General Discussion: 2018 Investor Roundtable

[Waiting4M3]

Model 3 VINs on Twitter

"#Tesla registered 253 new #Model3 VINs. Highest VIN is 33719."​

Why?

 

[SteveG3]

Model 3 VINs on Twitter

"#Tesla registered 253 new #Model3 VINs. Highest VIN is 33719."​

Why?

perhaps these VINs refer to a configuration still in testing.

 

[schonelucht]

oops, missed your assertion that 75% of North Americans that reserved did so on the first day.

Where does that come from?

Again the spreadsheet.

There were about 130,000 Day 1 reservations.

The only way I can make sense of the numbers is that this is an underestimation of the actual number of first day reservations. Another possibility is that many who put themselves as first day reserves in the spreadsheet actually reserved a day later but possibly misremember or just don't want to bother with the exact date anymore and put in the date everyone picks. But that does not change my conclusion of a 15% take rate.

 

[kbM3]

This gets me to a current take up rate of about 15%. Agree/disagree?

IIRC Troy, who has done the most work at estimating, at one time stated the take rate was about 30%. It could be that Tesla was intentionally not inviting people who had specified an early precedence for dual motor or SR, and they changed since so that this take rate has since dropped.

 

[SteveG3]

Again the spreadsheet.



The only way I can make sense of the numbers is that this is an underestimation of the actual number of first day reservations. Another possibility is that many who put themselves as first day reserves in the spreadsheet actually reserved a day later but possibly misremember or just don't want to bother with the exact date anymore and put in the date everyone picks. But that does not change my conclusion of a 15% take rate.

you are extrapolating from data you’ve found on a crowd sourced spreadsheet on an enthusiasts forum. another possibility is that extrapolation has a very large margin of error for several reasons.

putting aside the other contrary data I’ve referenced, for me common sense indicates that 75% of all US reservations to date happening on day 1 is quite off the mark.

as to take rate among all reservation holders on the rear wheel drive, PUP required, no choice in interior, early production cars... I’d guess 20-25%. My sense is that would be consistent with about a 70-75% overall conversion rate for the two year long waiting list.

 

[TradingInvest]

My rough estimate: the real buying intention of US Model 3 reservation holders:

15% back wheel drive short distance
15% back wheel drive long distance
15% AWD short distance
15% AWD long distance
10% AWD performance
30% will not buy

The early ordering data can be a little misleading. I wanted an AWD short distance, but I ordered a back wheel long distance as soon as the configurator was opened, need to try the car ASAP.

I think the current take rate probably is around 15%, because only back wheel long distance is available.

 

[elasalle]

Again the spreadsheet.



The only way I can make sense of the numbers is that this is an underestimation of the actual number of first day reservations. Another possibility is that many who put themselves as first day reserves in the spreadsheet actually reserved a day later but possibly misremember or just don't want to bother with the exact date anymore and put in the date everyone picks. But that does not change my conclusion of a 15% take rate.

If we take your 15% based on 160K, and instead go with 96K(60% US of 1st day 160K) we would get 25%. However, based on constraints and assumptions, i would say any conclusions are just guesstimates and kinda inconclusive. cheers !!

 

[SteveG3]

If we take your 15% based on 160K, and instead go with 96K(60% US of 1st day 160K) we would get 25%. However, based on constraints and assumptions, i would say any conclusions are just guesstimates and kinda inconclusive. cheers !!

Schone wrote about 35K car's expected to be delivered to those invited to configure to date. That, I think is a good rough estimate and would be 22% of 160K (or 36% of 96K).

As I say, I think Schone's 35K number seems reasonable to me, I just find his/her idea of how large a percent of US reservationists have been invited to date to configure (80%), based on extrapolation from some crowd sourced data of enthusiasts, to be wildly off, and, at odds both with common sense and data available from Tesla. It follows that Schone's calculation based on that wildly off estimate, the claimed 15% take rate, is also almost certainly at best of no added value to understanding the take rate.

 

[Yggdrasill]

Diesel isn't doing great in Europe, it seems. This link was in a Norwegian article and it contained a lot of information:

Diesel in Europe in 2017: annus horribilis - JATO

 

[NicoV]

Update: somehow missed Schone’s assertion that

Fyi: ‘schonelucht’ means ‘clean air’ in Dutch. It is most likely not a firstname/lastname combination.

 

[Starno]

I can't read Tesla shorts tweet more than 2 min, it makes me sad. Not really concerning myself, but concerning them, the amount of negativity they must have in themselves is concerning.

 

[Reciprocity]

Diesel isn't doing great in Europe, it seems. This link was in a Norwegian article and it contained a lot of information:

Diesel in Europe in 2017: annus horribilis - JATO

Does this mean horrible arse? annus horribilis

 

[Yggdrasill]

Does this mean horrible arse? annus horribilis

Horrible *year*, if you seriously don't know.

 

[Intl Professor]

Hello everyone. Have lurked here for years, for longer than I’ve been long TSLA in fact, which is quite a while now.

Since the recent slide, I recently went back through the quarterly transcripts and financials of the early years, one by one, to make sure I hadn’t missed anything that would make me want to sell. I tracked anything that looked like a promise, forecast or prediction. Things that made me ponder:

• A promise that Model S would have a positive working capital cycle - a promise that’s been repeated for M3. This didn’t happen for MS, due to sustained build up of inventory. I’ll be watching this closely for M3 in coming months.
• On the Inventory build up - after removing Sales in Transit, finished inventory has at times exceeded what I expected would be needed for Store Display/Service Loaners, especially given Tesla’s claim that electric cars rarely go wrong and need minimal maintenance. But then again, I have been to a single Tesla showroom (in Shanghai, while pretty well oiled). How many vehicles you have in your big US showrooms I don’t know. Nor the service loaner density needed for a place like California. Maybe you can put my mind at rest. Again, one of the first items I’ll look for in Q1 / Q2 accounts to check the trend.
• Near term cashflow predictions have been pretty bang on, Model X launch delay aside. Betting against positive cashflow in Q3/Q4 this year seems a bold move if the M3 ramp looks like reaching anywhere close to 5,000.
• But medium term cashflow predictions have been mostly dreadful. Take your pick from this being a positive acceleration of the mission or a continual underestimation of capex requirements and a stodgy r&d department. When Elon says “a capital raise is not required”, we should take that to mean one is probably fairly imminent. This doesn’t necessarily mean he’s lying of course but until we see follow through on profit and cashflow, he’ll be open to that charge.
• You can fight over COGS accounting practices versus peers all you want. By Tesla’s own measure, gross margin predictions have been more or less there on quantum and timing. If Tesla predicts a 25% gross margin for the M3 at scale, I tend to believe them.
• But... operating leverage capability remains unproven. Deepak has promised “long term” high single digit net margin for years. Let’s see that please, given the first Masterplan is now complete and given there is very limited granularity on the largest components of Opex.
• Lease accounting. Variable disclosure, shallow detail and confusing comingling of different concepts (e.g. Resale Value Guarantee, direct leasing, price promise to third party leasing companies). This nags at me.
• Lease interest rates: tricky to quantify the impact of QE & record low rates on demand, other than to say it must have made a difference early on and was something that 2012 Elon saw as quite important to demand. Despite the turning of the rates cycle, Tesla’s brand strength means this doesn’t keep me up at night. But it might well slow some of the headier predictions of Xmln cars per year by 202X.
• Leasing resale value: I’d prefer much more detailed and regular disclosure on profit/loss from pre-owned inventory sales and the potential liquidity requirements from this component of past sales. That there is not yet a high volume/high transparency second hand market for Tesla’s products adds uncertainty to this line item.
• Technical promises: not much more needs to be said about Elon Time. But based upon performance promises of past models, there’s no good reason to disbelieve the Semi/Roadster specs. AI and autonomous driving? Maybe they’ll win the race, maybe they won’t. Doesn’t seem a core reason to invest or disinvest at this point.

In summary then, for a Long some leaps of faith are still needed. But most of the Question Marks are likely to be given a definitive answer in 2018. With short interest as high as it is, this seems a highly risky time to sit on the sidelines if you view the story positively, given the potential for large upward gapping of the share price. The risk/reward for the short side of the trade remains a mystery to me, as I see far larger leaps of faith needed to satisfy that outcome.

Welcome to active status. Please post more! You seem to have a comprehensive picture thoughtfully presented with arguments on a range of ways to look at things.

 

[Nightshifter]

Diesel isn't doing great in Europe, it seems. This link was in a Norwegian article and it contained a lot of information:

Diesel in Europe in 2017: annus horribilis - JATO

Hello all writers and readers in here.
Today this news popped on my desk (unfortunatly it is in german), written by a respected technical news site and basically it tells that BOSCH has found a way to reduce "the bad diesel exhaust" by tenfold. It looks very promising and will cost just a "low three-figured sum to add to diesel engines and could see the light of mass production very soon with VW". They prooved and showed it on a real massmarked car, a VW Golf.
Bosch verbessert Diesel-Abgaswerte dramatisch

Google Translate:
Google Übersetzer

And no I am not a Shortie, I am very long on TSLA waiting for my M3 and entered at 28 and 250 and enjoy the conversations here every day.

Greetings from Vienna

 

[Curt Renz]

...Greetings from Vienna

Willkommen bei TMC.

 

[SteveG3]

Hello all writers and readers in here.
Today this news popped on my desk (unfortunatly it is in german), written by a respected technical news site and basically it tells that BOSCH has found a way to reduce "the bad diesel exhaust" by tenfold. It looks very promising and will cost just a "low three-figured sum to add to diesel engines and could see the light of mass production very soon with VW". They prooved and showed it on a real massmarked car, a VW Golf.
Bosch verbessert Diesel-Abgaswerte dramatisch

Google Translate:
Google Übersetzer

And no I am not a Shortie, I am very long on TSLA waiting for my M3 and entered at 28 and 250 and enjoy the conversations here every day.

Greetings from Vienna

Thanks Nihtsfhifter.

No worries re "shortie," lols. If this turns out to work in production, this would actually greatly increase Tesla's largest moat- incumbent automakers pushing off their move to EVs as far off into the future as possible. Only concern would be the overall impact to the environment of incumbents leaving so much of the market to Tesla for an even larger time period.

 

[jelloslug]

Does this mean horrible arse? annus horribilis

It sounds like a Latin medical term for hemorrhoids or something...

 

[JRP3]

Today this news popped on my desk (unfortunatly it is in german), written by a respected technical news site and basically it tells that BOSCH has found a way to reduce "the bad diesel exhaust" by tenfold. It looks very promising and will cost just a "low three-figured sum to add to diesel engines and could see the light of mass production very soon with VW".

It still doesn't do anything about the CO2 emissions.

 

[JRP3]

Willkommen bei TMC.

Joined:
Feb 1, 2014