Those battery fires are bad. There is no way to put them out other than smothering them and cutting off all oxygen. Then as soon as some oxygen gets in there, the lithium just ignites again!
re: lithium fires I've been wondering if that was what exacerbated the Lahaina fire. Once the fire got to the solar panels on top of the roofs, it was too fast to save a world-renowned tourist town. re: LIT, the lithium/battery ETF I thought it would be able to find its footing at 57.50 earlier this month, but now it is breaking down to a 53 handle. This ETF breaking down is a sign that TSLA is not so strong right now. LIT could really plummet. Chart confirms that TSLA is not breaking its downtrend.
Yeah I have ALB and the stock pretty much tank every single day, might see a prolonged bear market for lithium if recession hits in 2024
The MegaPack fire is a version 2 device. As far as I know, these units are populated with LiFePo4 cells which burn far less intensely than lithium ion based packs. I suspect the fire will burn for a day or two, they will replace a few MegaPacks, and the whole program will move forward without the entire installation burning down. That's one of the reasons I posted here. Traders may find an overcorrection in the negative, followed by a surprised market when things return to normal quickly. People are morons. They have no attention span for detail, as they are too busy thinking they know everything. This MegaPack failed because of a coolant leak. Tesla has done a bunch of work on MegaPack safety so this shows they still have a way to go. Much like the car fires, Tesla has only had a few fires and they are working hard, with some success, to make the number zero. Meanwhile, other manufacturers have entire installations burning down with no mention of it. The anti-Tesla rhetoric and media bias is real. The pro-Tesla fan boys are also real. This seems like a powder keg that would be a dream situation for a trader. But, what do I know... I'm no trader.
I think the fire at Bouldercomb has been out for many hours. They brought the battery back online and tested it, briefly. They are in the throws of a root cause analysis. I expect it will take several days before they announce the problem was a coolant leak, which they know now. Whatever the case, the stock doesn't seem to have swung that much but we are back at $250, at least.
I may be the only person on the site still interested in Tesla, but I will post a status update. The Giga Mexico project which was announced at the end of February of 2023 is still a abandoned. I don't see so much as an Atco trailer on site (my surveillance pics are several days old). When Tom Zhu discussed the project in March, he gave the impression they were going to attempt to set a construction record on this project (currently held by Giga Shanghai). There is activity at the Tesla Lithium site. I can see vehicles coming and going but it still consists of two relatively small buildings and a handful of people. This project was to be a bulwark intended to shore up the EV industry in the face of a lithium shortage. I speculate Tesla has sufficient contracted lithium supply, they don't want to help their opponents, and lithium may no longer have long term strategic value to the battery industry. Phase 2a of Giga Berlin seems to be ambling along sufficiently. There are two new medium size buildings. Phase 2 was to bring Giga Berlin capacity to 1M annual units and come online in 2024. This is an interesting story. Giga Berlin was to be constructed in four major phases, bringing total capacity to 2M annual units. There were so many political problems with phase 1 that Elon said he was pulling the plug on future expansion. Now we are seeing a second phase but it is not on a particularly large scale. This work is being done by a small crew at normal pace, not a large crew at break-neck pace, as is so common with Tesla. There is no expansion at Giga Nevada proper. This was to be an important component in Tesla expansion but any effort to grow operations here has clearly been scuttled. They are working nearby on a building to support Tesla Semi production and they also have another medium to large building of mysterious purpose nearby. The main building where Panasonic makes batteries seems to have hit terminal velocity. I doubt it will grow beyond it's current size until the contract with Panasonic runs out. Construction at Giga Texas has essentially quiesced. Both battery buildings are done and production continues to ramp. Most notably, they seem to have had a cell breakthrough recently. They announced production of 20M cells at Giga Texas. I believe it is no longer being supplied by Fremont but this is speculation. Fully half of Tesla's total battery production has come in the last four months. Something has happened to kick them into a significantly higher gear. It looks like they are currently able to locally produce cells for roughly 20-25% of vehicles produced at Giga Texas. That ratio will go down, once Cybertruck production comes online, as it will soak up a lot more cells per unit and I believe it is 4680 only. Perhaps the recent production spur is in anticipation of truck production but they will surely be overflowing with cells for a while, as CT production is going to take a lot longer to ramp than the Y. CT has too many new techniques and novel design approaches to ramp quickly (just my opinion). I predict CT will take over a year to ramp to even a reasonable production rate (300K units per year) with plenty of pain along the way.
4 of my neighbors now have Teslas, just anecdotal and not representative of all markets, but there was a time when seeing a Tesla was rare. When I start seeing more EVs other than Telsa it might be a sign of peak demand passing. Still lots of room for growth, but at what rate?
There are quite a few rumors about Giga Mexico. Some of these have been published on reasonably trustable sources. I choose to disregard every one of them. Four months ago, suppliers were asked to ramp up to support Giga Mexico production. Three months ago, suppliers were asked to put their response to Giga Mexico support on hold. Clearly, no ground has been broken at Giga Mexico. The only thing on that barren land outside of Monterrey are empty shell casings from cartel enforcement activity. There is talk of permit delays. While this could be true, I think the odds are extremely low. Seven months ago, there was talk of a new plant in Canada, Britain, Spain, and India. At this point, I don't see any movement on any of these new initiatives. I believe the most likely scenario, by far, for the delays is either demand, Elon's concern regarding macro economic factors, or both. There was a time when every major or even medium decision at Tesla was existential. Those days ended once Model 3 production achieved 200k unit annualized production. There was also a time when Tesla, as a company, was being constructed in full view of social media. Elon is the best social media influencer that has ever lived. The company would not have succeeded without Elon hawking the Tesla vision. Those days too, are dead. Once a company reaches a comfortable level, behaviors change. Bold decisions become far more difficult. The more you have to lose, the less you want to risk. I believe this is what we are seeing at Tesla. Expansion will happen but I believe it will be trailing edge expansion, as opposed to leading edge expansion, with regard to demand.
Price: 214 range In the last few weeks, there have been a few news releases regarding dual opposed piston engines and the Achates Power / Cummins ACE engine project. I speculate these are triggered by ACE production nearing. The ACE project was to be in production by now but it has probably slipped. There are a couple of variants of the dual opposed engine platform that look more simple than the Achates design. This technology could hurt electric truck adoption. 0% of Tesla's future value is based on electric, heavy haul, trucks. Still, delays in wide spread adoption could cause a market reaction. I think Tesla only needs to build a couple of hundred trucks per year to break even so they won't have a demand problem. Curiously, even if a new diesel platform slows electrification of the heavy haul fleet, Tesla will be in a far better market demand situation than any other truck tractor producer. PS - Is Nikola still here? We recently learned Tesla expansion is on hold due to Elon's concern about the global economy.
There are some articles floating around about flagging demand at Tesla. The article I read was on Reuters. It cites both Panasonic executives and Elon Musk. They do a good job of maximizing a negative Tesla headline regarding the sky falling. It might seem factual to a person who does not understand the motive behind most Tesla articles. If a person reads far enough, they learn the "information" is completely misappropriated from Panasonic comments specific to the S and X platforms. They also pretend Elon mentioned softening demand for Tesla vehicles when his comment was regarding global vehicle consumption, not Tesla. I suspect what has happened is that Panasonic have been asked to reduce production of 18650 cells that are only useful in the S and X. This seems reasonable. Demand for S and X is higher this year than last so I think a redesign is far, far more likely the cause for a battery production cut, if there is one. Keep in mind, the 18650 format is two generations old by now. S and X production is tiny and not appreciably impactful to Tesla's bottom line so, if there is a demand issue in the premium line, it would not matter. Far more likely is the S and X being converted to the 4680 platform and self sourced cells, leaving Panasonic to convert their 18650 production to 2070 production which will increase the efficiency of both operations and reduce the number of battery platforms. I am extremely tempted to buy Tesla, right now, at $218.
Tesla is talking about supplying cars to India from Giga Berlin. Wow... German cars exported to India. It would be a temporary situation designed to test demand for Tesla in India. Apparently, India won't allow the import of cars from China. India and China have quite a bit of conflict. That strikes me odd, since both countries are doing everything they can to hurt North America. I would have thought the enemy of my enemy would be my friend. One of the things that got me out of Tesla, back in 2020, was talk of creating a gigafactory there. It's hard to imagine it could do well given systemic corruption but I am confident Tesla has considered all angles. Whatever the case, I stay away from companies that attempt to do business in India or Pakistan.
Well, it appears the price has gotten a bit cheaper today. Down another -6.50% currently with about an hour to go.
Indeed, Smokie. It's down to 233, right now. Tesla warns that demand may have plateaued for quite some time. I think Highland and the Model Y refresh will drive a lot of demand. These models are extremely compelling and they will bring either increased margins or price cuts. Current talk *among people who don't know* is the model 2 is pushed out to 2025 but I am skeptical of this. I will be surprised if we don't see the cheap-o model in 2024; at least, sampling in full production in Asia. Further, I don't think it will be a difficult ramp, like the CyberTruck.
This morning, I read about two revolutionary battery developments that will change the direction of EVs, grid storage, etc. The article with the most hyperbole was regarding Kyushu University's sodium ion breakthrough. How many battery breakthrough articles have been published in the last decade? It is easily in the thousands. How many LiIon killers have actually killed lithium ion? Zero. One day, it could be tomorrow, a better battery will come along. Many batteries are in various stages of development. Until that day, every single unsubstantiated claim of superiority should be summarily dismissed. LiIon will not be beaten until it is actually beaten. Lithium has come a long way. These articles invariably cite lithium storage densities from several years ago. They need 300 Wh/Kg to match Tesla's currently shipping batteries and Tesla can easily increase this energy density by 20%. If Tesla were to add a bunch of silicon and jack their energy density, they could brake whatever record they wanted but anodes would probably crack, causing cell failure, and ruin the companies reputation. Slow, evolutionary, progress is the way to go. It wasn't that many years ago when people doubted claims of 150Wh/Kg. The point being, in order to take the crown, you have to beat the champ. Saying you are going to kick the champ's ass at a press conference does not make it so. You have to step into the ring and put the champ on the mat. While that will eventually happen, any investor should be skeptical of any forward looking claim. This is the most basic tenant of investing. I can't believe people put their money on these ultra-long-shots but we can see a lot of money flowing into some of this technology vapor clouds.
I've been thinking about the flurry of EV related hyperbole coming out of every "news" organization that is anti-Tesla. Tons of positive message, despite the industry being on the brink of collapse. GM is struggling. I wish I could feel sorry for them. GM has played a significant role in western progress, over the course of the last century. This is not caused by Buffett selling off his GM position. Mary Barra has broken everything she has touched. As best I can tell, GM executive have good intentions and even some good ideas but their ability to execute is comically bad. Ford has said they expect an operating profit of 10B, this year. This is based on a non-EV operational profit of 13B. Orders for the F150 Lightning fell off a cliff. Ford is not remotely close to profitability on EVs. Perhaps pretending Tesla doesn't exit for a decade wasn't the best strategy, in hind sight. BMW has found revenue in non-automotive sectors to boost their income, year on year. This is impressive and a good strategy for them. I don't see a future in the auto sector for BMW, however, I thought they would have gone bankrupt by now and that is far from the case so my view is obviously subjective. The company cites sales in India, as their primary income source. That is a difficult pill to swallow. Also, they don't break out BEV versus hybrid. They simply break out plug-in vehicles so I wouldn't expect them capable of profit in the EV space. On the other hand, hybrid solutions make a lot of sense at this point in the EV migration. VW will soon be circling the drain. Toyota is in trouble. Over in the EV world, everyone is in trouble except Tesla. Even BYD is showing signs of trouble and the economic collapse of China is hitting them at a bad time.
