Tesla rumor mill vs. reality

Discussion in 'Tesla' started by Pushmi-Pullyu, Jul 26, 2018.

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  1. Pushmi-Pullyu

    Pushmi-Pullyu Well-Known Member

    I wonder what's causing the apparent ramp up in anti-Tesla rumors lately. Are the short-selling FUDsters getting nervous about their investments? Is it finally sinking in to them, with the Model 3 production ramp up accelerating, that their dreams of seeing Tesla fail are nothing more than mean-spirited wishful thinking on their part?

    Are Big Oil shills being whip-lashed by their masters to churn out even more EV-hater and Tesla-hater FUD, in response to the growing signs that more and more legacy auto makers are finally making real plans to move beyond mere compliance cars in making EVs?

    Are Russian troll farms taking aim at Tesla, with Vladimir Putin targeting Tesla as promoting the "green" revolution, threatening Russia's primary income which is selling fossil fuel? Russian troll farms are now targeting all sorts of divisive issues on American social media; are paid Russian trolls now copying and repeating the sort of Tesla hater bull pucky so often seen on Seeking Alpha and Yahoo Finance? Are some of the Tesla-bashing "Usual Suspects" right here on InsideEVs, paid Russian trolls? If they deny it, will they say "No" or "Nyet"?

    Or is the rumor mill being ramped up over nothing more than a few of Elon's more outrageous unfiltered Twitter posts?

    * * * * *

    The Green Tech Media site has a useful, fair and balanced (no sarcasm there) survey of the recent flurry of anti-Tesla rumors:

    "Elon Pushes Back Against Mounting Tesla Rumors"

    It's another busy week for electric vehicle pioneer, solar installer and battery supplier Tesla — both on the production front and in the rumor mill. And once again, Tesla CEO Elon Musk is on Twitter defending his disruptive company from rumors, as well as spreading a few of his own.

    Rumor: Teslas are stored in large numbers in parking lots across the West Coast. Twitter has photos. Is Tesla trying to stockpile cars in Lathrop, Calif. and Burbank, Calif. to avoid triggering the EV tax credit reduction?

    Nope. "We use Lathrop as a loading hub for cars being shipped to other locations for delivery to customers," a Tesla spokesperson told Business Insider. "As our deliveries increase, we're obviously going to have more cars there." By design, Tesla doesn't have the car lots of a national dealer network to store and finance its inventory.

    Rumor: Model 3 preorder cancellations are outpacing deposits. That's the claim from investment bank Needham & Company, which downgraded Tesla's stock to “sell” on that premise.

    That one gets an emphatic "no" from Tesla. “The notion that Model 3 cancellations are outpacing orders is unequivocally false,” a Tesla spokesperson told Reuters. Musk called Needham's claim "bs" on Twitter and went on to say there were over 2,000 Model S/X and 5,000 Model 3 *new* net orders" for that particular week.

    Rumor: Tesla asked its suppliers to provide refunds for goods or services dating to 2016, according to Bloomberg.

    There's a little truth in there. And maybe a walk-back from Tesla. The Wall Street Journal obtained a memo last week in which Tesla asked its suppliers for cost reductions. A Tesla spokesperson explained that the request was made to fewer than 10 suppliers and was "related to capital expenditures for long-term projects that started as far back as 2016 and aren’t complete." Tesla later went on to say that only future price concessions were being discussed, not retroactive payments, according to MarketWatch.
    (See link above for the full article, with pictures.)

     
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