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Tesla Faces Accelerating Rate of Model 3 Refunds (recode.net)
According to new U.S. data from analytics company Second Measure, Tesla is facing an accelerated rate of Model 3 refunds. As of the end of April, some 23 percent of all Model 3 deposits in the U.S. had been refunded. "Model 3 deposits are fully refundable up until the customer configures a car by selecting features and paying an additional fee of $2,500," notes Second Measure. "After configuration, vehicles are typically delivered in just a few weeks." Recode reports: These cancellations aren't necessarily bad for Tesla, since its production rate is nowhere near as high as it needs to be to fulfill the more than 450,000 reservations it still has. Last quarter, it delivered just 8,180 Model 3s. Presumably, potential Tesla customers could make a deposit again when production is more regular. The potential longer-term harm would be in alienating them so that they choose a different brand of car altogether. About 60 percent of Model 3 reservations so far in the U.S. were made back in April 2016, when Tesla first began taking deposits. About 18 percent of the total refunds on the Model 3 happened this past April, the largest share out of any month, according to Second Measure. That's when Musk explained that Model 3s would be delayed six to nine months. A Tesla spokesperson said that Second Measure's data does not align with its internal data, but would not be more specific as to how far off it is. But the analytics company's numbers did match up to Tesla's numbers last August, "when CEO Elon Musk disclosed that there were 455,000 net reservations out of 518,000 gross reservations, suggesting 63,000 cancelations and a 12 percent cancellation rate," reports TechCrunch.
Two front-page, back-to-back stories maligning Tesla and Space-X, by the same submitter.
Who's paying for this?
Deliver on your promises or be prepared to reap the whirlwind that follows.
These days, people have little patience for waiting.
Tesla is the most shorted stock in history.
This gives many, many people an incentive to trash-talk the company, so that the stock tanks and they can make money.
"Oh, but wait: if you look at the numbers this way, it shows that Tesla will crash and burn any day now."
or,
"Musk is a serial liar, literally nothing that comes out of his mouth is true. The company is run by incompetent nincompoops and Musk is one bad day swsy from a psychotic break"
Tesla will either crash and burn, or be completely out of the woods, in 3 months. Call it 6 months just for some wiggle room: by the end of the year, Tesla will be either gone or a rock solid investment.
What you are seeing is a bunch of last-ditch efforts to try and crash the stock so people can make some money from it.
Fortunately, many Tesla investors have realized that news reports about Tesla don't matter (I read one report that said exactly that, but can't find it ATM). They're going to wait out the summer storm and see a stronger, better company in the Fall.
Stock prices have dipped *slightly* over the last month, but have largely recovered.
Investors are keen to wait out the storm. Check back in 6 months time.
It is slightly disingenuous to solely look at gross debt, and no doubt the auto business is one of the most highly debt intensive businesses out there. But the life blood is consistently positive operating cash flow, if that's not robust then you might as well turn the lights out.
Ford: $18.1B
GM: $17.3B
Tesla: ($60M)
(After a run-through of the 10-Q, I'd be highly surprised if Tesla's suppliers aren't already demanding COD. There's strong hints that unit gross margins are actually negative (!).)
And what information do you have to back your assertion? According to the standard EV industry report Tesla models are 3 of the top 4 electric cars sold so far this year.
Is either story untrue? Both seem easy to fact-check.
Something doesn't need to be true or false in order to achieve a goal of crediting or discrediting something or someone. One can always find positive and negative things about everyone and almost anything. The positive or negative bias comes with which stories run with which spin.
You can see this in articles we discussed on the weekend: "Smartphone shipments are down for the first time in 2017" was quickly spun in the comments to "Apple smartphones defiant against an android slump in 2017" Both are true, both are based on the same data, and both drive different agendas from the person making the comments.