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

[MC3OZ]

Elon needs Trillions to colonize Mars. The world market for money is ripe for a neutral crypto to replace currencies where governments have abused their money issuing privileges. I could see Elon making those Trillions in this space with an internet/Twitter based money network. I still want the Twitter deal to go through.

Yes, Elon might have multiple reasons for wanting to take over Twitter.

The part on commenting on this the claim that buying Twitter would accelerate X.com by some number of years.

And as always, Elon seems in a rush to get things done, but I can see why the number of real Twitter users impacts on what he wants to pay for Twitter.

So far I view the Twitter lawsuits as "robust commercial negotiations", I think both sides want a deal, price is the sticking point.

 

[Cosmacelf]

X.com could have been the mother of all money transaction exchange out there, but it failed and it got fragmented into Paypal, Apple Pay, Zelle, Venmo, Google Pay etc..

TBF, you can’t really say it failed. The VCs were in control of it (the combined company spent like $50M or more around 1999 gaining consumer market acceptance) and they were calling the shots. A quick exit by selling to eBay was what they wanted. After that, it was simple incompetence under eBay managemnt that made it go nowhere for 20 years.

 

[Tommy O]

Try to buy ANY raspberry pi....

I don’t see what this has to do with my comments on chip shortages abating (from my perspective), especially considering I said tesla can still be limited by a single chip that is still in shortage.

I’m very aware of the pi shortages now and when I posted and months ago when they were giving me a big headache at work. It’s annoying.

I found a suitable replacement (for my purposes) with similar, and in some ways specific to my use cases, better specs than the latest pi 4s. Lack of supply in one product doesn’t mean lack of supply in all.

Happy to share more privately.

 

[Webeevdrivers]

Careful, say anything negative about FSD here and you’ll get showered with dislikes. It’s the same conversation that we’ve had since 2017 with Elons coast to coast aspirations for FSD and how that slowly melted away. Then I’m the 2019 crisis where Elon said all Tesla had to do was not go bankrupt until FSD was complete.

And you’ll find the same pro-comments over and over again if you look up post history from those years (when I was more of a lurker).

People here are forgiving about it because Tesla stock has made anyblongtime investor rich already and the non FSD roadmap is still a pathway to a multi trillion dollar company. But yah, being blindly religious about something is typically where the worst scandals pop up.

The idea of level 4 before the end of the year is funny. We have three intersections in our small town that Jarvis (our model Y) gets wrong 100 percent of the time. Always in the wrong lane and will break the law and kill me if I let him every single time. We report it every day every time he screws up in the hole that it will get noticed. It’s coming along and we actually like using it but it will kill you dead at least once per trip if you let it.

Fun though. . Just not hoping for leak level 4 till the end of the decade or so. .

 

[Tommy O]

The idea of level 4 before the end of the year is funny. We have three intersections in our small town that Jarvis (our model Y) gets wrong 100 percent of the time. Always in the wrong lane and will break the law and kill me if I let him every single time. We report it every day every time he screws up in the hole that it will get noticed. It’s coming along and we actually like using it but it will kill you dead at least once per trip if you let it.

Fun though. . Just not hoping for leak level 4 till the end of the decade or so. .

Map errors cause the majority of my disengagements on 10.12. That and driving behavior that’s impolite and uncommon to the local driving culture.

My maps got updated (I’m pretty sure) the other day without a notice. One problem has been corrected* and a new problem has arisen on my daily commute.

*original problem was at a weird intersection. Showed it to a friend and he commented “you know, it kind of did the right thing…although it was wrong.” Don’t know how to explain it in words.

 

[printf42]

Elon needs Trillions to colonize Mars. The world market for money is ripe for a neutral crypto to replace currencies where governments have abused their money issuing privileges. I could see Elon making those Trillions in this space with an internet/Twitter based money network. I still want the Twitter deal to go through.

Exactly what I feel, grand vision for x.com is much more than the definition of economy as of today, nor was it limited to earth.

Twitter would help bootstrap its user base, or else he could use Tesla app when FSD is ready, hence 3-5 years of speeding up.

 

[AudubonB]

Maybe this belongs in the Elon Musk thread, but I’ve been listening to it here and there when I’m driving or have extra time.

The interviewers, while not precisely idiots, are certainly ignorant. Not only of pretty much everything Elon does, but ignorant of much of how anything in the world works save their knowledge of current culture.

I understand why Elon does these interviews. These videos have huge reach and not only educate the masses, but also act as a giant free brand marketing exercise, worth, collectively, billions of dollars.

But I honestly don’t know if I’d be able to hang with these guys for three hours without betraying my exasperation on their general low intelligence and lack of knowledge. It’s actually quite impressive how Elon rolls with the punches here, deflecting asinine questions into jokes while sprinkling in wisdom and knowledge.

Sorry for the grumpy old man post, I just had to get that off my chest.

Well, thank you for saving me the time and, quite possibly, my computer screen. If they’re as bad as you describe…then I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised, other than that Mr Musk hung in there.

 

[Singuy]

The idea of level 4 before the end of the year is funny. We have three intersections in our small town that Jarvis (our model Y) gets wrong 100 percent of the time. Always in the wrong lane and will break the law and kill me if I let him every single time. We report it every day every time he screws up in the hole that it will get noticed. It’s coming along and we actually like using it but it will kill you dead at least once per trip if you let it.

Fun though. . Just not hoping for leak level 4 till the end of the decade or so. .

Level 4 is geofenced, which means that wrong lane will be geofenced off. Easy to get to level 4 if you just eliminate roads vs fixing them..waymo style.

 

[Thekiwi]

Which begs the question, why didn’t they do a 5-1 instead?

Why would management care about this at all? Genuine question - what is the benefit to a company of making things nice and neat for option traders?

 

[traxila]

Went through the 755 page document. Can't say it is easy reading.

I will say that I found no evidence of the words "union", "collective" or "bargaining".

EDIT: And the max credit appears to be 7,500.

EDIT: Courtesy of the NYT:

"As it exists, the 200,000-vehicle cap on tax credits would provide a competitive advantage to market newcomers like BYD of China that are expected to use electric vehicles to enter the U.S. market. They could have benefited from the credit while Tesla, the Texas-based company, could not.
The Democratic climate legislation would flip that. As written, the bill appears to disqualify cars not made in North America from the credit. Cars made in North America by foreign companies like Mercedes-Benz, Toyota or Volvo would qualify, but imported models would not.
Cars would qualify for the full credit only if their batteries were made with materials and components from the United States and countries with which it has trade agreements. The percentage of components that have to meet those restrictions to qualify for the credit would increase over time, under the bill. That provision is aimed at encouraging domestic development of businesses like lithium mining and refining."

 

[traxila]

Why would management care about this at all? Genuine question - what is the benefit to a company of making things nice and neat for option traders?

All I know is I have absolutely no problem with my overabundance of June 2024 soon to be 333.33 strike calls.

 

[StarFoxisDown!]

Went through the 755 page document. Can't say it is easy reading.

I will say that I found no evidence of the words "union", "collective" or "bargaining".

EDIT: And the max credit appears to be 7,500.

Been reading up on how many EV models will be excluded from this and how many EV’s that currently enjoy a EV credit that will lose it and man………this EV credit is going to put the model Y demand and thus sales, on steroids for the foreseeable future and be very bad for Tesla’s competitors.

This is especially material because US legacy auto makers that are eligible on the “made in North America” right now like the Mach E will lose it after 2023 because the Mach E’s batteries do not come from North America. Tesla however, by end of 2023, will have 4680 ramped up to mass production.

Essentially it comes down to not only are all Model Y trims eligible (and would still be eligible if Tesla increased prices by thousands), but many of many of Tesla’s best competition (Korean/Chinese/European) would lose their current tax credit. Yes some auto makers outside of North America are planning to build US factories, but we’re talking years away from start of production. Further, almost all other auto makers will be sourcing their batteries from outside the US for the next 2-3 years at minimum until a lot of the overseas battery makers build battery factories here. Tesla meanwhile, sources all of its Model Y batteries here in the US already. Then consider the 4680 ramp + Panasonic building their 4680 lines in the US next year

I know it’s by far not a perfect EV bill, but the dynamics of how it helps the Model Y and hurts many of its current competitors and future competitors is nuts. If Tesla chooses to and drops the Model 3 prices, it will be model 3 on steroids as well. But even if the Model 3 price doesn’t drop and thus it doesn’t get the credit, it’s still a big positive for Tesla. That’s because cars like Polestar will lose their credit that they currently get. When you start to get down into the details, this bill is very bullish for Tesla.

 

[Big Dog]

Went through the 755 page document. Can't say it is easy reading.

I will say that I found no evidence of the words "union", "collective" or "bargaining".

I salute your perseverance. Next pass thru, search for the two key words: "prevailing wages".

 

[Prunesquallor]

Just watched “Thirteen Lives” (Thai cave rescue docu-drama). Unsworth had a miniscule (and somewhat unfavorable) role. Musk was not mentioned at all.

Enjoyed it. Worth watching IMO.

 

[WattsHappening]

Just watched “Thirteen Lives” (Thai cave rescue docu-drama). Unsworth had a miniscule (and somewhat unfavorable) role. Musk was not mentioned at all.

Enjoyed it. Worth watching IMO.

Thanks for this. I wanted to watch this but was hesitant. Will definitely watch now.

 

[Discoducky]

Went through the 755 page document. Can't say it is easy reading.

I will say that I found no evidence of the words "union", "collective" or "bargaining".

EDIT: And the max credit appears to be 7,500.

EDIT: Courtesy of the NYT:

"As it exists, the 200,000-vehicle cap on tax credits would provide a competitive advantage to market newcomers like BYD of China that are expected to use electric vehicles to enter the U.S. market. They could have benefited from the credit while Tesla, the Texas-based company, could not.
The Democratic climate legislation would flip that. As written, the bill appears to disqualify cars not made in North America from the credit. Cars made in North America by foreign companies like Mercedes-Benz, Toyota or Volvo would qualify, but imported models would not.
Cars would qualify for the full credit only if their batteries were made with materials and components from the United States and countries with which it has trade agreements. The percentage of components that have to meet those restrictions to qualify for the credit would increase over time, under the bill. That provision is aimed at encouraging domestic development of businesses like lithium mining and refining."

Is there a final version that contains the actual final verbiage? (my bill-finding-foo is not that strong I guess...)

I've read a ton of contracts, but even a redlined contract is easier to read than this one (which is 755 pages and I think what you are referring to).

As an example below of how hard it is to read...

"(i) in the matter preceding subpara2 graph (A), by striking ‘‘qualified plug-in 3 electric drive motor’’ and inserting 4 ‘‘clean’’, 5 (ii) in subparagraph (C), by inserting 6 ‘‘qualified’’ before ‘‘manufacturer’’, 7 (iii) in subparagraph (F)— 8 (I) in clause (i), by striking ‘‘4’’ 9 and inserting ‘‘7’’, and 10 (II) in clause (ii), by striking 11 ‘‘and’’ at the end, 12 (iv) in subparagraph (G), by striking 13 the period at the end and inserting ‘‘, 14 and’’, and 15 (v) by adding at the end the following:

 

[hobbes]

The idea of level 4 before the end of the year is funny. We have three intersections in our small town that Jarvis (our model Y) gets wrong 100 percent of the time. Always in the wrong lane and will break the law and kill me if I let him every single time. We report it every day every time he screws up in the hole that it will get noticed. It’s coming along and we actually like using it but it will kill you dead at least once per trip if you let it.

Fun though. . Just not hoping for leak level 4 till the end of the decade or so. .

But you know what you have to do, don´t you?

1) Buy a drone
2) Set up a youtube channel
3) Get enough viewers that Elon gets you attention and sends the test drivers

 

[Artful Dodger]

I had a dream this morning that I'd received a Blue Tesla with a yoke and when someone asked me about it I said it was only $44k. Not sure if I dreamed about buying a used car or if in my dream new cars had dropped in price. Not sure if it was a Model S, Y, or 3. But it was the car of my dreams.

Was this yoke attached to a large, slightly bluish Ox? Dream interpretation is more art than science, but the $44K is clearly Tesla's ASP when they hit 20M/yr annual sales.

Cheers!

 

[Artful Dodger]

the current iteration of cells does not include much of the tech tesla touted (according the the limiting factor's cell video)

The Limiting Factor does not have the current iteration of Tesla 4680 cells. The cell they used for their teardown was obtained from Gali, who got it from a Kato Rd. employee back in Jan 2022. We do not even know when this sample cell was produced, just that it was at least 7 mths old, a lifetime (or 3) in Tesla terms.

Tesla has increased 4680 production by 35% every month since March (per Drew on the Q2 Conf. call). I'd say that teardown is way out of date. IE: Tesla wouldn't be ramping production in Q2 if the cell wasn't at the spec they need for it to go to mass production. More below from Drew:

Tesla (TSLA) Q2 2022 Earnings Call Transcript | The Motley Fool

Drew Baglino -- Senior Vice President, Powertrain and Energy Engineering

Yes. So we are making progress on 4680. But right now, as Elon mentioned, we are leveraging supplier cells, which we have in sufficient quantity to ramp Texas and Berlin. We expect to ramp total 4680 production to exceed 1k per week by the end of the year, hopefully before -- well before.

In Q2, at Kato, we fully automated power conveyance for the dry anode-electrode tool there, unlocking major increases in production and improvements in yields. Since March because of that, Kato output has grown about 35% month-over-month each month since, and yields throughout the factory are already at targets in most areas and trending in that direction and a few others. We did feed learnings from Fremont cell and pack lines to Texas and Berlin there, a carbon copy. Cell design was revved to unlock higher performance and manufacturing simplicity.

Manufacturing lines were further integrated and we in-sourced additional content. For these reasons, there are some new ramp challenges to overcome in Texas and Berlin. Specific to Texas last quarter, cell equipment was fully installed and commissioned and we produced our first commissioning car sets of cells through the end of the line. Our target for Texas is to begin production this quarter and aim for Texas to be capable of exceeding Kato weekly output before the end of this year.

 

[MikeAtkinson]

This seems bullish for FSD as a bump to .69 has been indicated by Elon to be only valid for really good versions.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1556181455570714624

“10.13 we’ve been working on for a while and—Actually, what sort of happened is we’ve made some pretty significant architectural improvements so it’s really gonna be more than 10.12 to 10.13 release. It might—I don’t want to speak too soon—it might qualify for 10.69.” Musk shared.

Elon Musk teases Tesla FSD 10.13 coming in next week…or two

While speaking about Tesla’s strong free cash flow generation, Elon Musk shared updates about FSD v.10.13 at the 2022 Shareholders Meeting.

www.teslarati.com