A lightly modified Tesla Model 3 Performance (different wheels, brakes, suspension) just came within 2 seconds of the Taycan Turbo unofficial record at Nurburgring. What's more, the track was classified as "damp" and there was other traffic. When we get a dry day and this near production 3 beats the Taycan, and it will, there will be plenty of balloons dropping and free publicity for Tesla. I literally feel bad for Tesla's competition, although the Volkswagen Group is no slouch and will surely be back with better times of their own. Meanwhile, GM is hiring EV engineers at best speed. It's great to see GM working toward saving itself from failure. I hope they make it.
I've been trying to figure out how far ahead of the pack we are, in this thread. As best I can tell, we have been 6 months to 4 years ahead of the vast majority of the public and even other investors, varying with the topic. Here are the world beaters: - FSD (this is literally an existential threat to every other auto maker on the planet) - 4680 tabless cell format (Tesla needs this more than other car makers but, one day, they will need it too) - dry anode - SuperCharger network I view the manufacturing evolution at Tesla as more helpful to Tesla. For example, the cast sub-frame seems to be a big production boost but not necessarily an industry beater. Legacy auto makers don't require the efficiency of the casting system to produce huge volumes of cars but it is an edge which improves Tesla's margin so improves their competitiveness.
I've read a few articles that suggest Biden/Harris will help Tesla but I don't see how. If Tesla could produce more cars, they would. They are fighting aggressively to expand their business and have all the money they need to do so.
I'm sure those articles are predicated around investment long-term on infrastructure, charging stations, etc. which would probably bode well for shifting public perception about ease of charging, etc. Ending subsidies for oil companies and possibly shifting those subsidies to more green options and more focus on the environment in general will probably help long-term as well. Agreed on the short/mid-term though, there should be no effect.
Six weeks ago, just before Battery Day, it was clear Roadrunner would not be complete in time. The parking lot was full of construction materials and the second floor addition was missing a piece of roof at the very back. The missing roof wasn't visible from the street but clear from various drone footage. They cleaned out the parking lot, made the place look almost done, and held Battery Day. Drone video from this morning shows Roadrunner is still missing a piece of roof and the parking lot has more construction materials than ever. This operation does not have the look of a project that is "almost done". I don't believe there is any fraud involved in this. Tesla seems to have gotten used to operating in construction zones and less than ideal physical facilities. I have no doubt, research and prototyping is moving forward smoothly with nerds watching cat videos on YouTube standing next to burly, ball scratching men with whiskers and hard hats. More interesting is speculation on how much space at Roadrunner is dedicated to the 10GWh/y of production. Roadrunner is about 150K ft^2, I speculate first floor will be used for production and floors two and three for research and cat videos. Looking at the permits, the first floor is about 65K ft^2. Assuming 85% manufacturing footprint, that leaves 55K ft^2 for battery production. 85% is unlikely, given requirements for elevators, secure entrances, loading docs, electrical closets, etc. These footprint subtractions add up but let's be optimistic. Giga Nevada, without the large second building, is planned to be over 15M ft^2. Assuming 80% manufacturing footprint devoted exclusively to batteries brings us to 2,2 TWh/y capacity. On Battery Day, Elon projected Tesla will produce 3TWh/y of batteries by 2030. That number looks easily doable. At this point, we can clearly see a path to battery self sufficiency, 10M cars per year, and dominating stationary storage. People who watched the Battery Day presentation and declared it to be a nothing burger are morons who are incapable of analyzing Tesla. The potential down side in this is that Tesla has promised the world. If it was any company other than Tesla making these projections, I would short the company knowing they are charletains. In Tesla's case, I give them a 50% chance of meeting the goal and a 90% chance of coming close but taking a bit longer than expected.
With Phase 2b coming to a close in Shanghai, Tesla is doing exactly what you would expect. That is, working on the foundation for a new building. I'd like to know what this is. It looks like a vehicle podium. It's by the river so it might be a good place for photography? Or, perhaps they are going to produce vehicles for Nikola and these ramps will get the trucks rolling fast enough to make it off the property.
Re: Tesla Valuation. The market assumes $~400B. Most of us would call it overvalued, with the potential to be much greater than that. Has anyone seen anywhere where someone has gone about separating Tesla out into the various businesses that are under their roof to try and tease out what people are paying for the value vs. the potential of Tesla.
I'm pretty sure someone has done exactly that, Chris. BTW, welcome to Stockaholics. It's nice to see you posting.
Tesla is on the cusp of another production step forward at Giga Shanghai that will bring them to annualized production of 300K units. I believe this will come from two fully operational general assembly lines. By the end of next year, Tesla plans to scale Model Y production at Shanghai to 250K units. They have Chinese certification and are sampling now. This is going to result in an operation I'm calling "the flood". There will be heavy exports from China to Europe. The only region fully serviced, right now, is the US. Even here, this only applies to Model 3. There is a big queue for Model Y orders. At some point, I expect Chinese Model Y on American soil.
The latest I’ve seen from Troy Teslike is that Tesla is on track to hitting 500k vehicles for 2020. This would be a great achievement for Team Tesla in the midst of this pandemic. I just thought it would be interesting to look ahead at likely production rates in the next couple years. Q4 2020 Production Rates: Fremont: 125k in Q4 (500k ARR) S,3,X,Y China: 69k in Q4 (275k ARR) 3 Yearly 2021 Predicted (1.1-1.2M) Fremont: 600k -75k MS/X, 300k M3, 225k MY China: 500k -370k M3, 130k MY Berlin: 50-100k Texas: 50-100k Fun to watch this company put the pieces in place.
Hi Chris. Thank you for posting good content. I believe Mr. Teslike got his information from this rumor that came on Nov. 8.
Teslarati reports index funds will be buying $8B of stock on or shortly after December 21. That is obviously an approximation that will vary with the price of the moment but their point is clear: it will be an impactful event.
With the help of S&P 500 inclusion my JAN 15 2021 $500C is almost break-even (was down more than $13000 before). I have just bought a couple of JAN 20 2023 $200C LEAP. The future is bright, just pray that Elon Musk will be fully recovered from the coronavirus.
