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Tesla Model 3 Outselling Small, Midsize Luxury Cars In US (forbes.com)
WindBourne shares a report from Forbes: In the second quarter of 2018, Tesla produced just over 53,000 vehicles, doubling its output compared to the same quarter last year. For the first time, Model 3 production (28,578) exceeded combined Model S and X production (24,761) with deliveries to customers totaling 40,740 for the quarter. The ramp up in Model 3 production is enabling it to outsell small and midsize luxury car sales in the U.S., according to some number crunching by CleanTechnica's Zachary Shahan.
His analysis claims that the Model 3 is crushing its "competitors" in that segment with total estimated sales for July amounting to 16,000 vehicles. The closest individual model to Tesla's mass-market endeavor is the Mercedes C-Class and even then, its July sales are estimated at just 6,029 units. The Model 3 is still untouchable when sales figures from multiple vehicles produced by the same company are added together. For example, the analysis expects sales of the BMW 2, 3, 4 and 5 Series to hit 12,811 at the end of July in total while customers will get their hands on 11,835 Mercedes C, CLA, CLS and E-Class models. That all means that Tesla would have a 23% share of the small and midsize luxury car market in July, ahead of BMW's 17% and Mercedes' 17%.
His analysis claims that the Model 3 is crushing its "competitors" in that segment with total estimated sales for July amounting to 16,000 vehicles. The closest individual model to Tesla's mass-market endeavor is the Mercedes C-Class and even then, its July sales are estimated at just 6,029 units. The Model 3 is still untouchable when sales figures from multiple vehicles produced by the same company are added together. For example, the analysis expects sales of the BMW 2, 3, 4 and 5 Series to hit 12,811 at the end of July in total while customers will get their hands on 11,835 Mercedes C, CLA, CLS and E-Class models. That all means that Tesla would have a 23% share of the small and midsize luxury car market in July, ahead of BMW's 17% and Mercedes' 17%.
I suppose we can expect more muskisdelusionalandoutofcash postings.
In the last Tesla thread I pointed out that, as an stockholder, what I am looking for is NOT Elon Musk's cute personality or science fantasy. Nor do I care to whig out at every little story of production problems. What I am looking for is:
Technological leadership.
Market presence.
Production leadership.
Most of all: backorders and strong forecast. None of the rest matters unless you have someone willing to buy it. Tesla has that in spades.
So Tesla is delivering. Skepticism is healthy but not to the extent that the Tesla naysayers on /. take it.
The size of the backlog is still increasing, so demand shows no sign of slowing down anytime soon.
I suppose we can expect more muskisdelusionalandoutofcash postings.
In the last Tesla thread I pointed out that, as an stockholder, what I am looking for is NOT Elon Musk's cute personality or science fantasy. Nor do I care to whig out at every little story of production problems. What I am looking for is:
Technological leadership.
Market presence.
Production leadership.
Most of all: backorders and strong forecast. None of the rest matters unless you have someone willing to buy it. Tesla has that in spades.
So Tesla is delivering. Skepticism is healthy but not to the extent that the Tesla naysayers on /. take it.
There are a lot of people sending out fake news about Tesla nowadays, but there's an interesting bit of information.
Normally, in the two weeks ahead of a financial report the stock will mirror the report outcome. If the report is good, the stock will rise a little just before the announcement. If the report is bad, the stock will drop a little.
Tesla will be making their Q2 announcement on Wednesday (after the market closes), and it's dropped by 10% in that time.
In any other stock that would indicate bad news, but for Tesla? It could indicate a last-ditch effort for the bears to drive the stock down before a "good news" report. People are changing Tesla from "hold" to "sell", and saying that they're certain Tesla will need another round of financing.
(Musk claims that they will not need another round, and that Tesla will be profitable in Q3 and Q4 of this year.)
Tesla short interest is 34m shares right now, and with 170m shares outstanding, that's about 20% of Tesla is being shorted right now. 25% is held by Musk, so that's about 1/4 of public shares are held short.
There are three key periods coming up for Tesla: the Q2 report (Wednesday), and Q3 and Q4 of this year.
Over 50% of Tesla shares are held by 5 entities: Musk, Fidelity, Baillie Gifford, and so on. If the institutions dig their heels into the sand and refuse to sell, and if the other public shareholders also refuse to sell, there will be a short run and the stock price will skyrocket. There's nowhere that the short sellers can go to settle.
If no one is selling the stock, or there are many buyers, including panic buyers, caused by other short sellers attempting to close out their positions as they lose more and more money, you may be in a position to incur serious losses.
The institutions know this. Many of the public shareholders know this.
If the stock jumps up and Tesla seems reasonably solvent, it's estimated the short sellers will be out several tens of billions of dollars.
Expect a lot of wailing and gnashing of teeth...
(I own shares in Tesla and want to see them succeed.)