4 report. then shortly after that the 10-k is delayed? oh my god as a short you had to be salivating, you'd probably add to your position. which they did. a lot. and the short interest jumped by 5 million shares in a month. it was very fortunate for us longs that the 10-k was delayed, because imo the shorts really pressed their bets too hard during that time.
but then the 10-k came out, and the mystery is solved. $15000+ in credits per vehicle, and with that much in excess profit, all of the math works just fine. everything makes sense. but who would have expected the credits were that high? not one article i read had ever predicted anything above $5000-7000 per car.
that was just the recent increase in short interest. now think about a few of these questions for a few moments, and after a while you start to wonder why would tesla succeed?
1. what's the last automaker that started from scratch and became profitable and successful in the usa? how many years has that been? how many have tried and failed? if i remember correctly the answer in the last fifty years is zero have succeeded.
2. even looking at the ones that are successful, what kind of profits do they generate, what are their earnings multiples? ford has a p/e of 10 and toyota a p/e of 15. at this time it's hard to imagine that next year tesla generates $2+ in eps to justify a $30+ stock price.
3. look at the short history on http://www.tesla-short-interest.us . 2/3rds of the shorts have been around since the early days, when it wasn't even clear if tesla could make it to manufacturing this car. the company ipo'd as basically a one-product company with a concept. wall street is littered with carcasses of companies that started like that.
4. as all the critics point out, tesla's book value has steadily eroded, cash flows have historically been highly negative, working capital was in question. how many companies in a condition like this attain critical velocity to break up and out of the downward spiral? frankly it's not that many.
5. now think about the one time risks. imagine a product fire like fiskar had. or a major safety issue with the battery pack. or a structural defect with the frame. or stuck pedals like toyota. remember all the stuff that tesla is using is all new. any one major failure could be a significant dent to their reputation. and when you're burning $90m in cash each quarter with only $200m in the bank, well you just don't have a lot of room to have such mistakes. as a short you could even bet that heck there would be one major issue somewhere, that a startup couldn't possibly go from zero to perfect production. as a shareholder, that's the main thing i worry about when i go to bed each night: a major recall / product defect.
6. even if tesla executes everything else perfectly, what if the economy turns down or interest rates shoot up? luxury car sales have always fallen off a cliff in those circumstances. tesla would have a very hard time surviving another economic rough patch.
7. prior to model s, which electric cars have gained enough traction to make it seem like industry is viable at all? none. the safe bet would be the trend will continue, the shorts would say.
i'm sure you could think of many more logical reasons to be short tesla based on numerical data and historical precedent.
it's very difficult to quantify the drive and passion of a ceo and employees who are hell-bent on achieving a mission. imagine if you had a ceo who was paid to lead tesla, not leading tesla to achieve a personal mission? would you be as interested in the company?
