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

[Singuy]

Yeah, I don't care what the requirements to use it are, if it can't handle a nice sunny day test it shouldn't get 10/10 ahead of Tesla on capabilities and performance.

View attachment 1046646

Exactly. If it can't do what AP can do then CR is publishing objective lies. This was the point of the video, exposing lies from the media.

 

[2daMoon]

Yeah, I don't care what the requirements to use it are, if it can't handle a nice sunny day test it shouldn't get 10/10 ahead of Tesla on capabilities and performance.

View attachment 1046646

Notice how they tested the Benz DA against Tesla Autopilot, not FSD.

Possibly, against Autopilot on an early Model S that CR kept in a Faraday cage and which has never received an update?

Apples and Orangutans

 

[Knightshade]

Omar's intention is to review a system Consumer report stated that is rated higher than AP. All bets are off when it comes to how or where anything is used. If CR is telling their audience is better, well let's see what it's made of.

...what?


You can be assured CR tested the system where it's supposed to be used.

Omar did not, becuase he wanted to make it look bad.

In fact the other dude in the car even called that out early in the video and Omar mostly ignored it.

At 4:12 he says "it's not intended to be used on city streets" and we hear back "by highways they mean any street where the traffic is 45 mph"

Which is... not remotely what anyone means by highways.

He knows he's doing a dishonest test.

Oh btw this test was not some crazy gauntlet involving blind upl 6 lane 50 mph cross traffic kind of test. The mercedes just had to go straight in light traffic....

So if mercedes are explicitly calling foul, then CR should just stfu next time if they can't compare apples to apples.

Again, CR compared Autopilot-- a HIGHWAY system... to Mercedes HIGHWAY system. On highways.


Omar didn't compare ANY of those.

He compared Teslas city streets FSD to Mercedes HIGHWAY system. On NOT a highway.

And BTW it wasn't "all just straight"-- he counts needing to manually take over at intersections as an intervention too. On a system not meant for intersections.

You can see this at 13:20 in the video where you counts an intervention as needing to stop for a red light and turn right.



If you can't recognize (or are unwilling to admit) the dishonesty on his part.... that's.... certainly a position one might hold for reasons.

 

[Singuy]

...what?


You can be assured CR tested the system where it's supposed to be used.

Omar did not, becuase he wanted to make it look bad.

In fact the other dude in the car even called that out early in the video and Omar mostly ignored it.

At 4:12 he says "it's not intended to be used on city streets" and we hear back "by highways they mean any street where the traffic is 45 mph"

Which is... not remotely what anyone means by highways.

He knows he's doing a dishonest test.







Again, CR compared Autopilot-- a HIGHWAY system... to Mercedes HIGHWAY system. On highways.


Omar didn't compare ANY of those.

He compared Teslas city streets FSD to Mercedes HIGHWAY system. On NOT a highway.




If you can't recognize (or are unwilling to admit) the dishonesty on his part.... that's.... certainly a position one might hold for reasons.

AP can lane keep and go straight no problem on city streets. CR compared AP vs Mercedes AP equivalent. I don't really care how FSD did (and I agree Omar used FSD to give Tesla the best possible light), but we know for a fact AP had zero problem on city street lane keeping a straight line unlike this Mercedes system. So Omar exposing Mercedes 41+ interventions in a few miles going in a straight line is exactly the lie CR and mercedes tries to sell the public that their system is better. (Also I'm in the camp of, if it can be enabled, then it can be used). Per user manual, AP was designated for HWY as well.

 

[Knightshade]

AP can lane keep and go straight no problem on city streets.

It CAN.

It's not supposed to. And explicitly says that in the manual.

This was in fact why Tesla has been found to have no liability the times someone died using it that way.


Further- it still won't stop for red lights, or handle turns.... Things Omar dishonestly counted as "interventions" in his video.

So Omar exposing Mercedes 41+ interventions in a few miles going in a straight line is exactly the lie CR and mercedes tries to sell the public that their system is better.

Mercedes never made any claims at all about their systems performance on city streets.

Because it's explicitly not meant to be used there.

Oncoming traffic, double-yellow lines, intersections, construction signs, traffic control signals... those are all situations explicitly outside the ODD of their L3 system.


It's a completely pointless hit piece.... Just as bad as Dan O'Dowds FUD. Why do you support and amplify it?

 

[Singuy]

It CAN.

It's not supposed to. And explicitly says that in the manual.

This was in fact why Tesla has been found to have no liability the times someone died using it that way.


Further- it still won't stop for red lights, or handle turns.... Things Omar dishonestly counted as "interventions" in his video.






Mercedes never made any claims at all about their systems performance on city streets.

Because it's explicitly not meant to be used there.

Oncoming traffic, double-yellow lines, intersections, construction signs, traffic control signals... those are all situations explicitly outside the ODD of their L3 system.


It's a completely pointless hit piece.... Just as bad as Dan O'Dowds FUD. Why do you support and amplify it?

Mercedes purposely use definition loopholes in the SAE descriptions to market their cars' autonomous capabilities in a deceiving way because they lack actual USEFUL autonomous capabilities. You know this, so why are you defending such practices?

 

[15Peter20]

Thanks, push and hold works.
What are those 6 buttons means?

The light bulb buttons means "mind blown"?
The i in circle means "good information"?
Then you have Like button?
Hand down shall really be dislike button rather than disagree.
Smiley face means "happy" or "I am laughing at you"?
It is pretty clear what the Love button means.

The ‘lightbulb’ is an insect missing a leg, viewed from above. Press it to mean ‘I will crush you like a bug’.
The ‘I’ in a circle is a man with no arms entering a TBC tunnel. It means ‘I am invading your space’.
The blue thumb up means ‘I have a very cold hand’ whereas the black thumb down means ‘I have frostbite and have lost all circulation’.
The smiley face means ‘You post as though you are on 1990s recreational drugs: get real’.
The heart means ‘defibrillator here’.

 

[15Peter20]

Delivery information coming in so far for first halve of Q2 is showing demand weakness again. There is data from China, Europe, and VIN data in the U.S. indicated deliveries are definitely going to be way behind 2023 Q2.

They also will be only a little better than Q1. There really at this point should be no more conjecture that "supply chain issues" explained the low deliveries in Q1. It's just simply incorrect.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1789285939388289119

The demand issue seems further validated by Tesla introducing low interest rate financing.

It will be interesting to see what the financial modelers spit out, but I would imagine automotive earnings will nearly be flat QoQ.

In addition, I think there is the realization happening that FSD subscription increases won't be helping the company financially for quite a while. The 50% cut in FSD subscription prices means that subscriptions will need to double just to make back the money lost from the price cut on current subscribers. FSD subscriptions will need to triple or quadruple probably to even have any real subtle effect on EPS. Not happening for a year at least, and that would be if the FSD gets really good, near robotaxi level.

With Megapack growth capacity stalled until 2025 (meaning no huge further gains until 2026) and Semi delayed, we are essentially now waiting to see what net income can be derived from a fully ramped Cybertruck line as the main contributor to incremental earnings in the next 12 months.

For Q4 if I assume a $80k ASP for 3,000 Cybertrucks / week with 20% operating margins, I get about 600 million in operational income (before taxes). So maybe $0.15 in incremental EPS from Cybertruck.

With costs going down from layoffs and some projects slowing and some additional Megapack revenue, maybe we could get a $0.2 to $0.25 increase in EPS by Q4. Maybe $0.6 or $0.7.

If we can, maybe the market will model $3.5 in EPS in 2025. With a forward PE of say 50, we would get $175 target share price, which coincidentally is near where we are today.

So I think the stock may oscillate around this price +/- 20% depending on sentiment until we get information that would materially affect earnings projections in 2025.

If thumbs down must be justified then why not the laughter response, when a serious, considered post like this is written?

 

[Musskiah]

To be fair the test is running on roads the Mercedes system is explicitly not supposed to be used on.

To be fair, this video from Omar is made in direct response to Consumer Reports rating Mercedes higher than Tesla...

It'd be the same as if someone tested basic autopilot then complained they had to intervene at every intersection that wasn't a green light.

...and as you insinuate, Mercedes is similar to basic Autopilot - circa 2018 or so...

He compared Teslas city streets FSD to Mercedes HIGHWAY system. On NOT a highway..

Because it's horrific, and it's obvious to anyone capable of even remote levels of honesty.

 

[CitizenKane]

Performing on an Olympic team level is not necessarily comfortable for anyone and is certainly not for everyone.

For an Olympic team to do well I would think keeping spirits high is extremely important and highly dependent on how the leader behaves.

 

[Thekiwi]

Mercedes purposely use definition loopholes in the SAE descriptions to market their cars' autonomous capabilities in a deceiving way because they lack actual USEFUL autonomous capabilities. You know this, so why are you defending such practices?

Wait - how is autonomous driving on highways not useful?

We spent the better part of last decade shouting to everyone who would listen how good an experience it was to have autonomous driving on highways as a great Tesla feature.

 

[Todd Burch]

Wait - how is autonomous driving on highways not useful?

We spent the better part of last decade shouting to everyone who would listen how good an experience it was to have autonomous driving on highways as a great Tesla feature.

I think he’a referring to all of the additional qualifications that are required for the Mercedes system to be considered Level 3–following a car below a certain speed, etc.

 

[aubreymcfato]

Re ‘weak demand for Highland 3 in Europe’, this just doesn’t sit right with me.

I see a healthy demand in the Netherlands which is a good sign, considering that of our BEV fleet of 400K model 3 is at a hefty 52K, they’re literally everywhere you look.

Data for daily reporting countries looks fine too:

View attachment 1046367

Electric Vehicle registrations in Europe: 15 countries, majority of BEV market

Below the record year 2019 but tracking second best now.

Only explanation for market down as a whole could be a total collapse in Germany where subsidies ended abruptly and FUD is at a record high but that might recover later this year.

April 2024 was just <200 cars shy from April 2023.
Some countries are stepping up, but the big 3 are declining: Germany, France and UK are down roughly 12k cars in the first 4 months of 2024, YoY. This means that it's like we lost a whole quarter of UK or France. So there are reasons to be concerned.

 

[EVMeister]

April 2024 was just <200 cars shy from April 2023.
Some countries are stepping up, but the big 3 are declining: Germany, France and UK are down roughly 12k cars in the first 4 months of 2024, YoY. This means that it's like we lost a whole quarter of UK or France. So there are reasons to be concerned.

In the UK leases are very popular and the interest rates are far more attractive on the Model Y. As somebody in the UK who will shortly take delivery of a new Model 3, I was seriously considering whether I could put up with a Model Y instead due to interest rates.

 

[cusetownusa]

I didn’t realize so many vehicles had low financing rates.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1789818904040046978

I have no way to back this up but anecdotally it seems like the overall car market is really slowing down. Including Tesla. There is a huge dealership near me (located in an old mall) that sells pretty much all brands, and the huge lot looks full or almost full. This lot was almost empty not too long ago.

The inventory for Tesla’s near me is huge also, and still includes a lot of 2023 vehicles. My brother just got a 2023 LR AWD Y for $5000 off and 1% financing. Pretty good deal for him but makes me a bit nervous as an investor.

 

[Todd Burch]

Car market IS slowing down. Elon even announced a while ago that he expected this would happen and here we are.

Lot’s of people are thinking that “Elon has killed the demand for Tesla.” The reality is the entire market has been slowing down. Teslas didn’t suddenly get undesirable in the last two quarters. EVs didn’t suddenly get less desirable in the last two quarters either. Just the opposite—there’s now a standard in North America and chargers are officially almost everywhere. Slowing car sales in general are why the other OEMS pulled back on EV production—EVs cause them to lose money so in an effort to save where they can, EV production was the first to go.

If only Tesla was having issues, this would have been the perfect time for other OEMs to raise prices a bit and get a leg up on Tesla’s EV production, but that’s not what happened.

 

[replicant]

Car market IS slowing down. Elon even announced a while ago that he expected this would happen and here we are.

Lot’s of people are thinking that “Elon has killed the demand for Tesla.” The reality is the entire market has been slowing down. Teslas didn’t suddenly get undesirable in the last two quarters. EVs didn’t suddenly get less desirable in the last two quarters either. Just the opposite—there’s now a standard in North America and chargers are officially almost everywhere. Slowing car sales in general are why the other OEMS pulled back on EV production—EVs cause them to lose money so in an effort to save where they can, EV production was the first to go.

If only Tesla was having issues, this would have been the perfect time for other OEMs to raise prices a bit and get a leg up on Tesla’s EV production, but that’s not what happened.

Why have expensive ICE been selling better than EV recently when EV prices have dropped further?

When non-Tesla EV manufacturers slow down production, we should Tesla to sell more EV especially when Tesla reduce prices and improve their offering significantly.

A global slow down in auto sales should favor new entrants with high margin and low price, not expensive, low-margin incumbents with poor EV offering.

Tesla has trouble reaching prospects outside the early-adopters' customers segment. And their main action plan is to lower prices when people cearly don't know about the affordability of Tesla.

 

[tslagreen]

Why have expensive ICE been selling better than EV recently when EV prices have dropped further?

When non-Tesla EV manufacturers slow down production, we should Tesla to sell more EV especially when Tesla reduce prices and improve their offering significantly.

A global slow down in auto sales should favor new entrants, not incumbents.

People who can afford expensive ICE generally don't need auto loans. Interest rates have had a big impact on the auto market (and housing).

 

[Musskiah]

Wait - how is autonomous driving on highways not useful?

We spent the better part of last decade shouting to everyone who would listen how good an experience it was to have autonomous driving on highways as a great Tesla feature.

It would be useful...if it could work over 40mph, at night, in the rain...but the Mercedes autonomy cannot and the Tesla can.

 

[2daMoon]

It would be useful...if it could work over 40mph, at night, in the rain...but the Mercedes autonomy cannot and the Tesla can.

..and, simply stay in its lane in daylight and dry weather, which the Mercedes system seems unable to do with any consistency in Omar's video.