How Tesla Fell To Earth

[Hammered]

Since you brought up market cap, let’s look at other numbers that matter.

2023 Tesla vehicle sales- 1.81 million
2023 Ford vehicle sales- 4.4 million

2023 Tesla revenue-$96 billion
2023 Ford revenue- $176 billion

2023 Tesla gross profit- $13.4 billion
2023 Ford gross profit- $25.6 billion


Now explain why Tesla market cap is still 10x Ford. And no, it’s not because Ford is undervalued.

At the end of the year
tesla had 10$ bil debt, 30bil cash on hand
ford has 230$ bil debt, 40bil cash on hand
Tesla's charging network when fully opened will generate them 25bil/yr and we're in the infancy of Ev adoption in the states. Assuming they're able to maintain their market share of the charging market, and EVs continue to grow at current rates, by 2030 their charging business alone will be generating 200bil/yr.

Factor in their ADAS which I fully expect to be marketed to anyone willing to license it...
and the robot. Sure it's yet to happen, but they'll be unstoppable making the robots. Elon knows how to make factories and mass produce products and has the cash to do it. The market is factoring in all possibilities at their currently assessed risk of maturity. In 1 year, FSD was completely rewritten and has no equal today, let alone the path they're on being caught by legacy auto.

Tesla and ford aren't comparable companies. Tesla is just as much of a tech company as they are car manufacturer. When the bot is realized and can replace 4 humans, it's going to print them money more than the cars were. They could charge $200k/ea on $6k worth of parts and companies would be foolish to not buy as many as fast as possible. The rest of this decade is going to be nuts with new massive corporations emerging, eclipsing todays players. Nvidia's explosion is just one of many more to come at an even larger scale.

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[OcSteve39]

Okay, chief, name some names.

I named two that are true believers in EVs and on good terms with Elon Musk.

Is Lee Iacocca available?

 

[Billyk24]

Tesla ADAS superior to others? There is a lawsuit from a family of an Apple management team against Tesla's ADAS. Curtains blocking internal workings on the system may be pulled back during this case. Too many owner reports of malfunction during ADAS to believe the full hype.

 

[Mach1E]

At the end of the year
tesla had 10$ bil debt, 30bil cash on hand
ford has 230$ bil debt, 40bil cash on hand
Tesla's charging network when fully opened will generate them 25bil/yr and we're in the infancy of Ev adoption in the states. Assuming they're able to maintain their market share of the charging market, and EVs continue to grow at current rates, by 2030 their charging business alone will be generating 200bil/yr.

Factor in their ADAS which I fully expect to be marketed to anyone willing to license it...
and the robot. Sure it's yet to happen, but they'll be unstoppable making the robots. Elon knows how to make factories and mass produce products and has the cash to do it. The market is factoring in all possibilities at their currently assessed risk of maturity. In 1 year, FSD was completely rewritten and has no equal today, let alone the path they're on being caught by legacy auto.

Tesla and ford aren't comparable companies. Tesla is just as much of a tech company as they are car manufacturer. When the bot is realized and can replace 4 humans, it's going to print them money more than the cars were. They could charge $200k/ea on $6k worth of parts and companies would be foolish to not buy as many as fast as possible. The rest of this decade is going to be nuts with new massive corporations emerging, eclipsing todays players. Nvidia's explosion is just one of many more to come at an even larger scale.

Maybe? Tesla does have parts of both a tech and a manufacturing company.

A few issues evaluating Tesla like this still.

The charging network. Generating revenue? Yes. Generating profit? Unclear.

The economics and road to profit for DC charging seem very difficult.

Robots? They’ve been helping build cars for decades. I’m not convinced it will make a huge difference in profitability.

Nvidia? Has nothing to do with Tesla. But yes, also a perfect example of a grossly overpriced stock.

And then there is Musk. He doesn’t mind blowing (or blowing up) money on things like rockets, his ego (twitter), environmental money losses (solar), and Mars.

 

[alexgorod]

And then there is Musk.

https://techcrunch.com/2024/04/16/t...formers-slashes-some-departments-sources-say/

 

[rcechinel]

Expanding into new markets is likely a way to obtain growth.

Problem is that BYD already made that move in most relevant secondary markets. They dominate in Brazil, for example.

 

[silverelan]

They have reached terminal velocity with a four-model strategy. Now it’s time to ditch the stupid CT and focus on a new Juniper and an M2 sedan & suv. It’s the first challenge to Musk to show up or shut up. I predict he will be booted soon.

“You either die a hero or live long enough to see yourself become the villain.”

Originally, Musk said that Tesla wanted to show how EVs could be both cool and sexy by appealing to the mainstream with beautiful designs and high performance. Tesla’s EVs like the Roadster, S, and 3 were a stark contrast from the weird “Science Project” electric go karts that were out there.

Then what does Tesla do? They release the weirdest Science Project car of all time. Cybertruck is a bizarre decision by Musk and is so off-putting that the vehicle will likely be a sales flop with the general public.

The hero to villain arc is complete.

 

[ARK]

At the end of the year
tesla had 10$ bil debt, 30bil cash on hand
ford has 230$ bil debt, 40bil cash on hand
Tesla's charging network when fully opened will generate them 25bil/yr and we're in the infancy of Ev adoption in the states. Assuming they're able to maintain their market share of the charging market, and EVs continue to grow at current rates, by 2030 their charging business alone will be generating 200bil/yr.

Factor in their ADAS which I fully expect to be marketed to anyone willing to license it...
and the robot. Sure it's yet to happen, but they'll be unstoppable making the robots. Elon knows how to make factories and mass produce products and has the cash to do it. The market is factoring in all possibilities at their currently assessed risk of maturity. In 1 year, FSD was completely rewritten and has no equal today, let alone the path they're on being caught by legacy auto.

Tesla and ford aren't comparable companies. Tesla is just as much of a tech company as they are car manufacturer. When the bot is realized and can replace 4 humans, it's going to print them money more than the cars were. They could charge $200k/ea on $6k worth of parts and companies would be foolish to not buy as many as fast as possible. The rest of this decade is going to be nuts with new massive corporations emerging, eclipsing todays players. Nvidia's explosion is just one of many more to come at an even larger scale.

That’s the thing though, I don’t think we can still say that EV adoption is in its infancy. People have seen them at this point and aren’t all-in on them. It’s also clear that it’s not going to be like smartphones where one or two companies take 90% of the market.

Their ADAS promises have also sort of stalled. There isn’t any known information that suggests Tesla is about to make FSD full-proof. It is still very buggy, rewritten or not, and it seems they have no good way of fixing things anytime in the near future.

This would all suggest that the company’s sky high valuation isn’t justified when its established peers get priced very differently.

 

[Dear_OP]

The market is doing its thing. EVs prices need to come down. The next wave of EV buyers will be more discerning unlike tech-hungry "me first!" early adopters. EVs need to demonstrate value to the everyday citizens. Isn't Ford still bleeding money on each EV it sells? Plants halting production. GM too is floundering. It's Blazer has stopped work order not too long ago.

The long play for Tesla aren't cars. It's real estate and energy. It's already happening see NACS adoption. As much critique the FSD has, it is has become the Kleenex of self-driving tech. I will not be surprised that too will be adopted by other makers eventually. R&D for self-driving is not trivia and is $$$. You need data and lots of it.

I feel in the future global EVconomics there will be Tesla and Chinese brands followed by a few surviving legacy makers.

 

[ARK]

The market is doing its thing. EVs prices need to come down. The next wave of EV buyers will be more discerning unlike tech-hungry "me first!" early adopters. EVs need to demonstrate value to the everyday citizens. Isn't Ford still bleeding money on each EV it sells? Plants halting production. GM too is floundering. It's Blazer has stopped work order not too long ago.

The long play for Tesla aren't cars. It's real estate and energy. It's already happening see NACS adoption. As much critique the FSD has, it is has become the Kleenex of self-driving tech. I will not be surprised that too will be adopted by other makers eventually. R&D for self-driving is not trivia and is $$$. You need data and lots of it.

I feel in the future global EVconomics there will be Tesla and Chinese brands followed by a few surviving legacy makers.

I don’t know how much money there is in real estate and energy though. Most people who use superchargers either don’t have home charging or are on a trip. The home charging issue will be solved over time, and I don’t know if road trip charging will ever be that profitable if other companies can just open charging stations on particularly lucrative routes.

The middle of nowhere nature of roadtrip charging also means a real estate empire is unlikely.

Tesla is undoubtedly much better than anyone at building EVs, but their margins have been decreasing as they’ve had to cut prices and spend on advertising. Their workforce costs are also likely to rise overtime as the company ages.

I also don’t think the legacy EV makers are going anywhere. Teslas are just not popular enough for it. They’ve been on the market long enough now where if it was going to happen, we’d already have started seeing the legacies skidding along, but their sales started falling back and layoffs began long before they reached that sort of dominance in the market.

 

[RickMachE]

The market is doing its thing. EVs prices need to come down. The next wave of EV buyers will be more discerning unlike tech-hungry "me first!" early adopters. EVs need to demonstrate value to the everyday citizens. Isn't Ford still bleeding money on each EV it sells? Plants halting production. GM too is floundering. It's Blazer has stopped work order not too long ago.

The long play for Tesla aren't cars. It's real estate and energy. It's already happening see NACS adoption. As much critique the FSD has, it is has become the Kleenex of self-driving tech. I will not be surprised that too will be adopted by other makers eventually. R&D for self-driving is not trivia and is $$$. You need data and lots of it.

I feel in the future global EVconomics there will be Tesla and Chinese brands followed by a few surviving legacy makers.

I bought 3 Ford EVs in 3 years to help make this not happen.

 

[Hammered]

That’s the thing though, I don’t think we can still say that EV adoption is in its infancy. People have seen them at this point and aren’t all-in on them.

3 of 288mil vehicles in the US are EVs. If barely breaking 1% total market share isn't infancy, I don't know what is. China has around the same amount of 4 wheeled vehicles as the US, but more than 4x as many EVs owned.

 

[ARK]

3 of 288mil vehicles in the US are EVs. If barely breaking 1% total market share isn't infancy, I don't know what is. China has around the same amount of 4 wheeled vehicles as the US, but more than 4x as many EVs owned.

Cars last a long time, the figures for new car EV sales are around 7.5% in the USA, around 20% globally, and 25% in California. There are also a range of different EVs available, at different price points and different vehicle types.

I’d say infancy was when the choices were Model S and Nissan Leaf, where initially fast charging didn’t even exist. Things were much more further along by the time the Mach-E launched, but we’d still get comparisons like Mach-E versus Audi E-tron (Q8) because there were so few EVs on the market. That sort of comparison between EVs at pretty different price points of the market are rarer now since there are so many more EV options.

We’re still far from having a fully-developed market, but I don’t think we can say EVs are in their infancy. Something like VR headsets are still in their infancy. EVs are a bit too far along the road to mainstream at this point to qualify IMO.

 

[Hammered]

Cars last a long time, the figures for new car EV sales are around 7.5% in the USA, around 20% globally, and 25% in California. There are also a range of different EVs available, at different price points and different vehicle types.

I’d say infancy was when the choices were Model S and Nissan Leaf, where initially fast charging didn’t even exist. Things were much more further along by the time the Mach-E launched, but we’d still get comparisons like Mach-E versus Audi E-tron (Q8) because there were so few EVs on the market. That sort of comparison between EVs at pretty different price points of the market are rarer now since there are so many more EV options.

We’re still far from having a fully-developed market, but I don’t think we can say EVs are in their infancy. Something like VR headsets are still in their infancy. EVs are a bit too far along the road to mainstream at this point to qualify IMO.

Our future overlords agree it's still in its infancy

 

[stealthytolkien]

Unpopular opinion incoming.

Even today, when I have discussions with my colleagues, acquaintances, friends, and families about EVs, 90% don’t want to buy it because of “range”, then “convenience”, and finally “price”.

We are a road trip loving country, it’s a very big country, and despite owning 2 EVs so far, I will continue to defend gas, especially hybrid cars for road trip time savings and convenience vs EV and I’m willing to die on this hill.

In my own household, my spouse is 100% against going fully electric and to a great extent, I agree with her. Our EV doesn’t leave town. And our hybrid drives around town minimally.

If a Kia is asking $75k for an albeit massive SUV that goes 270 miles rated (real world will be a little less) and whose batteries continue to degrade each day of ownership, not many budget conscious people would opt for that when a 50K luxury hybrid SUV can be had that will leave $30k in the bank enough for the next 10 years of fuel and maintenance of that car. Exceptions exist. Some people are just too rich to care. And some are too careless to understand that they cannot afford it and that better options exist. And some just live like it’s their last day. No judgements there.

So then no wonder that the EV adoption seems to have flattened over the last two years. And Tesla are removing one feature a day from their cars (there goes another while you were here), and others are barely affordable and rely on a not so great charging infrastructure, half-assing NACS adoption, and we are unable to break the 400 mile rated range barrier for a midsize EUV at an affordable price yet. Once these two things happen, I feel like we will see a resurgence. The true next generation of EV.

I always think to myself after having driven the EV9 and Rivian how amazing it would be to have a 400 mile range SUV that charges from 10-80 in 20 minutes and costs 60-65k out the door! I am only these two examples because they are the only two spacious SUVs today. The Model X is relatively cramped and aside from FSD, fart sounds, and in car Netflix, pretty lacking in features and look dated.

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