This argument is flawed. The other manufacturers have model variances to spread their buyers among. Tesla has just three.

And takes orders for a $35K version that'll never be produced.

Indeed. Swindled to provide an interest-free loan that one may get back if the company goes bankrupt.

Huh? GM's EPS is $5.15 and at its current share price pays a dividend with a 3.87% yield. Tesla has the dubious honor of increasing its losses per share even as share dilution increases.

They must need to shut shut down the line to let those robots cool off from that air friction!

And one of my favorites...

Elon Musk, on the Model 3 production, 2017: "So -- but what people should absolutely have zero concern about, zero, is that Tesla will achieve a 10,000-unit production week by the end of next year."

Musk says a lot of things:

Elon Musk, 2012: "The electricity used by the Supercharger comes from a solar carport system provided by SolarCity, which results in almost zero marginal energy cost after installation. Combining these two factors, Tesla is able to provide Model S owners free long distance travel indefinitely. () The Supercharger system will always generate more power from sunlight than Model S customers use for driving."

Elon Musk, 2013: "Model S is designed to allow a fast battery swap, exchanging your battery for a fully charged battery in less than half the time it takes to refill a gas tank. () Hopefully, this is what convinces people finally that electric cars are the future."

Elon Musk, 2014: "I am confident in the German consumer. I bet that from the end of 2014 onwards, we can sell 10,000 cars in Germany annually () By the end of 2014, we'll have 25 German Service Centres () We'll have 200 maybe 300 cars per week going to Germany (10,400 to 15,600 annually)."

Elon Musk, 2014: "I expect that in the long run, Tesla will build a battery factory in Germany."

Elon Musk, 2015: "The response has been overwhelming, OK, like crazy. In the course of like less than a week, we've had 38,000 reservations for the Powerwall, 2,500 reservations for Powerpack. So, it's like crazy off the hook. Yeah. And it seems to have gone super viral."

Elon Musk, 2015: "I don't want to sort of name specific suppliers, but our biggest challenges are with the second row seat, which is, it's an amazing seat, like a sculptural work of art, but a very tricky thing to get right. The falcon-wing door actually seems to probably not be a critical path item."

Elon Musk, 2015: "We should be able to do 90 percent of miles driven within three years," Elon Musk told the Financial Times in 2013, "The problem with Google's current approach (LIDAR among other sensors) is that the sensor system is too expensive," Musk said. "It's better to have an optical system, basically cameras with software that is able to figure out what's going on just by looking at things."

Elon Musk, 2016: "If you're in New York and the car's in Los Angeles, you can summon your car to you from your phone and tell the car to find you. It'll automatically charge itself along the journey () I might be slightly optimistic on that, but I don't think significantly optimistic that we can do that in two years"

Elon Musk, 2016: "We plan to fund about $1.5 billion in capital expenditures without accessing any outside capital other than our existing sources that support our leasing and finished goods inventory."

Elon Musk, 2016: "So as a rough guess, I would say we would aim to produce 100,000 to 200,000 Model 3s in the second half of next year. That's my expectation right now. Yeah, so that's the thing. () The date we are setting with suppliers to get to a volume production capability with the Model 3 is July 1 next year."

Elon Musk, 2016: "The probability of having an accident is 50 percent lower if you have Autopilot on () Even with our first version, it's almost twice as good as a person."

Elon Musk, 2016: "With your Model S, Model X, or Model 3, your solar panel system, and your Powerwall all in place, you would be able to deploy and consume energy in the most efficient and sustainable way possible, lowering your costs and minimizing your dependence on fossil fuels and the grid. () Culturally, this is a great fit."

Elon Musk, 2016: Musk told analysts the company's current plan "does not require any capital raise for the Model 3 at all."

The deposits weren't put into an escrow account. They were fed into Tesla's massive cash incinerator. As such, deposit holders are unsecured creditors and stand behind secured creditors in a bankruptcy. Among the unsecured creditors, there is priority, and its not clear where deposit holders fall. Given the relatively small amount each Model 3 depositor paid, a bankruptcy judge may pay them out first. However, given that manufacturing assets are traditionally worth pennies on the dollar in a bankruptcy(even the "Alien Dreadnought" type), the secured creditors may take all, leaving deposit holders with nothing.

It wasn't the stupidest thing they went along with - that would be the SolarCity merger. But many don't seem to realize that Tesla can increase its market cap by issuing new shares while the stock price stays the same or drops. Retail holders lose out, Musk wins. Although it may be a moot issue anyway, given the precarious cash position of Tesla. I'd warn current stock holders that the price drop last week was just the beginning, but if people have been holding on this long I'm afraid they're going to ride this thing all the way down regardless.

There is no $35K Model 3. Plain and simple.

To the question of who's fault it is and should pay for replacement, Bosch made the bolt but was it to Tesla's spec? And isn't it so fortunate Tesla has plenty of service center capacity to handle the recall?

Oops, I did mix up AP with AR. Have you heard? Tesla's CAO just left: https://seekingalpha.com/filin... If you own the stock, get out while you can.

Do you know why they were able to show that much cash on hand? For all the supposed smarts on this site, no one seems to be able to read a quarterly result, much less a 10K. Tesla currently has $2.3B in accounts receivable. That's what they owed their suppliers at the end of 2017. There's a reason why one of the first things Musk said on the 4Q conference call was a big thanks to the patience of their suppliers. They also blew out their entire stale inventory of Model S and Model X at a huge discount to help show less cash burn. And they horded all their ZEV credits to be used for 4Q. These are one time events to make things look better than they are. They are at a negative $1.1B of working capital. 1Q results are going to be even worse. Did you check out the 10K that was released Friday? Look at the section on risks. Some read like they belong on The Onion. Their financials are a disaster.

Panasonic has no problem keeping up with cell demand and Tesla is on the hook to buy more cells than they need. Look at the cell costs in the 10K and extrapolate how many cars they need to build to use them all. Model S and Model X demand has plateaued and dropped over the last year. Look at the seasonally adjusted sale numbers. They would have dropped even more drastically without massive discounting involved. Did you even listen to the 4Q conference call? Tesla management said they are reducing production of the Model S and Model X to a total of 100K a year because of demand.

They're going to need a massive cash infusion in Q2. If they can get it it'll probably be a very dilutive equity issue. The bond market is closed off to them(see below).

Those were auto lease bonds based off the income of their Model S and Model X leases. They gave up future cash flow from those leases to keep the company afloat. A desperate move. The $1.8B junk bond issue last August started trading underwater almost immediately and still is. The initial bond buyers got screwed.

Tesla should have never offered free charging to Model S and Model X owners and instead have charged for their use in the beginning. Now they're stuck with paying electricity costs for these vehicles. "A new “workplace charging” program unveiled today offers businesses free Tesla wall connectors and will also cover installation, provided they meet certain qualifications set forth by the California carmaker. Tesla won’t cover the cost of operating the charging stations, and the company says there could be other permitting, construction, zoning, or labor costs." I wonder what Tesla owns after install. The Supercharger network will be one of the few assets another company will buy when Tesla goes into bankruptcy reorg.

Tesla delivered only 1,550 Model 3 vehicles in the Q4, lower than the lowest "analyst" guidance. But as they say, "Hope springs eternal". http://www.latimes.com/busines... [latimes.com]

The people who made money were the ones who sold the equipment, not the ones looking for gold.