StealthP3D
Well-Known Member
There comes a point where you have to start digging into things on your own, and forming your own actionable views. You could start with posing yourself the question of why buy a 10kWh domestic storage unit from Tesla at GBP 10k when you can buy basically the same thing from SolarEdge for GBP 6k, or from a Chinese clone for less.
I treat the back of the napkin profit numbers we have seen lately with a contempt reserved for all wild claims without supporting hard data. And that is about where our agreement ends. It appears to me like you are treating the energy storage business like a highly competitive market in terms of pricing. From where I sit, Tesla cannot produce enough to fill all the demand so, rather than extend their current backlog more years into the future, they simply assign a high price on their products and field services instead of having a lottery to see who gets a product that is in such short supply, relative to demand, that they cannot hope to saturate the market. And neither can any other battery storage provider. If and when Tesla's backlog diminishes, they will lower prices to keep their order books full, as necessary.
I've seen you mention time and time again how much competition there is in grid scale battery storage and yet, the fact remains, the operators cannot get their hands on enough installed battery capacity, soon enough. It's like claiming Tesla prices their EV's too high for mass adoption when they are actually scaling as quickly as feasible and selling every one they can make. They adjust prices to match demand. The fact that Tesla has higher prices than the rest is likely due to a better experience, perhaps a faster install, maybe customers find the product more reliable, I don't know and I'm not claiming to know. I'm simply saying that the higher price indicates strength, not weakness. Claiming that Tesla's high published prices indicates weakness flies in the face of basic economics unless you assume the high price is as low as Tesla can get it and still make a profit. And you have no data indicating that is the case.
No offense intended, but you don't need 30 years of grid energy experience to understand simple concepts. As an investor, I have to discount everything you've said that doesn't make sense given that grid battery storage is supply limited. And, as an investor again, I'm going to continue to watch the quarterly reports and management discussion for clues as to whether this is ready to take off yet or not. Analysts and the rest of the investment community will be slow to assign value to the energy business, if and when it grows into interesting volumes. It's currently being valued at zero, so no great loss if it doesn't take off.