Very good post.

Ok once again, I specifically prefaced that post about the Boring Co and the missing VINs as a conspiracy theory! That is not what I am basing my bets on.

Like I said in my first response- Gali literally believes that Wall Street is conspiring against Tesla by setting their estimates "too high" to set Tesla up for disappointment. He has no understanding of balance sheets, income statements, Tesla's market cap and growth multiple, etc. His "numbers" consist of Tesla's 2018 sales which no bear disagrees with and which are completely irrelevant to forecasting Tesla's stock price and business prospects going FORWARD.

The bear case has always been that
1. Tesla's stock is absurdly overvalued and based on vaporware and future roadmap that will never happen (FSD, flying roadster, semi, solar roof, etc)

2. Tesla can't sell enough cars in their current market segment to support their bloated capital structure and infrastructure and desperately need to produce a mass-market car in volume ($35k). Q3 was a high water mark that was achieved by virtue of fulfilling almost 3 years of pent-up demand in 3 months and by focusing on fulfilling the highest margin orders from their reservation list.

3. Despite everything going in their favor and despite gaming the numbers by holding back Q2 cars and securing supplier rebates (likely by making future commitments.) Tesla still turned only a small profit.

Everything that is happening right now confirms that its been downhill since Q3- the executive departures, the layoffs, the slashed guidance, the lack of investment in their future product line (Model Y, Semi, Roadster, Service Centers, Supercharger Network, etc), the empty Gigafactory 2, worldwide economy and automobile economy faltering, and yes the lots full of cars and lack of sales as reported by ground observers across the country.

Finally its not grasping at straws to point out that the M3s have a lot of issues because they weren't tested properly but that is really tangential to the lack of demand issue.

Yeah it's like those old alex jones videos of a bunch of fenced in areas with thousands of plastic burial liners. It's hilariously the same filmmaking style. FEMA IS STOCKPILING MILLIONS OF COFFINS FOLKS I HAVE THE DOCUMENTS! ELON MUSK IS RUNNING TESLA CAMPS AND WILL BECOME OUR SUPREME LIZARD OVERLORD!!!

No sane bear doubted that they could sell a lot of Model 3s in the first quarter or two. That was never the bear case. You're strawmanning pretty hard.

#1 selling luxury vehicle for a short time was pretty much a given. Profitability wasn't, but 1-2 barely profitable quarters means next to nothing.

KEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEED,

Feel free to post your own predictions for January or Q1 deliveries instead of your usual strawmanning.

The only argument I'm making is that the only analysis dumber than filming parking lots full of cars is running around FEMA facilities counting how many large plastic bins they have sitting around. It tells you very little about how the company is doing. So I'm not sure what I'm straw manning exactly. I'm just laughing at dudes obsessing over how many cars are sitting in a ****ing parking lot.

1. Lots full of cars not being delivered to customers was one of first pieces of evidence showing that the 420k reservations were bunk and Tesla was no longer "supply constrained" as they'd led the market to believe. (its also weak evidence for channel stuffing or some kind of related party sale but far from conclusive.)

2. Leading to what is now being observed- collapse in sales.

Interesting video. I wonder which concept is closer to being viable, the loop or the hyperloop (aka vactrain). I like the loop concept although I've never been under the illusion that such a project could be successfully implemented in my lifetime. The hyperloop concept just seems stupid though, particularly if it is built above ground.

when the company is telling everyone they are supply-constrained and all of a sudden there is half a billion in inventory sitting around in parking lots all over the country collecting dust, that obviously raises some questions.

Bulls are in a tough spot here, hard not to feel for them. Path of degradation:

-Believe in popular mechanics flying cars promises. Nothing wrong with taking the loser bait, it's fun to dream of the future etc..

-Brush off funding secured, 10k a week. "These were only projections and the SP is still high."

-Now they are forced to avoid verified sales declines of 80+% by looking away like a guilty dog.


Believing in Tesla is believing in your own special-ness, when the mind can no longer ignore the clash between reality and pretend it breaks down. Very confident our bulls can create a new make believe to support themselves soon.

And in time monthly and quarterly sales numbers will answer all these questions. But flying drones around parking lots and breathlessly posting videos going guys guys guys I'VE SOLVED TESLA is just conspiracy nonsense. If someone obsessively documented various GM lots I'm sure there would be able to build similar obsessive Alex Jones styled videos where you're not getting the whole picture or a good idea of what GM's sales or position is.

Seriously?

Very interesting that Saudi Arabia hedged its stake in TSLA (owns 4.9% of the company) on January 17th, the day before TSLA announced layoffs. The news claims locking in the hedge when the stock was $347 was just good timing.

Technically the truth. It was just good timing because they knew what was coming

KEEEEEEEEED,

You might want to review the two rational responses you got before doubling down on your hot take.

Obviously this type of information is only valuable before the sales numbers become public knowledge. So yeah- the sales numbers will answer all questions eventually but if you want to make any money you have to put your bets down before the numbers are released.

I mean if you don't believe the twitter reports of no demand and massive amounts of inventory from 10+ different locations around the country that all corroborate each other just google the operating hours for Marina Del Ray, California delivery center.

Monday, Sunday CLOSED.
Tuesday-Saturday don't open until 10am.

Hmmmm.........

This is a delivery center that these conspiracy nutters observed selling 140+ cars per week in September and 100+ per week in October. But in January they cut their operating hours by 40%?

Hmmmm.......

The kid behind the #s I refuse to look at due to group think:

https://twitter.com/Gfilche/status/1057666167802904576

Thanks, this guy has most of it right, some of it wrong, but a good listen regardless. For example, you don't need wide curves like he mentioned, you only need to slow down the guidance system to navigate sharper curves.

I think you mean what the Boring Co. is doing to relieve urban traffic congestion, not the interurban long-distance hyperloop. I believe Hyperloop has a chance with moving freight, probably not humans though.

Yeah, the idea of indiscriminate digging of dozens of single-lane tunnels under major urban areas like New York is idiotic on many levels, and generally impossible to avoid major calamities both in development and operation. Also, this guy did not bring up delays in digging, e.g. when LA Red Line got delayed a year when encountering methane gas.

All that is really required to reduce traffic congestion is incremental improvements in autonomous navigation, V2V, improvements in intersections which do not require stopping/waiting (e.g. roundabouts), and conversion of selected freeways to high-speed autonomous vehicles only to allow very high-speed high-volume travel.

I forgot to mention that relying on new technology such as V2V networks introduces other risks, such as cyberterrorism.

Disagree, it’s not marginally profitable, spiking one or 2 quarters is easy in an immediate rev Rec industry, that doesn’t make you a profitable company

I think it’s pretty clear that boring only exists to try and siphon cash from govt entities. What’s weird is it makes me think Elon might actually be smart. What better way to create a never ending cash flow than a govt contract for mass transit?

Gov. Brown convinced enough people that a $100B bullet train from norcal to socal was a good idea, so you are probably correct.

Politicians + Musk = sheer lunacy

Great find! I wonder how many more shares he bought (maybe he just bought 1 share). I should hire him to watch my dogs. Although, honestly I don't think he can handle them.

If TSLA goes under I'm gonna feel bad for the fella. he does make good videos even if his investment decisions are very questionable.

BTW, I know you kids like to use the word kid quite loosely but I would like to point out that despite having the same job I had when I was 11 years old, he isn't actually a kid. He attended NYU Stern undergrad, Class of 2015. It's not entirely clear to me whether he graduated but I guess we should assume he did since he was there for 4 years.

Yeah that’s my take. We can promise some magic despite not having anything close to the tech and gullible politicians will eat it up. Seems pretty standard for musk and a just another window to understand him a bit more as some Lionel hutz monorail salesman.