Investing Thread

[ZiggysFryBoy]

But your point about me overusing "culture war" is right. I didn't need to keep restating the obvious.

🤣🤣🤣🤣

[JWags85]

IMHO, your point was wrong about Musk's oversight of his main company and about TSLA stock's related poor performance. Not sure why you have pretty consistently defended his unacceptable stewardship of Tesla and the loss of value that has brought to shareholders.

But your point about me overusing "culture war" is right. I didn't need to keep restating the obvious.

I literally didn't defend him once there.  I even said you could argue his antics and Twitter infatuation arrested the creative drive and vision of TSLA.  Please show me where Ive been "consistently defending his stewardship of Tesla" throughout this Twitter saga.  Cause thats an absolute lie.  Ive not even posted about Musk in this thread for months.  And in the Twitter thread, Ive spoken about his actions at Twitter, not at TSLA.

I did say there needed to be a TSLA drawdown regardless of Musk.  Thats not a defense, thats a fact.  Even if he never bought Twitter, TSLA wouldn't be 900/1000/1100+ (pre split). 

Also fact is that a company's share price will decline as their multiples decline due to slowing growth or company maturity, unless revenues/profits keep surging to match that.  In that I referenced AAPL, which has went from a 30+ (sometimes much higher) P/E in the early to mid 2000s so a mid teen P/E up until the COVID runups.  I was mentioning nothing of how AAPL was run or how their company performance or leadership relates to Musk and TSLA.

[StillAWarrior]

But your point about me overusing "culture war" is right. I didn't need to keep restating the obvious.

That's never stopped you before. 

[TSmith34, Inc.]

I literally didn't defend him once there.  I even said you could argue his antics and Twitter infatuation arrested the creative drive and vision of TSLA.  Please show me where Ive been "consistently defending his stewardship of Tesla" throughout this Twitter saga.  Cause thats an absolute lie.  Ive not even posted about Musk in this thread for months.  And in the Twitter thread, Ive spoken about his actions at Twitter, not at TSLA.

I did say there needed to be a TSLA drawdown regardless of Musk.  Thats not a defense, thats a fact.  Even if he never bought Twitter, TSLA wouldn't be 900/1000/1100+ (pre split). 

Also fact is that a company's share price will decline as their multiples decline due to slowing growth or company maturity, unless revenues/profits keep surging to match that.  In that I referenced AAPL, which has went from a 30+ (sometimes much higher) P/E in the early to mid 2000s so a mid teen P/E up until the COVID runups.  I was mentioning nothing of how AAPL was run or how their company performance or leadership relates to Musk and TSLA.

Unquestionably TSLA has been overpriced/had an unsustainable valuation since...well forever it seems. In addition to being the first mass producer to successfully enter the market, however, I would argue much of their valuation derived from Musk's personal brand. Musk is/was Tesla.

As he destroys his personal brand with virtually every tweet, it's reflecting on TSLA. The institutional investors can see that clearly.

I can't see how the shareholder lawsuits WON'T start flying.

And of course not a peep from his tame BoD.

[MU82]

I literally didn't defend him once there.  I even said you could argue his antics and Twitter infatuation arrested the creative drive and vision of TSLA.  Please show me where Ive been "consistently defending his stewardship of Tesla" throughout this Twitter saga.  Cause thats an absolute lie.  Ive not even posted about Musk in this thread for months.  And in the Twitter thread, Ive spoken about his actions at Twitter, not at TSLA.

I did say there needed to be a TSLA drawdown regardless of Musk.  Thats not a defense, thats a fact.  Even if he never bought Twitter, TSLA wouldn't be 900/1000/1100+ (pre split). 

Also fact is that a company's share price will decline as their multiples decline due to slowing growth or company maturity, unless revenues/profits keep surging to match that.  In that I referenced AAPL, which has went from a 30+ (sometimes much higher) P/E in the early to mid 2000s so a mid teen P/E up until the COVID runups.  I was mentioning nothing of how AAPL was run or how their company performance or leadership relates to Musk and TSLA.

I must have had you confused with someone else then. And if so, I apologize.

We'll agree to disagree that TSLA was destined to crash the way it has regardless of what Musk has done.

Have a good one, Wags.

[TSmith34, Inc.]

Lawsuits, they're a-coming soon IMO.

"KoGuan Leo, an Indonesian billionaire and the third-largest individual shareholder of Tesla, is calling for the electric carmaker’s CEO, Elon Musk, to step down as much of his attention is focused on Twitter lately.

Elon abandoned Tesla and Tesla has no working CEO,” Leo tweeted on Dec. 14. “Tesla needs and deserves to have working full-time CEO.”

Leo proposed Tesla’s board of directors appoint a professional manager, someone similar to Apple CEO Tim Cook, as Musk’s replacement."


https://observer.com/2022/12/koguan-leo-tesla-shareholder-oust-elon-musk/

[JWags85]

Lawsuits, they're a-coming soon IMO.

"KoGuan Leo, an Indonesian billionaire and the third-largest individual shareholder of Tesla, is calling for the electric carmaker’s CEO, Elon Musk, to step down as much of his attention is focused on Twitter lately.

Elon abandoned Tesla and Tesla has no working CEO,” Leo tweeted on Dec. 14. “Tesla needs and deserves to have working full-time CEO.”

Leo proposed Tesla’s board of directors appoint a professional manager, someone similar to Apple CEO Tim Cook, as Musk’s replacement."


https://observer.com/2022/12/koguan-leo-tesla-shareholder-oust-elon-musk/

KoGuan Leo is an interesting case.  He's not a hedge fund/portfolio manager.  He's a dude who got filthy rich from a software company, picked up stocks in his mid 60s, and then dumped a bunch of money into TSLA before a big run up.  I mean, his money still spends and he's got enough cache in it to make some noise, but saying TSLA needs a Tim Cook shows how much of a savvy activist investor he is not.

This, however, could open the door for true activist/connected funds that have a big, but considerably small in comparison, TSLA piece to start squawking.

[MU82]

Tesla stock rises as Musk's followers say he should no longer be Twitter CEO

https://seekingalpha.com/news/3918349-tesla-stock-rises-3-as-twitter-poll-calls-for-elon-musk-to-exit-ceo-role?mailingid=30020993&messageid=portfolio&serial=30020993.9953&utm_campaign=nl-portfolio&utm_content=portfolio_digest&utm_medium=email&utm_source=seeking_alpha&utm_term=30020993.9953

Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA) shares benefited from a signal that Elon Musk may remove himself from the helm of Twitter (TWTR).

On Sunday evening, Musk initiated a poll that asked whether or not he should continue in his capacity as the head of Twitter (TWTR). He also promised to abide by the results of the poll. As of the poll’s close, 57.5% of voters did indeed call for him to step down.

For Tesla (TSLA) investors that have been vocal about their displeasure with his Twitter leadership, this appeared to be a welcome sign. Indeed, Oppenheimer downgraded Tesla (TSLA) on Monday amid concerns that Twitter is an undue distraction for the Tesla CEO.

“While we continue to see Tesla evolving EV and autonomous technology in advance of peers and driving costs to levels those peers will struggle to match—and have tried to separate Elon Musk’s non-Tesla endeavors (personal and professional) from our analysis on TSLA—we believe Mr. Musk’s acquisition and subsequent management of Twitter now make that separation untenable,” they told clients on Monday. “The combination of Twitter's unclear cash needs and diminishing options for Mr. Musk to serve those needs amid the broad public backlash driven by inconsistent standards application for Twitter users, notably banning select journalists, is pushing us to the sidelines on TSLA.”

[MU82]

This is fun ...

https://www.ndtv.com/feature/nearly-1-million-vote-for-snoop-dogg-to-run-twitter-as-he-mocks-musk-poll-3620345

Hour after Elon Musk, rapper Snoop Dogg has posted a poll on Twitter asking users if he should run the microblogging platform.

The poll was launched on Monday morning and there are still about 13 hours left for users to choose from "Yes" and "No."

Snoop Dogg's poll has already received more than 1.2 million votes, with a staggering 81 per cent of the respondents saying Yes.

[Herman Cain]

Nouriel Roubini, Doctor Doom says deep recession on the way

https://www.rt.com/business/568574-world-economy-train-wreck-roubini/

[Skatastrophy]

Nouriel Roubini, Doctor Doom says deep recession on the way

https://www.rt.com/business/568574-world-economy-train-wreck-roubini/

Literal russian propaganda. Again

[Goose]

Herman

I always appreciate your take on the economy and curious on your thoughts for 2023. I remain pessimistic and probably more concerned than I was even a few months ago. I do not see a lot of silver linings out there and think there are a lot of hot spots around the world. Again, I would love to hear your thoughts and hopefully you brighten up my view of 2023.

[Tortuga94]

If you need a reason to be optimistic about stocks, you should just look at what history tells us. Drops of 20% or more are very rare, in fact in the last 100 years there have only been 6 years where the stock market had a decline of 20% or more for that calendar year. We were down 25% at the low of the year on 10/10/2022, measured from the high which occurred on 1/3/2022, the first trading day of the year.

Since 1950 this is just the 9th time that the S&P 500 has experienced a decline, peak to trough of 25% or higher. In nearly every one of those instances the market was higher in the following 12 months, with the exception of the decline of the great recession. And in most of those cases we are talking about double digit returns for the following 12 months. In fact, the average 1-yr return following a 25% or more decline is 21.6%.

Now, I'm not predicting that we'll be higher a year from now as it's possible that things can get worse from here but this feels nothing like 2008 or 2001 the last 2 major economic downturns we've had.

I understand that history can only tell us what has happened and not predict what's going to happen, but I do find comfort in knowing that buying stocks in the past when things were down this much has almost always produced positive returns.

[Goose]

Tortuga

The stock market is the least of my concerns. My concern is the overall health of the USA and global economy. As for the stock market, I am confident that the market will see new highs down the road, when that happens is up in the air.

[Herman Cain]

Herman

I always appreciate your take on the economy and curious on your thoughts for 2023. I remain pessimistic and probably more concerned than I was even a few months ago. I do not see a lot of silver linings out there and think there are a lot of hot spots around the world. Again, I would love to hear your thoughts and hopefully you brighten up my view of 2023.

Goose :
We are full speed ahead in our business making strategic acquisitions and capital expenditures. Continuing to look for talent at all levels of the Company. Having been through quite a few recessions in my day, I tend to look at them as opportunities .

I am sanguine about the economy for several reasons .

First , people have jobs and employers are still net understaffed .

Second, Energy prices have moderated .  There are plenty of energy resources world wide

Third, I see the Russia Ukraine war coming to some resolution in the coming year .

Fourth, the chip shortage, which drives a lot of disruption in the economy  should start to abate in late 2023.

Fifth , there is still plenty of liquidity in the financial system. Banks are open for new business . We had multiple bidders on our renewal. Private Equity has to be put to work.

Sixth, Housing and Auto demand is very strong . Albeit tempered by interest rates which prevents over heating

Seventh , Chinese manufacturing is being move to other low cost , more reliable , venues .

Finally, The gridlock in Washington , that has resulted  from the mid- terms , is a good thing . No new adverse tax laws or anti business legislation can happen for at least two years .

[MU82]

I agree with almost all of that, 9-9-9. The economy isn't incredible, but it isn't a disaster either. There are still some issues, obviously, but most are getting resolved, albeit slowly.

And while I agree with Goose that the economy and the stock market are two different things, there are bellwethers. For example, both Nike and FedEx released surprisingly good earnings reports after the bell this afternoon. That both are well up in after-hours trading is one thing; that each of these giant bellwethers of the retail industry far exceeded expectations is an example of a positive for the economy.

[Goose]

Herman

Appreciate your thoughts. I like the optimism and fingers crossed you are right. Merry Christmas to you and your family.

[JWags85]

FedEx released surprisingly good earnings reports after the bell this afternoon.

Not surprised at all by this.  They are charging the same price...for far less reliable or dependable service.  Good chance we move our 5 figure international shipping budget, thats been with FedEx for 20 years, to DHL in 2023.  They are so tied to Amazon that everything else takes a backseat.

If you pay $200 for a shipment to Singapore or Mumbai on a Friday, and its delivered on a Monday for the last 5-6 years, even through Covid, but now it delivers on Wed, Thur, sometimes Friday (even though it says "expected delivery on Monday" still when shipping), I can't see how thats not significant cost savings and boosts to their bottom line.

[The Hippie Satan of Hyperbole]

Not surprised at all by this.  They are charging the same price...for far less reliable or dependable service.  Good chance we move our 5 figure international shipping budget, thats been with FedEx for 20 years, to DHL in 2023.  They are so tied to Amazon that everything else takes a backseat.

If you pay $200 for a shipment to Singapore or Mumbai on a Friday, and its delivered on a Monday for the last 5-6 years, even through Covid, but now it delivers on Wed, Thur, sometimes Friday (even though it says "expected delivery on Monday" still when shipping), I can't see how thats not significant cost savings and boosts to their bottom line.

"When it absolutely, positively has to be there sometime next week."

[Spotcheck Billy]

I believe all service guarantees that were suspended during covid are still suspended for most if not all carriers.

[MU Fan in Connecticut]

Not surprised at all by this.  They are charging the same price...for far less reliable or dependable service.  Good chance we move our 5 figure international shipping budget, thats been with FedEx for 20 years, to DHL in 2023.  They are so tied to Amazon that everything else takes a backseat.

If you pay $200 for a shipment to Singapore or Mumbai on a Friday, and its delivered on a Monday for the last 5-6 years, even through Covid, but now it delivers on Wed, Thur, sometimes Friday (even though it says "expected delivery on Monday" still when shipping), I can't see how thats not significant cost savings and boosts to their bottom line.

I can tell you dealing with DHL is awful.  Everything we ship is Ex-works on our customer account.  When we see a customer specify DHL we groan because their handling of customs documentation is not smooth.

[Uncle Rico]

https://twitter.com/veryimportant/status/1605976420479406080?s=46&t=p_qJQvty7ySm28UJkDH-wA

[TSmith34, Inc.]

Down 45% in two months, despite record earnings. I wonder what could have caused it?

[JWags85]

If Musk steps down as Twitter CEO, the short term rip in TSLA is gonna melt some shorts faces off.

[TSmith34, Inc.]

If Musk steps down as Twitter CEO, the short term rip in TSLA is gonna melt some shorts faces off.

Short term I think you're right.

Longer term, Musk would need to stop tweeting and repeatedly showing the world what an a-hole he is. Musk is the Tesla brand. I'm not sure he has it in him to stop at this point.