Tesla/Lithium stocks discussion

zpehtsfd

cros13 wrote: »

The iPace is production is limited to 12,000 units next year.... Why? because LG Chem can't supply any more cells.

Link please? tia

Skelet0n

"Funding secured" might be problematic with the SEC if he doesn't deliver on it.

ct5amr2ig1nfhp

Link. A few websites claiming 13k production a year.

Other sites saying "LG Chem expects to produce up to 100,000 EV batteries in Poland annually"

So who else are they supplying from Poland?

Chevrolet Bolt EV batteries seem to be coming from South Korea.

zpehtsfd wrote: »

Link please? tia

cros13

zpehtsfd wrote: »

Link please? tia

http://europe.autonews.com/article/20171206/ANE/171209855/jaguar-i-pace-likely-to-beat-audi-porsche-rivals-to-showrooms

IHS Markit have the 13,000 number broken down in their paywalled report.

I got 12,000 from the planned plant capacity reported by LG Chem for the Wroclaw plant minus Renault-Nissan Alliance, Volvo and PSA's expected volumes.

Funny enough... a lot of rumors around a few months back that Tesla were talking to Magna Steyr (who build the iPace) about them taking over model 3 production or a portion of for the european market.
If they do go private with some big money behind them that would be a good move.
Concentrate on european gigafactory construction (and make it battery only) and leave bolting the cars together to Magna.

cros13

Bradley Fat Warlock wrote: »

Other sites saying "LG Chem expects to produce up to 100,000 EV batteries in Poland annually"

100,000 packs of 30kWh capacity.... fine print!
The iPace has a 92kWh pack.

Bradley Fat Warlock wrote: »

So who else are they supplying from Poland?

Renault-Nissan (Renault now, Nissan added in 2019 for new models and the 60kWh Leaf)
Volvo-Geely (XC40 Electric and Lynk & Co models)
PSA (208 Electric and an Unnamed CUV (possibly 2008 or 3008 derivative)... late '19)
Daimler (sample quantities)

Bradley Fat Warlock wrote: »

Chevrolet Bolt EV batteries seem to be coming from South Korea.

Bolt batteries are mostly from LG Chem's Holland, Michigan plant which is adding more lines at the moment... so some cells may be shipped in for SK.

phantom_lord

lucky john wrote: »

I doubt he is looking to borrow the money. This seems to be a shares for cash deal. Only those with deep pockets like google, apple, Buffet, wealth funds, Blackrock ect need apply. Buffet has $110 billion in cash looking for an opportunity and is annoyed he missed out on the big tech stories. he has the long term picture in mind, the CE in Musk and the growth potential. Not sure the present balance sheet will tick the boxes for him though.

This is just about the last thing in the world that Buffet would put cash into.

Think any deal is highly unlikely and that it's a last ditch effort by Musk to keep the company alive.

phantom_lord

cros13 wrote: »

Yes they do. Battery supply and vertical integration.

Vertical integration is not a positive thing. There's a reason the other majors don't use it, it's way more expensive and inefficient. It's great for building rockets but not for cars. It's part of the reason why Tesla is burning through cash at such a high rate.

drunkmonkey

Skelet0n wrote: »

"Funding secured" might be problematic with the SEC if he doesn't deliver on it.

It's Fraud rule 10b-5

cros13

phantom_lord wrote: »

Vertical integration is not a positive thing. There's a reason the other majors don't use it, it's way more expensive and inefficient. It's great for building rockets but not for cars. It's part of the reason why Tesla is burning through cash at such a high rate.

You're right that vertical integration is not a positive thing for a mature industry. Why make spark plugs when you can spin out your spark plug division etc. etc.

But it's a big problem when there's market disruption. VW for example didn't have the electrical engineering talent anymore for a big EV program because that was all contracted out to suppliers like Bosch and Continental. For their ID development program they've had to go on a hiring spree and fill the gaps with consultants and talent based with suppliers.
That also meant the managers promoted internally from combustion engine development and assembly tend to assess a challenger like Tesla from their frame of reference (panel gaps, DOT recalls).

This is a market in it's earliest stages of growth. There's so much custom engineering needed to make a competitive EV today it's difficult to just go to a supplier, and pick a part off a shelf (if a part is even available that meets the spec). Economies of scale need volume... and there's no volume if you can't bring a compelling product to market at the right price. And it's especially difficult if you are building a totally new product and asking suppliers to hire engineers and build new production capacity for parts that have very different specs to what they've spent 50 years optimising production of.

You can't go to a supplier of brake rotors and say I need brake rotors with a different dimension to the standard sizes you always made, a material change for a 15% reduction in weight to stay within spec, the part to cost the same as these other standard size rotors I buy from you and I can't guarantee any volume larger than 1,000 units/month.

There's also practical concerns which co-ordinating engineering teams in different companies. In the ICE market, change is slow, types and spec of parts well defined. But in EV development you can have major changes during development that impacts lots of parts. Like the current rating for numerous parts might change because you found out during drivetrain road testing that to hit your performance numbers you need to feed more power to the motor than expected, that might mean substantial changes to power electronics, cables switched out for thicker grades, and changes to the physical layout to accommodate that which may mean that the wire loom to the control panel has to move to a different path, uprated fuses with different metal alloys or changes to pack voltage that may mean you need a different DC-DC converter and inverter and sensors redesigned.

Continental, Bosch, ZF and others have put their toe in the water and got little to no interest in their first products. Continental used to supply the motor/inverter for the Zoe for example... Renault has brought those in house in favour of a custom solution with 3% better efficiency. ZF put out a range of EV products and sold nothing but in-gearbox motors to BMW (who were an existing gearbox customer). Bosch built a line of low powered motors that missed where the market was going entirely... sold a few to china and gave up. BMW's motor in my i3 was built in house.

As for the SEC/who the buyer is side of things... I'm keeping an eye out for an 8-K filing.

Kuva

phantom_lord wrote: »

Tesla relies on Panasonic for their batteries, and there's massive battery factories popping up all over asia that are much larger than the gigafactory

Lad, you're just writing whatever pops into your head on here.

lucky john

There is a 20% difference or so between the present price and the going private price. I for one will be buying again. The process could take anything from 3 months to a year but it's 99% a done deal pending shareholder agreement which in itself is 95% sure. If he can deliver present shareholders a place inside the new private company then that will be 99% sure. I'm allowing the 1% incase the share price rises above $420 before the ink gets to paper.

Skelet0n

lucky john wrote: »

There is a 20% difference or so between the present price and the going private price. I for one will be buying again. The process could take anything from 3 months to a year but it's 99% a done deal pending shareholder agreement which in itself is 95% sure. If he can deliver present shareholders a place inside the new private company then that will be 99% sure. I'm allowing the 1% incase the share price rises above $420 before the ink gets to paper.

I really hope you don't believe that. If there was a 99% chance the share price would be $419, it's not.

Funding is 100% not secured, the board will meet to discuss the "offer" and reject it to protect Musk from the price manipulation that the SEC will be looking into him for.

Also really hoping the media calls this scandal #ElonGate.

Shai

lucky john wrote: »

There is a 20% difference or so between the present price and the going private price. I for one will be buying again. The process could take anything from 3 months to a year but it's 99% a done deal pending shareholder agreement which in itself is 95% sure. If he can deliver present shareholders a place inside the new private company then that will be 99% sure. I'm allowing the 1% incase the share price rises above $420 before the ink gets to paper.

This sounds an awful lot like a man trying to convince me of the efficacy of a Sex Panther cologne.

lucky john

Skelet0n wrote: »

I really hope you don't believe that. If there was a 99% chance the share price would be $419, it's not.

Funding is 100% not secured, the board will meet to discuss the "offer" and reject it to protect Musk from the price manipulation that the SEC will be looking into him for.

Also really hoping the media calls this scandal #ElonGate.

Since the tweet everyone is assuming that Musk is the stupidest guy in america. As if he doesn't know saying "Funding Secured" could/would land him in jail if he was lying. But he's one of the smartest guys in the world. All the evidence points in that direction. Musk delivers.

lucky john

Shai wrote: »

This sounds an awful lot like a man trying to convince me of the efficacy of a Sex Panther cologne.

I have no interest is selling you cologne Shai or anything else. There's nothing in it for me if you buy or don't buy shares. I'm just giving my opinion on what is going to happen. I have been consistently posting on this forum since it was started and the share price was $220 or something like that. My opinion has never changed. It won't now either. Ignore the noise.

Skelet0n

lucky john wrote: »

Since the tweet everyone is assuming that Musk is the stupidest guy in america. As if he doesn't know saying "Funding Secured" could/would land him in jail if he was lying. But he's one of the smartest guys in the world. All the evidence points in that direction. Musk delivers.

Hmm... If only I could think of an example of something stupid Elon has tweeted recently, pedo guy.

zpehtsfd

lucky john wrote: »

Since the tweet everyone is assuming that Musk is the stupidest guy in america. As if he doesn't know saying "Funding Secured" could/would land him in jail if he was lying. But he's one of the smartest guys in the world. All the evidence points in that direction. Musk delivers.

Yeah it's like saying Musk would be stupid enough to call someone a pedo cause they happen to live in Thailand. :rolleyes:

Elon Musk is a shyster and he thinks he's untouchable. He crossed the line and deserves to be prosecuted if what he says was untrue. Lets see what the 8K says on Monday.

Sabre Man

On a lighter note.

Hedge fund manager betting against Tesla gets box of short shorts from Elon Musk: 'He is a man of his word!'

https://www.cnbc.com/2018/08/10/david-einhorn-gets-short-shorts-from-musk-he-is-a-man-of-his-word.html

Skelet0n

Funding secured.

zpehtsfd

*TESLA IS SAID TO SEEK WIDE INVESTOR POOL FOR TAKE-PRIVATE PLAN
*TESLA DELIBERATIONS SAID TO BE EARLY STAGE, NO DECISIONS MADE
*TESLA IS SAID TO HOLD EARLY DISCUSSIONS WITH BANKS ABOUT PLANS
*TESLA SAID TO WANT TO AVOID CONCENTRATING OWNERSHIP OF STOCK

#FundingSecuredMeHole

Guess we can forget about that 8K. I really hope the SEC follows through on this one. Won't hold my breath.

lucky john

zpehtsfd wrote: »

*TESLA IS SAID TO SEEK WIDE INVESTOR POOL FOR TAKE-PRIVATE PLAN
*TESLA DELIBERATIONS SAID TO BE EARLY STAGE, NO DECISIONS MADE
*TESLA IS SAID TO HOLD EARLY DISCUSSIONS WITH BANKS ABOUT PLANS
*TESLA SAID TO WANT TO AVOID CONCENTRATING OWNERSHIP OF STOCK

#FundingSecuredMeHole

Guess we can forget about that 8K. I really hope the SEC follows through on this one. Won't hold my breath.

Tesla said... Tesla is said to ...Who said? Is even one source named? This is just makie up news.
The only name to any statement was from the only the only man that matters.

zpehtsfd

lucky john wrote: »

Tesla said... Tesla is said to ...Who said? Is even one source named? This is just makie up news.
The only name to any statement was from the only the only man that matters.

The headlines are from Bloomberg (which like all news outlets never name sources). Were you expecting clarification via a tweet from Musk or something? He screwed up and the BOD are covering his ass by saying "discussions have began".

It's an absolute joke and the SEC now have grounds to prosecute him for market manipulation. He will probably get away with a fine.

Privatization will never happen. imo

Sabre Man

zpehtsfd wrote: »

The headlines are from Bloomberg (which like all news outlets never name sources). Were you expecting clarification via a tweet from Musk or something? He screwed up and the BOD are covering his ass by saying "discussions have began".

It's an absolute joke and the SEC now have grounds to prosecute him for market manipulation. He will probably get away with a fine.

Privatization will never happen. imo

I only found the headlines on Twitter from some questionable Twitter users.

Please provide the links if they do exist.

zpehtsfd

Sabre Man wrote: »

I only found the headlines on Twitter from some questionable Twitter users.

Please provide the links if they do exist.

Sorry but i can't afford the 10+ grand for a yearly subscription to a Bloomberg Terminal.

Check out @BloombergDeals

Sabre Man

zpehtsfd wrote: »

Sorry but i can't afford the 10+ grand for a yearly subscription to a Bloomberg Terminal.

Check out @BloombergDeals

So you don't even know if they are real Bloomberg headlines, do you?

lucky john

zpehtsfd wrote: »

Sorry but i can't afford the 10+ grand for a yearly subscription to a Bloomberg Terminal.

Check out @BloombergDeals

So you didn't even read the articles? :rolleyes:

b4bmm

All Hyundai would have to do is throw $8B at LG Chem and they would be able to produce 1m battery packs in no time.

Thats loosely what some poster said here.
There is a real lack of understanding by most here as to how long this would actually take.
Tesla are 5 years ahead in this regard.

For LG Chem to make these expansions a hell of alot needs to happen, its not just flicking a switch and its done.
For a start where are all the raw materials for the battery going to come from? 
Lithium, cobalt, nickel, graphite, manganese etc.

Most of the major lithium mines that are under construction/producing are already sold out of product, despite the controversial headlines touting oversupply, to Chinese/Japanese or Korean partners. 

It takes a long time to build a brine mining operation, Galaxy resources in Australia have one of the better ones which is located in Argentina IIRC. They have had this project form maybe 2 or more years now already and have only in the last few months completed studies showing the financial projections and viability of moving forward with the mine. They need to get all the mining/environmental permits in order before construction/extraction can take place. They need to carry out metallurgical test works and feed that into the engineering design to come up with the best design for the plant. 

When all the above has been completed Next they need to find financing to build this mine so in the quoted example LG Chem would have to put up money if they want to secure supply from this mine. Say a $100-200M prepayment or equity for cash transfer. They would likely need a few partners to get full amount needed (they should also have a nice cash option internally by selling half of the brine tenements) so all those deals would have to be ongoing or completed while construction starts. I have yet to see a brine project that has reached the output that has been promised.

All in all from start to finish your talking minimum five years for a brine operation but likely 7 years + by the time the operation has reached the nameplate or as close as they can to nameplate.


In regards to a hard rock lithium miner which is becoming the mine of choice if you take Pilbara Minerals in Australia your talking approx 4 years to get to the point of production and then anywhere from 6-12 months to ramp up to nameplate. This is usually a best case scenario as Pilbara and some others were in the right place at the right time and lithium sentiment was positive spot they were able to get financed, lithium sentiment is negative right now through misleading reports and its hard for these new mines to get finance. Tawana Resources being the standout in this regard took less than 18 months for various reasons that I wont go into. 

Pilbara minerals if things go to plan will be a top 3 lithium producer by 2022 and they are already fully sold out of lithium for those planned expansion plans. So what im trying to say is if LG Chem/Hyundai or any other player actually wanted to produce that many batteries/EVs then they would need to wait until a new mine got built to supply them with lithium, need to lock in all the other raw materials, need to build the processing plants to allow the conversion of the raw materials to battery grade and they would have to build a big gigafactory or two. This would take at least 5 years. 

In five years time Tesla will at least have integrated GF and manufacturing plant in China if not one in Europe aswell. They will have Model 3s being sold in the 100,000s around the world.
They will have the truck being produced and maybe a pick up truck too which is the highest selling segment in the USA and nobody else is building one. They have a huge head start right now so it will take quite a while for others to catch up. 

I think Tesla would likely be funded through some Chinese parties, maybe Tencent, Alibaba, Baidu, government subsidies etc. Maybe Softbank and the Saudis. Who knows but he is not stupid enough to tweet this out without knowing the repercussions. He would have known exactly the kind of feedback this would have had and would have been prepared for it.  Any clown would know that.

The Chinese are driving this revolution. They do not want to be dependent on oil as its a national security issue and the best way to reduce this is through EVs/Renweables.  There are only two players in this game right now, China and Tesla (argument for Nissan too), Musk is getting no support from the US government despite all the jobs he is creating so I dont think he would be too sad at all partnering with the Chinese.

FriendsEV

b4bmm wrote: »

All Hyundai would have to do is throw $8B at LG Chem and they would be able to produce 1m battery packs in no time.

Thats loosely what some poster said here.
There is a real lack of understanding by most here as to how long this would actually take.
Tesla are 5 years ahead in this regard.

Excellent post man

Lots of good stuff there, me schooled lol 😂

That was me with the throw 8 billion at LG Chem

Saw VW recently talking up a 48 billion battery supply deal with LG, CATL etc

Of course no details on anything on how and when, that's the Germans trolling these days

b4bmm

FriendsEV wrote: »

Excellent post man

Lots of good stuff there, me schooled lol ��

That was me with the throw 8 billion at LG Chem

Saw VW recently talking up a 48 billion battery supply deal with LG, CATL etc

Of course no details on anything on how and when, that's the Germans trolling these days

There are any amount of articles saying X will be committing $XB to build/recieve X. The VW one bugs me. Very little money is changing hands right now from what I can see. Plenty of talk, very little action, apart from China and Tesla.

Great Wall motor company is big in China they have locked in lithium production from Pilbara minerals mine, as has Gangeng a lithium processor in China, as has general lithium a processor of China and Posco of Korea. Pilbara are also in talks with LG Chem.

The most recent lithium mine of size globally to get financed is Nemaska Lithium which has a project in Canada. LG Chem has taken some of the expected production there too and that mine is very close to being fully sold out AFAIK and likely won’t come online until 2020 even though they state next year.

You have two choices of who you want to believe in the lithium space.
The lithium players themselves and there customers or the big banks/similar who release reports of where the market is at and where it is going over the next few years.

If you listen to Morgan Stanley the lithium prices are going to plummet and there is huge over supply coming next couple of years. There are many faults that have been picked apart in there report but it hasn’t stopped a huge sell off in the space since it was released. People listen to these reports because they don’t have Be time to do there own research. At the prices they predict lithium to fall to it makes no economic sense for a lithium mine to go into production except for the very lowest cost producers so again where is the lithium going to come from........

I try to remain impartial and feel the best indicator is lithium customers. Are they still signing deals? Not only that but are they willing to put large sums of money on the line before the mine has even been built to lock in supply of lithium production? If they are then there most definitely is not an oversupply or they wouldn’t need to do this. This is the main way these lithium mines are being built right now and I am still seeing deals like this going through.

So with those points in mind (we haven’t even touched on the conversion plants to upgrade the brine/hard rock lithium products to achieve battery grade purity which are right now the biggest bottleneck in the supply chain, predominantly done in China) then its clear that a lot of things need to happen to lock in the whole supply chain which Tesla seems to be Doing.

FYI Tesla now claim to produce more batteries than all other Carmakers combined at approx 20GW. Even so Tesla still claim they are having a shortage and Panasonic are building new battery production lines to keep up with demand for Model 3 and the often overlooked (yes Morgan Stanley again) stationary storage markets that are growing just as fast.

https://electrek.co/2018/08/02/tesla-gigafactory-1-battery-production-20-gwh/

I have no idea where CATL expect to get the raw materials for the huge battery factories they claim to be building. BYD (Buffet backed) also expanding and I think we might see them do a deal this year with Tawana Resources when they pull the trigger on mine expansions here in Western Australia. Just speculation on my part. From what I can see supply gets snapped up very quickly right now in the lithium space.

lucky john

b4bmm post is an example of well researched real information that can be checked out as fact or fiction by dyor. unfortunatelly its a rare thing to find this in any of the multitude of articles you see on the finance web site or stations. It's much easier for them to write meaningless nothing. It's not even fake news, it's just no news. When it comes to Tesla its even worse.