-- Published: Tuesday, 21 May 2019 | Print | Disqus
By: Dave Kranzler
Tesla has been “done” for awhile but many of the Wall Street and investor “uber” bulls are finally starting to see this reality. Amusingly, Wedbush’s Dan Ives issued a report in which he lowered his price target on Tesla stock from $270 to $235. He refers to Tesla’s situation as a “code red situation.” Quite frankly, a “code red situation” with regard to a company and its stock price should be regarded as, “sell your shares if you’re long and get out of the way.”
How someone with the credentials to occupy a stock analyst’s seat at a stock brokerage – even if it is just Wedbush, a retail pump and dump mill – can truly believe that Tesla stock is worth the $40 billion market cap at $230/share is truly mind-blowing. As an example, consider just a basic valuation metric. The average automotive car OEM trades at an enterprise to revenue ratio of 0.2x revenues. At the high-end Toyota trades at 0.6x revenues. That’s because Toyota sports a 7.5% operating margin. Tesla’s market cap plus debt is 2.6x revenues, or 13x greater than the industry mean.
It would be useful to use other valuation metrics but Tesla does not generate any profits beyond its highly suspicious gross profit as shown in its SEC filings. It would also be useful to know if Dan Ives owns any Tesla shares. Does he really put his money where is mouth is?
That aside, Tesla shares are going to zero. Tesla stock broke down last week, closing at its lowest price since December 21, 2016. The stock is down $44 (17.5%) since May 6th, when it closed at $255 after completing the stock/convertible deal. It’s down 43% from its $370 close after the “funding secured” incident (August 8, 2018). Today the shares traded as low as $195 before a dead-cat short-cover bounce that has lifted the shares back over $200.
Tesla has likely entered into an irreversible death spiral. The only question at this point is how long it will take for the stock to head below $10 and how long the Company can stay solvent. There are scattered reports that the latest price cuts have stimulated a brief increase in sales of the Model S and X, but nothing has been verified. To be sure, sales of the Model 3 have fallen off a cliff in Europe and China, as an increasing number of potential buyers are made aware of the poor quality and follow-up service of this vehicle.
At TSLA’s current cash-burn rate, it won’t make it until the end of the year without a sales turnaround miracle on par with Moses seeing God in a burning bush. I doubt the Company will ever be able to raise money again. The stock does not have value as an acquisition because I highly doubt any potential acquirer would pay an amount that would cover Tesla’s debt load plus other fixed obligations.
In my 34+ years of experience in the financial markets, I’ve witnessed several Pied Piper types who have led their faithful off the cliff. Elon Musk for my money is the greatest purveyor of cult of personality that I’ve observed in my lifetime. I don’t know how else to explain, at least for myself, how so many seemingly intelligent people continue to support Musk’s glaringly indisputable fraud.
- Dave Kranzler
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-- Published: Tuesday, 21 May 2019 | E-Mail | Print | Source: GoldSeek.com
