Tesla Inc (TSLA)

He's short Tesla. Forget the Elon Musk stuff. They have balance sheet and cash flow problems--they can't pay their
suppliers. They also have many production issues.

He wants to have confidence in a company’s CEO, but Musk is erratic. Entrepreneurs often build a company well but stay too long. That is a pronounced problem at Tesla at this time. Also, until recently, Tesla had the luxury electric vehicle market to its own. Now major manufacturers, such a Mercedes, are announcing that they will make these types of vehicles within the next few years. This competition will work against Tesla.

Valuation is bothersome and the owner is erratic. They have trouble bringing product to market and they are burning through capital. He likes the car and e-cars, but the company is quite overvalued.

The problem is that it is a car company run by a guy that doesn’t understand the manufacturing aspect. A high cap ex industry. It has overpromised and underdelivered. The CEO has been very erratic. Burning too much cash.

The caller asked whether to short Tesla. Goodreid does not short companies. His general concern with shorting stocks is that even if the short thesis is correct, the stock might have enough momentum over the near term to cause a short squeeze and cost the investor a lot of money. He thinks that Tesla is way overvalued, but because it has a cult following, he thinks that it might cause real financial pain to people who short it.

During the time of the show, Elon Musk tweeted a potential buyout of Tesla at $420 and the stock started rallying. Hurst’s comment was that the Tesla price fluctuations this summer are an illustration of the problem of signal and noise. There is all sorts of irrelevant noise about this stock, and investors are over-focused on the production numbers for Model 3. He thinks there is tremendous embedded value in the company and that SpaceX alone might be worth this much. Tesla’s cash burn is important, but the embedded value is being missed.

The short traders like this one – and he thinks they are right. They are burning a ton of cash, but have met their production numbers. It is not the most transparent company and there are now more companies coming into the electric care space and they are not developing autonomous driving technology. He is staying away.

He's not positive on cars as a whole now. Electrification is a trend, yes. There will be more e-cars, batteries and maybe hybrids. That said, Tesla needs to raise capital constantly and and has no plans to create cash flow. Can Elon Musk succeed? He's innovative, so it's possible. But the car space is too risky for him. How big will be the car market be in light of ride-sharing? Car sales may even shrink in the future. (However, battery technology is attractive.)

The CEO has a pretty big hammer in terms of the voting shares. He generally likes chairman of the board and chief operating officer to be separate. He generally votes against a combined role. TSLA-Q is a fabulous technology but you have to ask how much of the future expectation for this company is already priced into this stock.

A stock that analysts hate. This is a great play to get into this sector, e-cars. Tesla continues to struggle to boost production. A speculative stock.

He recommended it in 2012 and it ran up a lot more than he expected it to. The market cap rivals Ford or GM. He thinks it will come off in price.

It's burning through cash, has very high debt, is underdelivering and recently Elon Musk snapped at caller questions. Red flags are everywhere. They still haven't nailed down their level three entry-level car. Definitely don't buy.

People may be questioning what management is doing. It broke down out of a down trend to about the $250 level, which is encouraging investors to come in. You have to break out above the top of the trend.

Short or long? He doesn't short stocks, but to answer this question he would short Tesla. Yes, they make a fine car, but this is the poster boy between a good company and a good stock. The estimated market cap of Tesla to produce pera car is $500,000 vs. GM's $4,000. Even if Tesla is outrageously successful, then can't grow into their stock price.

No plans to buy this. Tesla continues to miss production targets, is burning through cash, and carries heavy debt. Tesla must prove it can produce cars on a sustainable basis. Model 3's production is below scheduled rates. Also, Tesla now faces more competition.