ERICOPOLY

You still need electricity to operate the geothermal heat pump, so the solar electric system is complimentary. Ground-source heat pumps always produce less greenhouse gases than air conditioners, oil furnaces, and electric heating, but natural gas furnaces may be competitive depending on the greenhouse gas intensity of the local electricity supply. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geothermal_heat_pump

Glad to hear it :) Damn my avatar looks good... I might have to post less.

I saw an article where they interviewed the Tesla engineer responsible for the battery tech stuff. He seemed to think that full battery recharge will one day get down to 5 minutes. So long term, that's where it goes. That will keep the lines from being long. This will be iterative, where the battery charging technology will get better and better over the years. Then Tesla merely needs to sell chargers to existing gas stations -- they're always in need of more people using their mini-marts while they pull in for a 5 minute quick charge. http://www.plugincars.com/tesla-jb-straubel-five-minute-recharging-without-swap-127734.html I have 4 cars. I have a 2008 Suburban, a 2011 Roadtrek Sprinter Van, a 2004 BMW X5, and the Tesla Model S. We're simply not going to drive the Model S long distances very much given these other options sitting there parked in the driveway. I have more than 50% of it in my RothIRA. Unless the laws change, it's sort of the ultimate tax situation as far as that money goes. The rest of it in the taxable account is what I'm using to fund my house purchase in 3 years when the purchase option matures, as well as my ongoing living expenses while I wait 19 years to reach age 59.5 (Roth IRA withdrawal without penalty age). There is also the problem that I'm not well suited to run a holding company.

Electric vehicles will probably grow as a revenue savior for electric utilities. Given that EVs will largely charge up during the night, the utilities will then start charging more for overnight electric rates -- coupled with a future popularity for battery residential systems, the time-of-use metering will probably trend towards a flat rate throughout the day.

400 mile range battery. We'll see in time what happens: http://cleantechnica.com/2013/09/19/new-tesla-patent-400-mile-battery-pack-using-metal-air-lithium-ion-batteries/

Actually, a $7 strike 2015 BAC put only costs 11 cents now at the ask. The stock is about $7.50 above that strike price currently. So about 1.27% annualized. Cost of leverage then is a bit under 2% annualized if you have IB margin rates. By this logic, when the stock hits $20.80 (about $7.50 above the warrant strike) the price of the warrant leverage could fall from today's 9.3% all the way down to 2%. So lets say, hypothetically, the stock rallies to $20.80 by this January. That would be 5 years before warrant expiry. 7.3% delta multiplied by 5 years would be 36.5% hit. A move in the stock from today's $14.50 up to $20.80 would be a 43.44% move. But if the warrants take a 36.5% cost-of-leverage revaluation hit, then the warrants give you barely any upside versus the common. Probably only a 5% boost after you also include the time value decay between now and January -- about 2%. So maybe you make 48.44% on the warrants instead of 43.44% in the common. This might be the most severe case, but it's certainly possible based on how the $7 strike LEAPS puts are trading today.

Not sure who provides battery backup at this time. BYD doesn't have a sales person in this country to talk to (I'm not calling their sales team in China), and Solar City's product is still in beta testing. I'd love to know what the price point is for an installed system.

This price is more like it -- $3.39 per watt installed cost: http://www.mothernaturesolar.com/ Now they just need to grow their company to include my area. quote: Our prices are so low that on average a system will pay itself off in less than 48 months!

class A warrants selling for $6.29 today, up 12.3% since the discussion began. Common stock is up 21.1% over same period. Not quite double the performance of the warrants, but almost! I believe cost of leverage is roughly 9.3% annualized at this point. That's down from about 13.1% when this discussion began. Somebody with 2x leverage would have made 42.2% over this period were there to be no decay in the cost of leverage (or time value loss). So the erosion cost them about 30% -- a bit more than a 20% hit from the revaluation in cost of leverage over the remaining time period to expiry, and the rest from time decay. Very costly leverage. Maybe the stock is at $20 or $25 by 2015 -- that would probably cost another 20% (not including the time value decay -- if included, it's probably a 30% total cost of leverage for a period of only 1.25 years). Makes the LEAPS continue to look relatively more attractive. So we're only half-way there -- half the medicine has been swallowed.

Painful. I commented earlier that it regularly rallies to at least $60 every time. Dammit.

Estate and gift taxes raised only about $14 billion last year. That’s about 1 percent of the $1.2 trillion passed down in America each year, mostly by the very rich, former Treasury Secretary Lawrence Summers estimated in a December blog post on Reuters.com. The contrast suggests “our estate tax system is broken,” he wrote. I'm not too worried that people are allowed to accumulate a lot of money. The outrage seems to be that families are keeping their money and not having it stolen from them by the public treasury?

Interesting. Thus is pure speculation on my part-- their focus on creating sustainable earnings rather than increasing dividends sounds like the advice Moynihan probably got from Warren during his recent lunch. This is bound to disappoint some impatient stockholders. The US Treasury should be the most disappointed. Stockholders less so.

I can't bear to watch it.

Well, they get volume discounts. So it does help them both. This was explained in either one of the conference call transcripts that I read or in the annual report itself -- I don't remember which. It was mentioned somewhere in the transcripts, and I don't want to go flipping through the Q&A again to find it. But here is how I understood it: 1) Initially SHLD and SHOS were all under one roof. There are 'N' amounts of product 'X' inventory purchased by SHLD. 2) Then the spinoff of SHOS. Now both SHLD and SHOS still collectively need to purchase 'N' amounts of product "X" inventory 3) Were they each to purchase "X" separately, they wouldn't get the volume discount. So if SHLD still buys "N" amounts of product "X" and merely sells some of it (at cost) to SHOS, then SHLD still gets the volume discount on what it stocks in SHLD stores. Let's say that SHLD stops selling any of product "X" at cost to SHOS. Then SHLD no longer gets the volume discount on what it sells in it's own stores. And of course, SHOS no longer gets it at volume discount pricing either. So as I understand it, both stand to benefit from this arrangement. EDIT: They sell it at cost to SHOS -- so this not-for-profit revenue negatively impacts SHLD margins. But in doing so, it makes things better by getting better pricing on some of the items stocked in SHLD stores.

Well, they get volume discounts. So it does help them both. This was explained in either one of the conference call transcripts that I read or in the annual report itself -- I don't remember which.

He also dropped hints about why he likes to retain it. Such as speaking of the individual investments as tributaries that combine to form the mighty Amazon. His strategy makes Berkshire stronger with every investment. Returning cash to shareholders, does not!

The market is efficient, so you can't underperform it consistently. Fool's errand :)

I don't clearly remember Buffett's discussion, but didn't he compare repurchase decisions to the whole universe of alternative capital allocation? If so, that's very different from a buyback vs. dividend argument. A dividend gives you the same % ownership + pile of cash. Given a buy back, you can return to your same % ownership by exchanging your excess shares for a pile of cash. So claiming that a dividend is better than a buy back at overvalued prices is the same as claiming that your Pile Of Cash will be greater in one case than the other. Maybe, but it would be due to trade execution and market volatility issues rather than directly related to over/under valuation. In fact, valuation aside, you can see how an upward market would give you a greater Pile Of Cash in the buy back scenario if you simply defer your sale. The buyback vs. dividend debate is not a valuation issue except to the extent that valuation affects price volatility. +1 Additionally, if your cost basis is relatively close to the share price at the time when you sell then you have perhaps no tax (or very little) on this method of distributing cash. Thus, the price volatility needs to be relatively high in order to be caught in a situation where your cash pile is smaller than that from the dividend. And most likely, it will be higher. Compare that to where you always lose a significant portion to taxes (dividend taxes). It seems that over the long run, quarter after quarter, you would almost certainly come out ahead from selling shares (after company buys offsetting number of shares) instead of getting a cash dividend. We just need more people to realize this and our tax bills will come down.

Yes but Elon claims to have dreamed about changing the world. Well, he is changing the world but he could accelerate solar adoption if he gets these soft costs down.

So $800 per panel for installation. But look at how much a professional installer is actually paid in California: http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How_much_does_a_solar_installer_make#page3 15 to 20 per hour depending on were you work in California theres a high demand so they pay more sorry for spelling Solar Panel installer jobs are demanding and highly dangerous, because of dealings with electricity and mainly working on roof tops even at high temperatures. Considering this aspects of the job including knowledge and education required to be able to work as an installer, and in relation to other similar jobs like air conditioning, electricians etc... and also researching the cost,(about 35k for regular American home) and government involvement and backing in this industry... A regular installer after 3 months, (of course in normal economic conditions in the country) should not make less then $21.00-$29.00/hour, But you figure a professional installer can install at least 3 per hour. So at that rate you are actually paying at least $2,400 per hour to Solar City just for labor! I think what I will do is: 1) buy the equipment 2) draw and submit the plans myself to get the permit 3) offer $50 per hour to a handyman to install the modules (this will cost $1,000 total if he installs two per hour) 4) hire an electrician to run conduit up to the roof and install the junction box (probably another $1,000 at most) My total cost, fully installed, should be under $20,000 including sales tax. Now, why does Solar City charge 150% more than that???

I reason that they install your 2.93 KW system at a profit for $14,000. Thus, the additional cost of a larger system should merely be additional parts plus per-module-installation-labor. There are roughly 12 solar modules in your system. Based on the below computations, it looks like the hardware for your 3 KW system is about $4,650 total cost for a "do-it-yourself" project. Therefore the "soft costs" on your project are at least $9,500 -- or about $800 per module for installation. So here is how I arrive at that: 1) Solar City quoted me $50,000 for a 10 KW system. 2) The solar modules for a 10KW system cost $7,448 (using Canadian Solar 245W panels -- priced by www.renvu.com) Inverters would cost another $4,200. 3) So you are looking at $11,648 dollars for the panels and the inverters. Then add lets say $3,500 for racking hardware. Total cost is about $15,000 for all the hardware to install a 10,000 watt system. Add $500 for freight delivery to the site. So there are $34,500 of "soft costs" in the 10 KW system. Divide that by the number of modules (40) and you get roughly $800 per panel. So think about that. $800 per panel for installation! And they just multiply that number by the number of panels you want installed. No cost efficiency flow to the customer.

That was my recollection. I dont think he was ever banned. No, he was never banned. He left on his own accord because you minions had no way of grasping his ginormous intellect. You fools! You could have had his trading secrets for free...now it will cost you just under 200 bucks! Although, if he could sell his book for $200, what do you think someone with an actual successful and astonishing record like Eric could sell his for? Twacowfca, you guys better sign Eric up now...he has no idea what he's worth yet. Cheers! I could sell it for the cost of my reputation, dignity, privacy all rolled into one. It would be expensive!

And how much sales growth have these promotions brought them? Or how much is lost after taking them away?

Right, see this is where they're gouging me on that quoted $50,421 for the 10,000 watt system. Your $14,000 price includes design of the system, permitting, marketing, overhead.... etc.... etc... And presumably they are making a profit on your system, or they would be asking for a higher price. On your system, they install one inverter... same as mine (not the same inverter, just the same total install time). So the extra $36,000 they're charging me is for what exactly? Once you are already up on the roof each additional panel you install is not that much additional work. That's where the scalability comes in and it all flows to their pocket -- none to the customer.

The issue is with the soft costs: http://www.technologyreview.com/news/509196/why-solar-installations-cost-more-in-the-us-than-in-germany/ I'm disappointed that Solar City is not using the efficiencies of it's scale to drive down soft costs. If you swallow the argument that the US market for installed residental solar is high fragmented and that Mom-and-Pop installers are inefficient and those high soft costs are holding back more widespread solar adoption... then.... why isn't Solar City using it's economies of scale to bring down the soft costs?