TSLA - Tesla Motors

[muscleman]

I'd rather that they spend more time improving charging time than range. There is no difference between 280 vs 315 miles range but big difference between a 5 minute charge vs a 40 minute charge.

[fareastwarriors]

I'd rather that they spend more time improving charging time than range. There is no difference between 280 vs 315 miles range but big difference between a 5 minute charge vs a 40 minute charge.

 

Once they roll out supercharger v3 to more places, that will boost the speed of charging.

[Investmentacct]

I'd rather that they spend more time improving charging time than range. There is no difference between 280 vs 315 miles range but big difference between a 5 minute charge vs a 40 minute charge.

Driven 75K miles in combined 2 Tesla for past 2 & 1/2 years. Drove 500 gas miles in same time. Charging time concern is over-rated concern, once you start charging in free solar charging which is available  in abundant way. For reduced charging time, visit V3 charger to see Model 3 charging at 650 mi/hr to 1000 mi/hr with 2018 battery tech. Usually , you do not go to fill up like gas recurrently so that behavior fades away, once you charge at home, you will never miss gas station.

[fareastwarriors]

I'd rather that they spend more time improving charging time than range. There is no difference between 280 vs 315 miles range but big difference between a 5 minute charge vs a 40 minute charge.

Driven 75K miles in combined 2 Tesla for past 2 & 1/2 years. Drove 500 gas miles in same time. Charging time concern is over-rated concern, once you start charging in free solar charging which is available  in abundant way. For reduced charging time, visit V3 charger to see Model 3 charging at 650 mi/hr to 1000 mi/hr with 2018 battery tech. Usually , you do not go to fill up like gas recurrently so that behavior fades away, once you charge at home, you will never miss gas station.

 

I have a 3 for year and half and only used supercharge once. That was just to try it.

Charge at home.

[A Dhandho Investor]

I definitely get the excitement over the results and the fact that the stock has been printing fresh all time highs in after hours trading. The net loss decreased from almost 1b in 2018 to only 862 million in 2019 after all. In addition to that, there was a whopping YoY revenue growth of 1% in Q4.

 

I also like the fact that in Q4, Tesla suddenly decided to report adjusted EBITDA instead of regular EBITDA in the update letters, adding back stock based compensation and a number of other items.

 

Does anybody understand btw how it is in shareholders best interest that Elon has a performance based compensation based on adjusted EBITDA, ignoring stock based compensation of about 800 million per year?

 

edit: Ow yeah, another observation for the "Tesla fraud pile", this time on the solar glass roof tiles. The Q4 update letter says this:

Solarglass tiles are made in our Gigafactory New York, and we are hiring hundreds of employees at this facility.

 

In practice, they just seem to be made in China.. https://pv-magazine-usa.com/2020/01/29/does-tesla-make-solar-glass-roof-tile-in-its-buffalo-factory-or-in-china/

 

[A Dhandho Investor]

Going through the conference call transcript now. Can you be more vague in your answers than this?

 

A question on the number of orders they have for the Solarglass Roof:

we are seeing, I admitly promise from a small base, exponential growth in demand and output for our Solarglass Roof. So it's a real hard to predict what that will be this year except that the demand is very strong [...]

 

So no idea on the number of orders, but exponential growth will be ensured.

 

On how many California owners are currently insured with Tesla insurance and what is the target for 2020:

 

Yes, so Tesla Insurance is currently available in California. A couple of things that we're working on this front, the first is to expand it to other locations and we are preparing the regulatory processes, preparing our processes to go through the regulatory processes in those locations. We're also working on the processes to continue to adjust our rates in California, which also have to go through regulatory processes as insurance is quite heavily regulated. And that's where we're spending our time focusing on Tesla Insurance right now. There is a significant amount of innovation as we've discussed before in this space, exactly getting to the intent of what the question, here is using our technology to reduce rates. And this will be rolled in over time.

 

So no idea of the number of insurance holders, but a lot of progress is being made!

 

On FSD - you set expectations that you would be feature complete on FSD by the end of 2019. Can you please provide an update on when will we see this -- but with end users, where are you in retrofitting the FSD computer to older models?

 

Well, I mean, to be precise, I said I was hoping would be feature complete with both FSD by the end of last year. We got pretty close, it's looking like we might be feature complete in a few months. The feature complete just means like it has some chance of going from your home to work let's say with no debentures. So, that's -- it does mean the features are working well, but it means it has above zero chance.[...]

 

On a possible capital raise given the high share price:

 

Well, we're actually spending money as quickly as we can spend it sensibly. So if there's any sensible way to spend money, we're spending it. There is no artificial hold back on expenditures anything that I see that is what looks like a -- it's got good value for money[...]

 

On the cap-ex budget for 2020:

 

I don't know if we wanted to tell you, I don't think we want to say what our CapEx is going to be this year and certainly -- except to say that like -- as I said earlier, we're spending money as fast as we can spend money in sensible ways. So it's definitely not artificially limited. We will spend like a lot of money this year for sure. It's -- the challenge comes in like finding efficient ways to actually deploy the capital, that's the harder part then and sort of deciding on a CapEx number really.[...]

 

So they will not raise capital, because they believe the current funding is sufficient, but actually they don't have an idea of how much money they will spend in 2020  :o

[Liberty]

I'd rather that they spend more time improving charging time than range. There is no difference between 280 vs 315 miles range but big difference between a 5 minute charge vs a 40 minute charge.

 

Most of the charging is done at night while you're sleeping and you almost always drive off with a "full tank", unlike on a gas car. Only on long trips do you need to take these longer chages mid-drive, but usually by the time you've driven 300 miles, a stop to walk around a bit, go to the bathroom and eat something is a welcome thing. Few people will want to drive more than 300 miles without stopping for long, so for the vast majority of people it's a non-issue. In fact, I'll gladly trade off all those stops to the gas station for once or twice a year having to stop slightly longer during a longer trip.

[gary17]

i must be a lazy person

i just don't like to get out of my car in the winter (or summer) to stand there for 10min to put gas into my car ! 

i'd rather sit at the super charging station once in a while on a road trip, relax, watch a bit of Netflix on my tesla :)

[Dynamic]

I completely agree with the last two posters, that the reality is that charging at home (if you have somewhere to charge) and never visiting a gas station is far better than pumping gasoline once every week or two.

 

I suspect, however, that ubiquitous ultra-fast charging (e.g. 150-190 miles (240-300km), in 3 to 7 minutes) and medium-range at a lower price point may be a better sell for those who don't understand electric vehicles yet, and would really help take it over the hump. I suspect this would particularly be the case in Europe where more compact cars are favoured and where distances travelled aren't huge.

 

I suspect people would be a lot happier with 50-60 kWh batteries if they could add that sort of range that quickly while taking a brief stop, or even, like they do now, going off once a week to refill their car if they can't charge at home. Some people in US and Canada will happily queue at Costco for ages to get cheap gasoline, and many everywhere will take a trip out with a key part being to fill up for the week or ahead of a weekend trip.

 

It would bring up-front cost parity and similar convenience compared to gasoline cars if it could be achieved. However, I recognise that the physical chemistry involved and the physics do mean this is a tougher engineering hurdle than putting in a larger battery. So in reality it's probable that both energy density and charging speed will improve in parallel. Potentially the former will help reduce the weight, which will help increase miles per kWh and thus improve the speed of adding miles from the charger. I would expect Tesla to stay slightly ahead of its rivals for a few years yet. Everyone else either achieves great efficiency with only moderately fast charging (Hyundai, Kia etc) or achieves fast charging with poor efficiency and hampered range (Porsche, Jaguar), or worse, falls short on range and efficiency, albeit sometimes at lower price, or has insufficient active cooling (Nissan LEAF, yet not their eNV200).

[Liberty]

3-hour interview with Elon Musk about a little of everything in his life:

 

Pt1 https://overcast.fm/+VtRjaad-I

 

Pt2 https://overcast.fm/+VtRhZNSS8

[fareastwarriors]

China's CATL signs battery supply agreement with Tesla

 

 

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-tesla-catl-battery-electric/chinas-catl-signs-battery-supply-agreement-with-tesla-idUSKBN1ZX02D

[Liberty]

$720, what a crazy story...

[blainehodder]

I think this is it. I think it is finally the time to enter a Telsa short.

[Liberty]

I think this is it. I think it is finally the time to enter a Telsa short.

 

...said everyone for 10 years

 

(not saying it's wrong, just that it seemed right before too)

[blainehodder]

I think this is it. I think it is finally the time to enter a Telsa short.

 

...said everyone for 10 years

 

(not saying it's wrong, just that it seemed right before too)

 

I do recognize that. Maybe I'll be the one to get it right.

[rkbabang]

I think this is it. I think it is finally the time to enter a Telsa short.

 

...said everyone for 10 years

 

(not saying it's wrong, just that it seemed right before too)

 

I do recognize that. Maybe I'll be the one to get it right.

 

I suspect that you are correct, but I still wouldn't do it.

 

[Kaegi2011]

Going through the conference call transcript now. Can you be more vague in your answers than this?

 

Having seen a few large corporates operate from the inside, I can tell you that Wall St. over values precision and stability to everyone's detriment.  The world is fluid, business conditions change, and at the end of the day long term FCF is what we wish all companies to deliver.  However, to have "credibility" in the eyes of Wall St. means doing everything to meet expectations, and be really precise on a few key numbers.  Yes, the accountability of the mgmt team is important, but often times investors believe that these numbers provide a level of safety for their investments when in reality it does not (and many times the actions that lead to meeting the numbers actually reduce the moat of a company). 

 

I don't have a position in the stock, nor do I own a Tesla, so I have no dog in the fight.  From afar, however, it seems that Elon at least deserves a wide berth to operate the company for the best outcome in the long run.  If that means imprecision on capex, then so be it.  None of us here, I think, should pretend that we know better than he in terms of how to invest capital for long term growth. 

[Gilp]

Going through the conference call transcript now. Can you be more vague in your answers than this?

 

Having seen a few large corporates operate from the inside, I can tell you that Wall St. over values precision and stability to everyone's detriment.  The world is fluid, business conditions change, and at the end of the day long term FCF is what we wish all companies to deliver.  However, to have "credibility" in the eyes of Wall St. means doing everything to meet expectations, and be really precise on a few key numbers.  Yes, the accountability of the mgmt team is important, but often times investors believe that these numbers provide a level of safety for their investments when in reality it does not (and many times the actions that lead to meeting the numbers actually reduce the moat of a company). 

 

I don't have a position in the stock, nor do I own a Tesla, so I have no dog in the fight.  From afar, however, it seems that Elon at least deserves a wide berth to operate the company for the best outcome in the long run.  If that means imprecision on capex, then so be it.  None of us here, I think, should pretend that we know better than he in terms of how to invest capital for long term growth.

 

Very sane view. Agree.

[Dalal.Holdings]

;D

 

Out of my self imposed exile to say...

 

You shorted the Edison of our time based on Tweets and CNBC reporting???

 

 

Portrait of a very sad $TSLAQ existence:

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2020-01-22/the-tesla-tslaq-skeptics-who-bet-against-elon-musk

 

Is this a worthwhile way to live a life? Is Elon really such a villain to these people? Wtf did he do to them? Turns out the internet makes some people a lot less wise.

[Dalal.Holdings]

Going through the conference call transcript now. Can you be more vague in your answers than this?

 

Having seen a few large corporates operate from the inside, I can tell you that Wall St. over values precision and stability to everyone's detriment.  The world is fluid, business conditions change, and at the end of the day long term FCF is what we wish all companies to deliver.  However, to have "credibility" in the eyes of Wall St. means doing everything to meet expectations, and be really precise on a few key numbers.  Yes, the accountability of the mgmt team is important, but often times investors believe that these numbers provide a level of safety for their investments when in reality it does not (and many times the actions that lead to meeting the numbers actually reduce the moat of a company). 

 

I don't have a position in the stock, nor do I own a Tesla, so I have no dog in the fight.  From afar, however, it seems that Elon at least deserves a wide berth to operate the company for the best outcome in the long run.  If that means imprecision on capex, then so be it.  None of us here, I think, should pretend that we know better than he in terms of how to invest capital for long term growth.

 

Jeff Immelt and Virginia Rometty gave great conference calls with precise figures and forecasts (that never came true). They both left their companies with lots of money.

 

Unlike them, Elon has skin in the game with his companies and no plan to leave and most of his net worth tied up in them. Sloppiness and sleeping on the factory floor should be a virtue over CEOs who spend time on the golf course.

[Dalal.Holdings]

Anyway, I will leave you now to continue to invest in the dying dinosaurs of last century like DD and LBTYA with your precise EBITDAs. Back to your entertaining selves, CoBF!

 

Edit: add BA,GM to the mix. BA screwed up the clock on their manned rocket and used third rate programmers for their 737 Max? Who would have thought software would be so important to these companies that grew accustomed to excelling only in the hardware domain?  :o

[petec]

Going through the conference call transcript now. Can you be more vague in your answers than this?

 

Having seen a few large corporates operate from the inside, I can tell you that Wall St. over values precision and stability to everyone's detriment.  The world is fluid, business conditions change, and at the end of the day long term FCF is what we wish all companies to deliver.  However, to have "credibility" in the eyes of Wall St. means doing everything to meet expectations, and be really precise on a few key numbers.  Yes, the accountability of the mgmt team is important, but often times investors believe that these numbers provide a level of safety for their investments when in reality it does not (and many times the actions that lead to meeting the numbers actually reduce the moat of a company). 

 

I don't have a position in the stock, nor do I own a Tesla, so I have no dog in the fight.  From afar, however, it seems that Elon at least deserves a wide berth to operate the company for the best outcome in the long run.  If that means imprecision on capex, then so be it.  None of us here, I think, should pretend that we know better than he in terms of how to invest capital for long term growth.

 

I agree entirely with all of this, but IMHO there is a difference between being imprecise and being vague. In other words, it's possible to say "I don't know" or "that level of precision is impossible/useless" rather than to waffle incoherently.

 

Mind you it takes a very concise communicator to come over well on a transcript. Sometimes listening rather than reading turns an incoherent CEO into a coherent one.

 

None of this is aimed at Tesla or Musk - just general comments.

[chrispy]

This is all fascinating and I have no skin in this game.

 

But, how much more upside does this share price currently have? Could this double and be worth $250b in a few years? Seems crazy to me but I am also not that imaginative.

[Kaegi2011]

I agree entirely with all of this, but IMHO there is a difference between being imprecise and being vague. In other words, it's possible to say "I don't know" or "that level of precision is impossible/useless" rather than to waffle incoherently.

 

Mind you it takes a very concise communicator to come over well on a transcript. Sometimes listening rather than reading turns an incoherent CEO into a coherent one.

 

None of this is aimed at Tesla or Musk - just general comments.

 

I think this is where the context matters.  If one views vague comments as a reflection of a lack of understanding and grasp of the business, then for sure it's a negative.  However, if it's just a canned response to a question in which the CEO does not want to answer, for strategic reasons or otherwise, then I think it's perfectly acceptable.  At that point, the decision is choosing between "No, I will not answer that question, next!" vs. "babble babble let me deflect the question."  Maybe some folks would prefer the transparency of the former, but I certainly understand the desire to choose the latter. 

[Kaegi2011]

But, how much more upside does this share price currently have? Could this double and be worth $250b in a few years? Seems crazy to me but I am also not that imaginative.

 

I'm probably the least qualified person here to opine, but if they did 1bn of FCF in the last quarter, and 4bn of FCF on an annualized basis, then their current valuation (~30x?) isn't outrageous.  There are definitely worse positioned companies with less growth prospects trading for same if not lower FCF yields...