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Tencent buys 5% of Tesla

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Re: Tencent buys 5% of Tesla

#331

Post by MegaButts »

consultSKI wrote: post #319
MegaButts wrote: post #259

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Literally everything Elon Musk is doing has a strong element of trying to save the world. Maybe. Or maybe he's just saying that to make money. If Elon Musk ends up being completely successful in all of his endeavors, he will be the world's richest person by far . I suspect the truth is in the middle. He does want to change the world, but he's not willing to become poor (let's say a net worth of less than a million…

>> Of course time will tell. Time has already done that. He is simply put, the real deal. Major car OEMS are always talking about what they will do in three (or more) years from NOW. Elon has done it. Is doing it. And will continue to push the envelop. Zig Ziglar reminds us that EVERYONE sells. Elon is just that much better at it. Then he executes unlike very few others. I didn't get the merger, but now with the home…

Tesla is nowhere near GAAP profitable, and after numerous instances of "this is the last time we're raising money" Elon Musk has once again secured a large loan for Tesla. It is still very risky, especially now that GM is already selling the Bolt before the Model 3 has even come out.

SpaceX is nowhere near their goal of colonizing Mars. Yes, they are working on it, and more power to them, but it's not done yet. I love what this company has accomplished, but it's nowhere near reaching Musk's current trajectory.

Solar City went bankrupt and Elon had to pull several strings in order to save his relatives' company. Sure, there is an obvious alignment between Solar City and Tesla but it clearly wasn't doing great.

Elon Musk has an excellent track record of making promises and delivering on them years later. As his promises become more ambitious, and he spreads himself thinner, it becomes more and more likely that he will fail at some point. My money is on Elon Musk becoming the modern Greek tragedy. I want the guy to succeed, but he's clearly making promises he can't deliver with Tesla (it doesn't matter how good their software is - and frankly it's pretty bad compared to the competition - they can't make a level 4 vehicle with their intended sensor suite) and I suspect he's doing the same for SpaceX.

Elon Musk has accomplished a lot, and he deserves recognition for that. But if he makes a promise and fails, he should also be called out on his bullshit.

Re: Tencent buys 5% of Tesla

#332

Post by ethbro »

radiorental wrote: post #282
AOsborn wrote: post #271

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fair opinion, but I think you are arguing the wrong point. Apple ate market share from Nokia because of brand advantage. Many commentators mention that manufacturers are improving their EV product, but I think that boat has long sailed: Tesla vs. Ford won't be about features, but the brand.

Sorry, when the product is north of 30K, you'll find a significant number of people will put what they can afford ahead of brand loyalty.

Lots of people really love Ford.

And with an EV, there won't be that awkward moment when their friends ask how their transmission is doing...

Re: Tencent buys 5% of Tesla

#333

Post by Robotbeat »

btian wrote: post #237
Robotbeat wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I own a Volt. Best car I've ever driven. GM doesn't care much for it. The only advertising they really do for it basically is trying to steal EV customers from Nissan's Leaf. Really dumb. And the dealers don't like it because 1) they don't know how to service them and especially 2) they almost never need servicing. If you run almost exclusively on electric, you only need like 4-5 oil changes in the entire life of the…

When people claim "best X I've used", they should list all models of X that they have used.

Granted. :)

Re: Tencent buys 5% of Tesla

#334

Post by mikeash »

rootusrootus wrote: post #272
mikeash wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

EVs are unpopular because cheap ones aren't very good yet. You have to choose between almost unusably short range, or a very high price. Something like the LEAF is affordable, but only useful as a city car. A Model S is a great car, but extremely expensive. The cost is coming down. Chevy is now selling the Bolt, which has pretty good range, for under $40,000. Tesla's Model 3 is coming soon. More will follow. The high…

I am very interested to see how this plays out. Gas prices drive interest in electrics, and electrics drive down gas prices. Maybe the future of the consumer car market is going to split largely between gas-powered pickups and electric-powered sedans/crossovers. This of course completely ignores the potential effect of self-driving cars. I'm still skeptical we'll see large scale automated driving for at least 10-20 y…

I think gas prices are driving EVs less and less. It's still a factor, for sure, but things like performance, noise, maintenance, and convenience are driving it heavily as well. Of all the reasons I love my Model S, fuel savings are pretty far down the list, although I certainly don't mind!

Re: Tencent buys 5% of Tesla

#335

Post by cjrp »

ryanmonroe wrote: post #304
jkchu wrote: post #262

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But the closest thing to a $35k electric car from BMW, Mercedes, or Audi is BMW's i3 - which I think is targeting a different market.

Mercedes has the $40k B-Class electric car.

With a 124 mile range [http://www.mercedes-benz.co.uk/content/unitedkingdom/mpc/mpc...].

Re: Tencent buys 5% of Tesla

#337

Post by Qwertious »

forgotpwtomain wrote: post #178
dmix wrote: post #120

Tesla recently announced they are ramping up their Model 3 production even more than what some people thought was already optimistic numbers: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-03-27/tesla-mod... > For Musk to hit all of his targets, Tesla would need to build about 430,000 Model 3s by the end of next year. That’s more than all of the electric cars sold planet-wide last year. > Even if half of the Model 3 in…

> environment as well It's not going to do anything great for the environment and we've been over this on previous Tesla threads (years ago). Driving electric cars instead of hybrids in areas where the electricity is primarily derived from unclean sources is not better than hybrids for the environment.

>Driving electric cars instead of hybrids in areas where the electricity is primarily derived from unclean sources is not better than hybrids for the environment.

ICE cars are far less efficient than fossil-fuel power plants, due to the weight/size restraints of a car-engine form-factor. Given this, electric cars actually do emit less energy than cars that burn fossil fuels.

But frankly, you're looking at this the wrong way - most electric cars are at the start of their life, and have at least 10 years' worth of use, if not 20 or more. Given that renewables will inevitably become a major portion of the electricity grid within 10 years (and realistically, almost certainly within 5), they'll become more efficient in the future, and make renewables reduce even more CO2 emissions, since they're punting petrol away, too.

Re: Tencent buys 5% of Tesla

#338

Post by jgalt212 »

danhak wrote: post #83
jgalt212 wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The raise will dilute earnings for common shareholders, so definitely a downward force on stock price. That being said, this investment and the recent raise you alluded to should clobber the put skew. http://www.volcube.com/resources/options-articles/what-is-op...

This is not a new raise. The filing indicates shares were primarily purchased on the open market and then topped off by the Goldman-led round earlier this month. No new dilution here.

fair enough. so if it's not new shares, put skew should remain strong as there is still non-trivial risk Tesla runs out of cash. And probably at least a small positive push to stock price as investors would reasonably bet that Tencent could be called on to buy more shares.

Re: Tencent buys 5% of Tesla

#339

Post by Ntrails »

bkanber wrote: post #328
Ntrails wrote: post #311

Earlier quoted context omitted.

what? Not on $1k it doesn't. 1.06^30 is like 5.5 ish? Unless you mean on saving 1k pa which is not what they are talking about, and means you're very much changing the game (and apparently not derisking towards retirement)

On $35k, the price of a Tesla, which is what prompted that xkcd link

Ah, that makes more sense. Sorry!

Re: Tencent buys 5% of Tesla

#340

Post by nickjarboe »

Arizhel wrote: post #296
nickjarboe wrote: post #246

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Political freedom has often been the primary motivation for groups of people to emigrate. Hypothetical sea-steading aside, moving somewhere with no existing political system in place is not possible on Earth. Wealthy patrons might sponsor the pioneers. This was how much of early New England was settled by Europeans.

Yeah, but the problem here is that it seems unlikely that it'll be affordable to set up a self-sustaining colony any time in the foreseeable future without the resources of a large nation-state. And again, remember my previous post is talking about (and questioning the idea of) colonizing places other than Mars and the Moon (see the line about "except for a couple of somewhat-convenient places"), which are certainly…

I agree independent space stations make more sense than anywhere but maybe Mars. Using small, near-Earth asteroids for bulk resources at first seems likely. But for political autonomy, near Earth is unlikely. Earth's political systems will have a high incentive to have some control over massive objects moving very fast near the planet.
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