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Tesla to raise $1B

ir.tesla.com

61–70 of 334 posts

Re: Tesla to raise $1B

#61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're concerned with a 23% YTD return on the stock and a 600% return over 5 years? The market has a way of signaling if a company is totally screwed up. Looks like it isn't.

Well the market can be terribly wrong on many companies in the long run, both undervaluing great companies and overvaluing terrible companies. Tesla's vision is for the next 20 years, not the last 5. Historical performance is also not an indicator of future performance. Everyday I'm holding onto the shares is the same as if I made the decision to buy that many shares on that day. If anything the fantastic return woul…

If you're not sure then sell...or sell a call option against the shares you own

Re: Tesla to raise $1B

#62
post #33
post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Curious: What do you think is Tesla/Musk's "end game vision"?

To make humanity an interplanetary species. http://www.theverge.com/2016/9/27/13079472/elon-musk-mars-sp...

You can't really believe that; certainly Musk doesn't.

Edit: Just for one challenge with no current solution: http://www.nature.com/articles/srep34774

There are others.

Re: Tesla to raise $1B

#64

As an investor of Tesla who bought into Elon's vision I've been getting more and more nervous about how the company is actually run at this point. A modern car company is as much of a production and supply chain company as it's a product and tech company. I get the feeling that due to Tesla being cutting edge in the tech department it led to all the supply chain/production problems being treated as if they are speed…

The upcoming Model 3 will be the acid test for Tesla. It will no doubt be a good car, but at this point people should focus less on what the car can do and on how the car will be rolled out, sold and supported afterwards. A wealthy Model S customer may be ok with having the car in the shop after a minor accident for 5 months due to lack of replacement parts, but for an average Joe paying $500/month leasing a Model 3 that would just be the birth of a new BMW customer.

Yeah, that's pretty much it. The question then is do you think they can fix the issues that lead to those negative experiences with a little bit of time, and a billion more dollars?

Re: Tesla to raise $1B

#65
post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you explain why do you consider AP2 to be a downgrade from AP1? I thought it's everything AP1 has + more.

It will, but it doesn't yet. Cars with the second generation autopilot hardware were sold without any autopilot at all. It also had no auto park, no automatic headlights, no automatic wipers, no automatic emergency braking, no side collision warning, no lane departure warning, no automatic lane change, or summon. A 45Mph speed limited version of autosteer was enabled in an update, and maybe some of those other featur…

This is simply not true. AP2 has auto park, side collision warning, auto headlights, emergency braking, forward collision warning, 55 mph speed limit, with TACC at 80 mph.

Re: Tesla to raise $1B

#66
post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well the market can be terribly wrong on many companies in the long run, both undervaluing great companies and overvaluing terrible companies. Tesla's vision is for the next 20 years, not the last 5. Historical performance is also not an indicator of future performance. Everyday I'm holding onto the shares is the same as if I made the decision to buy that many shares on that day. If anything the fantastic return woul…

> Everyday I'm holding onto the shares is the same as if I made the decision to buy that many shares on that day This is a great way to think about holding investments. I remember using this argument to try and convince a family member that they should sell what I considered to be a bad investment. I phrased it as 'If you were forced to sell your shares right now would you use the money from the sale to immediately b…

Ignoring tax implications is a much, much bigger problem for your argument than ignoring brokerage fees.

Re: Tesla to raise $1B

#67

As an investor of Tesla who bought into Elon's vision I've been getting more and more nervous about how the company is actually run at this point. A modern car company is as much of a production and supply chain company as it's a product and tech company. I get the feeling that due to Tesla being cutting edge in the tech department it led to all the supply chain/production problems being treated as if they are speed…

Although I applaud your skepticism, I think it's misplaced. My first job out of University was working for Daimler-Benz when they owned Chrysler. I was a front line eng supervisor at the plant level focusing on In System Damage, Federal Torque and a host of other quality issues that were plaguing the company at the time. I dealt directly with it so I can tell you, Supply Chain is not that big a deal to fix. They will sort out their problems there, they just imo need a few vets from a traditional car company.

As an aside, my time there was a hugely formative experience for me. Given a $500K budget and armed with nothing more than a little sql, I was able to immediately start saving the company multi-millions of dollars annually. I was considered a big star among the fresh batch of talent they inhaled that year, but I left because I could see the writing on the wall about the industry. Given the bailout and all that, I am pretty happy with that decision.

Re: Tesla to raise $1B

#68

As an investor of Tesla who bought into Elon's vision I've been getting more and more nervous about how the company is actually run at this point. A modern car company is as much of a production and supply chain company as it's a product and tech company. I get the feeling that due to Tesla being cutting edge in the tech department it led to all the supply chain/production problems being treated as if they are speed…

You're concerned with a 23% YTD return on the stock and a 600% return over 5 years? The market has a way of signaling if a company is totally screwed up. Looks like it isn't.

Millennials will buy anything. Can't short the retail bull. (Yet.)

Re: Tesla to raise $1B

#69

As an investor of Tesla who bought into Elon's vision I've been getting more and more nervous about how the company is actually run at this point. A modern car company is as much of a production and supply chain company as it's a product and tech company. I get the feeling that due to Tesla being cutting edge in the tech department it led to all the supply chain/production problems being treated as if they are speed…

AP2 is truly dangerous. It's incomprehensible they would release something like this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UZ1XLqc5IUg I guess it's a good reality check for autonomous cars when you take away the LIDAR toys. One rather important point is that the car often doesn't realize it is screwing up, because quelle surprise, realizing you don't have a correctly detected lane can be just as difficult as detecting one…

Wow. That guy is going nineteen miles per hour on a simple road in daylight and the car literally crossed to the wrong side of the road in nine seconds!

That's an absolute disaster.

Re: Tesla to raise $1B

#70
post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That return can only be realized if OP sells. It sounds like OP's intent was to buy shares in a long-term business/vision, not in a stock. In the long term, markets are a weighing machine, but in the short term, they are a popularity contest. In August 1998, YHOO traded under $10/share. In December 1999, YHOO traded at > $100/share, a > 1000% return over 16 months. From February 2001 to February 2003, YHOO traded und…

That is because Yahoo got overtaken by Google's superior ad platform and search. Tesla has no obvious viable competitors. It is a premium product that caters to a specific demographic, much like the iPhone in 2007.

What about all the other manufacturers focusing on electric-only vehicles?
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