The future of Tesla

[hobbsyoyo]

I haven't heard a peep about Tesla's solar roof tiles which I take to mean that the claims they are cheaper than conventional roofs came with a giant asterisk.

The most frustrating thing about following Musk companies is trying to see through the smoke and mirrors.

 

[Oerdin]

It is rather ironic that these analysts kept attacking Tesla claiming not releasing a $35,000 vehicle was a broken promise but when they do release a $35,000 vehicle the very same analysts short the company claiming this will reduce profits.

 

[Oerdin]

Tesla paid out a rather large bond today, after Musk's gamble to raise the stock pcie and convert it to stock failed. I wonder how much cash it has remaining, and whether it got some new loans?

https://www.yahoo.com/news/germany-strip-fighters-citizenship-135322844.html

In Dec of last year they had $3.7 billion cash on hand and were profitable with positive cash flow.

 

[hobbsyoyo]

https://www.yahoo.com/news/germany-strip-fighters-citizenship-135322844.html

In Dec of last year they had $3.7 billion cash on hand and were profitable with positive cash flow.

That's looking more and more like a one-off event for him. He's giving all appearances of gutting the business to claw back cash to keep the lines moving and prop up the stock price. When Tesla shutters their stores, they will be open to massive lease-breaking fines; I think I read something like $1.3 billion in lease obligations will now be open to drawn out legal fights if they go through with cancelling the leases. They'll still end up saving money over the long run but not as much as they would appear to at first blush with this move and any time you invite litigation, you're asking for trouble.

I believe I also read that the FTC is again investigating Elon for flaunting the settlement he reached with them. Just like how his security clearance is being reviewed for smoking weed, he hurts his companies by being a bit of a jerk.

 

[Zkribbler]

Just like how his security clearance is being reviewed for smoking weed, .

OMG! He did something totally legal!

 

[hobbsyoyo]

OMG! He did something totally legal!

I think prohibition is pretty awful but I have to say that was an absolutely stupid thing for him to have done. it ranks right up there with calling that cave diving rescuer a pedo. Actually it's worse because the potential consequences apply to his company and not just himself. NASA is also reportedly looking into the culture of SpaceX at the behest of Senator Richard Shelby (R-AL) who really has it out for the company as their main competitor is in his district.

 

[Oerdin]

It was legal to smoke weed in California; yeah, not the brighteat thing in the world but hardly worth dwelling on either.

The Model Y geta revealed next qeek and the pickup truck (sloughted in the midsize segment which is both large and fast growing) will be soon after that. True, These projects will take money to bring to market and completing rhe Shanghai factory this year will also take money while Trump's trade war id making life difficult for automalers and that will be a drag. That daid the Model Y will have 80% parts commonality with the Model 3 while the pickup will have around 60% parts commonality. That is where things really get interesting and they become a full line up automaker.

Yep, they are cutting costs to move production and marketing costs more in line with the industry average but that is a good thing, a very good thing, and it helps to secure the company's long term position in the future. This company is not going to go away and it will continue to grow by leaps and bounds into the foreseeable future (five year time frame).

 

[hobbsyoyo]

They already spend less on advertising and sales efforts than all the other automakers by a large margin.

 

[Goodfella]

It is rather ironic that these analysts kept attacking Tesla claiming not releasing a $35,000 vehicle was a broken promise but when they do release a $35,000 vehicle the very same analysts short the company claiming this will reduce profits.

That's a fair point, and the short sellers and Seeking Alpha haters are going to spin Tesla news no matter what. However, when good news is accompanied by drastic measures, it doesn't make the good news seem all that great. If I told you that I'm going to sell all my belongings to help pay my credit card debt, how would you take that? That being said, I can see closing the stores being the smart choice, regardless of model 3 sales. They're making a bet that they can maintain robust sales through an online platform. If it works, the entire auto industry will follow them (more or less) and they'll save a ton. If it doesn't, I could see them setting up a franchise system (how that would work without oil changes/etc, I have no clue) while still saving.

 

[hobbsyoyo]

Tesla is reversing their plans to close stores and are raising prices for their cars by 3%. It's really hard to see any of this as anything but desperation.

 

[Lexicus]

Tesla is reversing their plans to close stores and are raising prices for their cars by 3%. It's really hard to see any of this as anything but desperation.

It feels increasingly like this all ends with a Jon Shafer-style Mea Culpa blog post from Elon after he dyes part of his hair blue and starts smoking clove cigarettes.

 

[hobbsyoyo]

Not to step on your awesome joke but he's famously anti-smoking. He funded Thank You for Smoking (in which he cameos as the pilot of his private jet which is also in the movie) and I'm somewhat surprised he doesn't nicotine-screen his employees, such is his hatred of smoking.

I'm actually thinking this might end with him in jail for stock manipulation.

 

[Lexicus]

Not to step on your awesome joke but he's famously anti-smoking. He funded Thank You for Smoking (in which he cameos as the pilot of his private jet which is also in the movie) and I'm somewhat surprised he doesn't nicotine-screen his employees, such is his hatred of smoking.

I'm actually thinking this might end with him in jail for stock manipulation.

That just makes the jokes (my joke about Elon must be distinguished from Elon, the joke) funnier! Also the fact that he smoked the cheeba with Joe Rogan even more surreal.

 

[Oerdin]

That's a fair point, and the short sellers and Seeking Alpha haters are going to spin Tesla news no matter what. However, when good news is accompanied by drastic measures, it doesn't make the good news seem all that great. If I told you that I'm going to sell all my belongings to help pay my credit card debt, how would you take that? That being said, I can see closing the stores being the smart choice, regardless of model 3 sales. They're making a bet that they can maintain robust sales through an online platform. If it works, the entire auto industry will follow them (more or less) and they'll save a ton. If it doesn't, I could see them setting up a franchise system (how that would work without oil changes/etc, I have no clue) while still saving.

They have already acaled back the plan to close company owned sales centers. They have admitted what they need to do is get more efficient on the manufacturing side. The hired to many people during the big push to ramp up production and now they are fixing that and optimizing their lines with the experience gained. This is pretty nornal stuff.

 

[hobbsyoyo]

This is pretty nornal stuff.

Not really? If it was, people wouldn't be so worked up about it all. Tesla is a lot of things but I wouldn't call it normal.

 

[civvver]

This is nuts and why anyone would buy one of these things right now is beyond me. Too much uncertainty with it and it's a product you plan to keep a while and needs to be reliable and have a place to be serviced.

 

[innonimatu]

A possible update on Musk's past antics at Tesla:

Elon Musk. Although he wasn’t asked about the Business Insider story the following day at the company’s annual meeting, he stewed for weeks, dispatching a team of investigators to try to figure out who’d shared the information with the press.
The leaker, they determined, was one Martin Tripp, a slight man of 40 who’d spent his career in a series of low-level manufacturing jobs before finding his way to the assembly line at the Gigafactory. Tripp later claimed to be an idealist trying to get Tesla to tighten its operations; Musk saw him as a dangerous foe who engaged in “extensive and damaging sabotage,” as he wrote in a staff memo.
[...]
Musk set out to destroy him. Tesla’s PR department spread rumors that Tripp was possibly homicidal and had been part of a grand conspiracy. On Twitter, Musk suggested the Business Insider reporter, Linette Lopez, was on the payroll of short sellers and claimed Tripp had admitted to taking bribes from her in exchange for “valuable Tesla IP.” Lopez denied the allegation.

The Tripp incident was the beginning of a social media meltdown so epic that the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission forced Tesla to appoint a so-called Twitter sitter, an in-house lawyer who’s supposed to vet Musk’s tweets. Since last summer, Musk’s antics have included:
Baselessly accusing a British cave diver on Twitter of pedophilia;
Falsely claiming on (where else?) Twitter that investors had put up funds to take Tesla private at $420 a share, leading to an SEC lawsuit;
Somehow igniting a feud with B-list hip-hop artist Azealia Banks (“Elon will learn very soon who is more powerful of us two,” Banks posted on Instagram);
Puffing a joint during a live podcast taping, causing the federal government to review the security clearance needed for his rocket company, SpaceX.

Musk’s treatment of Tripp threatens to complicate this legal and regulatory mess. The security manager at the Gigafactory, an ex-military guy with a high-and-tight haircut named Sean Gouthro, has filed a whistleblower report with the SEC. Gouthro says Tesla’s security operation behaved unethically in its zeal to nail the leaker. Investigators, he claims, hacked into Tripp’s phone, had him followed, and misled police about the surveillance. Gouthro says that Tripp didn’t sabotage Tesla or hack anything and that Musk knew this and sought to damage his reputation by spreading misinformation.

 

[hobbsyoyo]

Well that certainly fits the pattern.

 

[Oerdin]

Model Y unvailing event with Elon Musk. Tesla now has a midsized SUV, which is a super hot segment in North America and China, 3.5 seconds 0-60, very low drag coefficient, supposedly handles well, and it manages to look both good and distinctive while still obviously being a Tesla. Parts commonality with the model 3 is very high so both the Model 3 and Model Y cqn be built on the same production line allowing fqcilities to be used efficiently and for production to be maximized for what ever orders are needed.

 

[hobbsyoyo]

I like the styling of Teslas but they are not distinct from each other. I still have trouble identifying different models when I see them on the street and this is made worse because I do not believe the Model 3 even has any badging to identify it as a Model 3. This one has a mini-grill; neat, but it still looks almost identical to their other models. And that's fine, they do look great but I wouldn't call them distinct. The big standout in the lineup is the original Model S with the bulb-chin thing it had going on which was dropped to be more like the Model X when that came out.

And I feel like the 80% commonality thing is a bogie he's throwing out to gin up investor support. The Model X was supposed to be mostly common with the Model S and that didn't save it from production hell anymore than Model 3's commonality with the other vehicles did. It sounds amazing to say something is mostly common but the devil is in the details in complex engineering projects. That 20% difference can easily suck up a ton of design and productive efforts - if it is even that low to begin with. I do not take statements like this from Musk at face value anymore.