Evaporating 550 billion overnight, Tesla is doing it again

Investor Author | Zhao Sirui

The left hand increased the price, the right hand expanded production, and Tesla played a good hand.

However, while production and sales are booming, safety issues have also become a sharp sword hanging over Tesla's head.

How to find the balance between wealth growth and product quality tests Tesla's comprehensive ability, and it is more related to how far Tesla can go in the future.

One

Tesla is on the hot search again, this time because of the confusing "second factory".

Recently, some media reported that Tesla will build a new factory in Shanghai, that is, Tesla's "second factory" in China, which is expected to mainly produce Model 3 and Model Y, with an annual production capacity of 450,000 vehicles.

At present, Tesla has a total of six factories around the world, California, Shanghai, Berlin, Texas factories responsible for vehicle manufacturing, Nevada and New York factories are responsible for the production of battery packs, charging piles and solar roofs.

Among them, the Shanghai factory occupies half of Tesla's "half of the country". In 2021, Tesla delivered 936,000 vehicles worldwide, and the Shanghai plant delivered 484,000 vehicles, accounting for 51.7% of the total global deliveries.

If the "second factory" is successfully completed and put into operation, it means that Tesla's annual production capacity in Shanghai may double to 1 million vehicles. Shanghai will also become Tesla's largest car export center in China.

In terms of revenue, China is also an increasingly important market for Tesla. In 2021, Tesla's share of China's revenue in Tesla's global total revenue has risen from 12% in 2019 to 26%, and it may further increase in the future.

Musk once mentioned in the earnings call that Tesla will achieve an annual sales target of 20 million vehicles in 2030, and the premise of achieving this goal is that Tesla's annual production capacity will reach 20 million vehicles, and Tesla's expansion is imperative.

Previously, there were rumors about the location of Tesla's "second factory", such as Shenyang, Qingdao, Guangzhou, Wuhan, Chongqing and other popular cities, and even Hefei, the base of Weilai Automobile, which has become the object of scandal of the "second factory".

Today, Tesla can be described as "fond of Shanghai". However, some Tesla insiders said that the remarks of "building a second factory in Shanghai" are not accurate, and Tesla is actually "expanding production, not a second factory".

Relevant people said that Tesla has planned a large area of land near the existing factory area, including the future new production capacity planning, the news was displayed in a land transfer announcement on the official website of the Shanghai land exchange market in early March.

It is reported that a large piece of land near Tesla's existing factory has been sold, the plot covers an area of about 460,000 square meters, and the type of access industry is "new energy vehicle manufacturing". For now, it seems highly likely that the plot will be used to expand the Tesla factory.

In any case, Tesla's plan to further expand production capacity in the Chinese market seems to be a foregone conclusion. After all, the Shanghai factory is of great significance to Tesla, as it is both Tesla's first overseas factory and China's first wholly foreign-owned automobile factory.

The review found that Tesla's Shanghai factory, which covers an area of 860,000 square meters, broke ground in January 2019 and was officially delivered to car owners for the first time on December 30, 2019, which took less than a year from construction to production, fully demonstrating the "speed of China".

It is worth noting that Tesla's Shanghai factory has become the strongest competitor of domestic new energy vehicle companies, from the current market ranking, BYD, SAIC-GM-Wuling occupy the first and second positions, and Tesla ranks third.

If the Shanghai factory expansion plan is smoothly advanced, Tesla's production capacity will double, which is bound to form a stronger pressure on domestic new energy vehicle companies, and the domestic new energy market competition will become more intense.

Tesla's expansion of production would have been a good thing, but the paradox is that Tesla unexpectedly plummeted in the US stock market, plunging 8.33% overnight, and the company's total market value evaporated by more than $82 billion, equivalent to nearly 550 billion yuan.

Two

In Tesla, there is another paradoxical phenomenon, that is, the price increase will not have any impact on Tesla's sales, but the faster the price increase, the more hot the sales.

Entering 2022, Tesla's price increases are frequent. On March 17 this year, Tesla raised the price of the Standard Edition model produced in China, which is also the cheapest model in Tesla's Model Y series.

According to the price of Tesla's official website in China, the price of the standard version of the Model Y is currently raised by 15,060 yuan to 316,900 yuan.

The last price increase occurred on March 15, tesla raised the price of the Model 3 and Model Y high-end versions in the Chinese and US markets, and raised the price of the ModelY long-endurance version and the Model 3 high-performance version sold in China by 18,000 yuan respectively.

Previously, Tesla raised the price of some Model 3 and Model Y on March 10, with a price increase of 10,000 yuan. In just 7 days, Tesla announced price increases for 3 consecutive times, and the action was indeed a bit violent.

Through the price comparison of Tesla's official website, it is found that since January this year, the price of the high-performance version of the Model Y has increased by about 7.7%, the price of the long-endurance version of the Model Y has increased by about 8%, and the price of the standard version of the Model Y has increased by about 5%.

A car owner who just picked up the car in February said: "The frequency and amplitude of Tesla's price increases recently are a bit fierce, I bought the Tesla Model Y high-performance version, and now the price has risen by more than 30,000 yuan, is it difficult for electric vehicles to become futures?" ”

At present, Tesla adopts the model of early price locking at the time of sale, that is, the price at the time of the following order is subject, and even if the price of the car is raised after the order takes effect, the owner still pays according to the original price. To put it bluntly, the sooner the owner places an order, the more he can resist the impact of future price increases.

Or because of this, Tesla's sales are extremely hot. According to Tesla's official website, the delivery date of the current Model 3 and Model Y series models takes 20-24 weeks. That is to say, after the owner places an order, he must wait in line for at least half a year before he can pick up the car.

According to foreign media Outlet, the production capacity of many Tesla models in 2022 is close to being sold out. Tesla has a large backlog of undelivered orders, with the Model Y being the most serious, and orders will not be delivered until January 2023 at the earliest.

Driven by Tesla, domestic new energy vehicle companies represented by "Wei Xiaoli" have also set off a round of price increases. Recently, Xiaopeng, Weilai, Weima, BYD, GAC Aean, SAIC Roewe and other new energy vehicle manufacturers have begun to increase prices.

Behind Tesla's continuous price increases is the reality of rising global raw material prices and declining domestic subsidies. Taking the price of lithium carbonate upstream of the supply chain as an example, in early March this year, the price of lithium carbonate exceeded the mark of 500,000 yuan per ton, rising more than 4 times a year.

Under the trend of rising prices, the majority of consumers are enthusiastic about new energy vehicles. According to the data of the Association, the retail sales of new energy passenger vehicles reached 273,000 units in February this year, an increase of 180.9% year-on-year.

Three

Tesla does not seem to be worried about selling at all, Musk has repeatedly "Versailles" to the outside world: Tesla's challenge is not in demand, but in production capacity. In every Tesla earnings report, expanding production capacity is a top priority.

In the first quarter of this year, Tesla delivered about 310,000 vehicles worldwide, of which the Model 3 and Model Y models accounted for about 95%.

Musk said Tesla's production in 2022 may increase by at least 50% compared with 2021. At the same time, he envisioned: "It seems that we have the potential to produce 1.5 million cars this year." ”

However, the final result will have to be tested by the market. Due to the impact of the epidemic, Tesla's Shanghai factory was closed at the end of March this year and reopened on April 19. It is estimated that Tesla may lose more than 50,000 units during the shutdown.

Although the current production capacity of the Shanghai plant has not yet returned to normal levels, Musk said that the second quarter of the Shanghai plant's automobile production will still be the same as the first quarter. At the same time, it is optimistic that the delivery volume of the Shanghai plant will increase significantly in the third and fourth quarters.

While Tesla is busy with capacity expansion and the hot sales of various series of models, the blow is also followed, and the most concerned is safety issues.

At the Shanghai Auto Show in April 2021, a car owner wearing the words "brake failure" stood on the roof of a Tesla car to defend his rights, breaking the dazzling aura above Tesla's head and showing Tesla's backlit face in front of the public.

Recently, some Tesla owners claimed on social media that they had just encountered the horror scene of Tesla's brake failure, which aroused the attention of the majority of netizens.

In response, Tesla responded that it has retrieved background data for verification. The data shows that this result is caused by the driver's operation error when the vehicle is steering.

Public information shows that in 2022 alone, Tesla has twice "topped" the monthly electric vehicle recall list in February and April, and the safety issue is worth considering.

According to the official website of the State Administration for Market Regulation, Tesla recalled 26,047 vehicles, 127785 vehicles and 14,684 vehicles on February 18, April 7 and April 29, respectively, for a total of 168516 electric vehicles, and the reasons for the recall include safety factors such as driving vehicles losing driving power, lack of unit speed, and defrosting effects under special circumstances.

In response to the recall, Tesla said that it will upgrade the motor control software for the vehicles within the scope of the recall through the remote upgrade technology of the car; for the vehicles that cannot be recalled through the remote upgrade technology of the car, the relevant users will be contacted through the service center to upgrade the motor control software for the vehicle to closely monitor the rear motor inverter of the vehicle, and timely replace the rear inverter with related failures for free to eliminate safety hazards.

In terms of "emergency measures", Tesla said that before the vehicle recalls the upgrade software, users should drive the vehicle cautiously and contact the Tesla service center for maintenance as soon as the recall begins.

Tesla vehicle recall incident is not only happening in China, the latest news shows that a few days ago, Tesla Korea Co., Ltd. will recall model S models in South Korea due to a bug in the configuration logic of the vehicle software, a total of 1290 vehicles.

It is understood that the main reason for Tesla's recall is due to the error in the configuration logic of the vehicle software, resulting in the rear fog lights similar to the position of the reversing lights being activated, and the reversing lights may be lit during the vehicle driving, and there are serious safety hazards.

There is no doubt that in the case of both production and sales, safety is still a sharp sword hanging over Tesla's head. And once the sword falls, the consequences will be unimaginable.