I thought model 3 was one of best selling csrs in america last few months?

may this be a lesson for us all

It's like he hasn't even been reading this thread. The Model 3 was the best selling luxury car in the US in 2018 selling 138,000 units. In fact TSLA sold more Model 3s in the 2nd half of the year (118k+ units) than the #2 luxury vehicle sold all year (111,641 units for the Lexus RX) (Sources: Car and Driver Best Selling Luxury Cars 2018, HyperCharts Model 3 sales).

In December, TSLA destroyed the competition selling 25,250 Model 3s. The 2nd best luxury vehicle was the Mercedes C-Class which sold 6,799 units. To put this in context, the #1 selling passenger car overall was the Toyota Camry which sold 29,093 units. (Source)

Regardless, it's a pretty incredible call considering TSLA just recently became profitable, just now started construction on a GigaFactory in China, is finally ramping up production on its vehicles. Plus even some of the shorts are jumping on the TSLA bandwagon and while all the other tech stocks were plummeting October through December TSLA was moving higher.

you are comparing their sales to those of car companies and their stock price to that of tech companies.

what kind of company are they?

At worst they are a car company that won't be out of business by Q1 2019 as predicted ITT. At best they are a technology company that will revolutionize multiple industries.

is $7m growth capex per quarter enough to revolutionize multiple industries? asking for a friend with a tech company.

There's two years of backlog in that, so it's apples to oranges. Imagine Mercedes was selling their car at a loss + a $7500 tax credit, taking preorders. They'd be the best selling car for months after a two year wait.

No they didn't. But let's ignore all the accounting tricks and non-payments and "supplier rebate" tricks they pulled, and the great improvement of delivery times (a legitimate but one time boost of $700 million as it's equivalent to reducing inventory by 10 days). Let's say they made $300 million. They did this only while selling a far higher end car to eager first adopters at a huge markup of $63K. That is now long exhausted. Now what? After one times and accounting tricks they lost money with a $27K market per car and a $7.5K tax credit. AND with the Model X and Model S in the mix, which run to large profits at $100K/car. While scaling back all kinds of costs and capex. While SG&A barely moved. Let that sink in.
No they didn't. They already have a $9 billion factory there that they started in 2016:

No they aren't, they've been steady state since hitting 4300/week in July. The factory is now shut down on weekends and they're scaling back production.

Citron isn't a Tesla short. We know this for a fact. He sued Musk last year after he lost millions of dollars trading Tesla long after the "funding secured". His trades are in the filing. He also frequently flips and long and short on crap stocks.

The link you sent says they signed a contract in 2016. This article says they just started construction: https://www.teslarati.com/tesla-giga...rimeter-fence/

You all make strong cases for Tesla going out of business by the end of Q1 2019. I definitely disagree with your assessments but it will be interesting to see who is right.

Right. The contract didn't exist. It was a fraudulent PR exercise. The China factory has been announced many times, always with some "billions" number.

It's one of many examples of a purely fraudulent pump. Musk has a history of doing this. His "solar roofs" display was pure fakery on a grand scale to sell the acquisition of SCTY. He's been leaking China factory deals since 2014.

Now he lies and claims the factory will be built and production underway by the end of the year. This is a pure lie and he knows it; it's impossible to do.

This is the same total loser who said:

- We're going to have an alien dreadnought with "air friction limited" robots, then failed so badly at that he hand made shoddy cars in a tent while Tesla "was weeks away from dying" because of his utter stupidity and hubris.

- "What people should have zero doubt about, and I mean zero, is that Tesla will produce 10,000 Model 3s a week by the end of 2018".

The Chinese factory isn't going to happen. Sure they might build a shed for $30 million but they're not building cars there. There's no capex allocated for it. No SEC filings. Like the solar roofs fraud, he put on a big show to keep the stock pumped and get Chinese favors and maybe pull in Chinese investment money.
Your assessment will be different if you look at the history of Musk being a liar and a fraud. He's lied and pumped dozens of times on dozens of things that never eventuated, from "full autonomy" by 2017 which he charged $3000/unit for pure vaporware that could never be delivered, to "$420 funding secured" to Chinese factory agreements and on and on.

He's the greatest fraud of this decade and it's not close.

Right; where does anybody think they are getting 9 billion or whatever to build this thing. That's in addition to all the other money they need in the next 2-3 quarters.

This seems like a blatant pump to raise funds that will be used to keep TSLA on life support.

A fun theory is that Elon has gone even more 'rogue' lately with this kind of stuff.

- Premature showcase of Boring tunnel

- Clown fake tin-foil rocket

- Then he seems to be in China all alone, where is everyone else standing with him?

But that is the point, isn't it?

They gained a huge share of a niche market but still barely made a profit*. Now where do they go from there? How do they grow?

Not only can they not grow within their niche market but the demand in Q3 and early Q4 was still artificially high since there was pent-up demand from two years of hyping the M3 and making it seem exclusive with the reservation system.

They ran through that pent-up demand by early Q4 at the latest. But they still had the benefit of the full $7,500 tax credit until December 31st.

That is now halved to $3,750 so one would think that anyone who wanted a Tesla and had the money would have pulled the trigger in December. The anecdotal evidence provided by obsessed shorts across the country from Puget Sound, Portland, Tempe, Southern California, Denver, New Jersey, and Boston all says that is happening right now- delivery centers are dead and cars are piling up.

At some point they will get through this "air pocket" created by the tax credit halving event and reach an equilibrium run rate- but it won't be high enough to meet their leveraged fixed cost obligations.

Especially since they sacrificed quality and customer service in the mad rush to secure a profitable quarter. Elon will find out that buying a car is not like using Paypal- angry customers will stay angry and will tell all their friends if you don't fix their problems. You can't just let it burn.

*Tooth points out that even the modest profit they reported is tainted by shenanigans.

Pertinent to my point about Teslas not selling is the note released this morning by Baird "analyst" Ben Kallo reiterating his $465 price target while acknowledging that deliveries could decline sequentially in Q1 (due soleley to timing of international shipments.)

When that is coming from one of the biggest pumpers you know Q1 deliveries going to be a disaster.

At the same time Tesla tipped their hand on what excuse they will use to try to maintain the growth narrative. They are going to try to get 1000s of cars on a ship to Europe by the end of quarter (or at least pretend to.)

Of course this idea that the cars went to Europe instead of going to US buyers assumes that Tesla is still production constrained which is absurd. There are thousands if not tens of thousands of Teslas sitting in lots all over the country with no buyers.

And Tesla still doesn't have approval to sell the M3 in Europe. Strange.

Curious if you or anyone else would care to wager on this?

New year, same old bear echo chamber (I'm not a bull or bear, just an observation).

he'd be dumb to wager on it with you, if he's really right Tesla is going to be bankrupt in two and a half months and is willing to bet on it he can make an absolute killing on options with no escrow/counterparty risk.

The key statistic is that Tesla had 14,000 European orders for their higher end M3 cars. That's 3 weeks of production even at their paltry run rate. Then what?

Thanks Keeeeeed!

Already heavily wagered on a Tesla collapse although not really in the next two months.

That is just my attempt to make an epic prediction- what else are forums for?

Very true but since he's calling his shot I was curious if there was anything else behind that whether it be way OTM puts or a potential side bet.

For the life of me I couldn't figure out why Tesla wasn't selling M3s in Europe months ago. It seems like gross incompetence but maybe they already knew Europe demand wouldn't be high and this is a next level strategy to string this out further.

Maybe they intentionally delayed homologation in order to provide themselves with an excuse for poor Q1 numbers and also something to hype for the future.

Its always better to hype than to actually deliver because the delivery will inevitably be disappointing.

The kid is back. New year, same thread tard up.

Bankruptcy by April pays 73:1 on the $150 puts. Your $7000 to MrFeelNothin's $100, escrowed?

You think that's a good bet for you? Have you really thought this through?

Lol he's the one calling his shot plus why on earth would I book 70/1? Seems like if you are so confident he should be buying those huh Tooth? Someone is just mad he can't tard up the forum by himself today.

I know you guys like this alternate reality where Tesla is already bankrupt and Musk is out but let me know when it's actually going to happen. Waiting for five years+ since post one of this thread and hundreds/thousands of posts from the loud mouths driving the action.

On page 1, kind of funny how if you never posted again Tooth in this thread it probably would've been better served than the 1200+ posts that have followed in the years since. Stick with your original read...

I just did so lets see what happens.

Yep good luck man, I'm always looking to be proven wrong I just think it's not going to happen. The Detroit Auto show yesterday made it clear the competition no longer views Tesla as a niche threat, they are the leader in electric vehicles and will continue to be so until someone really challenges them. It's that simple, their customer base is willing to suffer through the headaches and Elon being a douche bag for the product. Doesn't sound like a bankruptcy is anywhere close but who knows? Maybe demand evaporates and Solar City blows up with an assist if the market tanks, a lot can happen in a couple months but evidence says the stock and sentiment will remain range bound.