Hey everybody Rob Merritt here, welcome back to Tesla Daily after an incredibly wild weekend, a lot going on in the business and technology worlds. We'll talk about some of the non-Tesla stuff towards the end, but for Tesla we've got updates on the Cybertruck, analyst updates, possibly some new information on FSD, and a few other items as well. Strong start to Thanksgiving week for the markets, the NASDAQ today up 1.1%, Tesla trailing a little bit behind up about a half a percent, closing at $235.60 on the day.
Alright, first up we've got quite a bit of news on the Cybertruck, ahead of the delivery event next week, Tesla is putting the first Cybertruck's on display in Tesla stores. The first one spotted here by John Davis is at the Westfield UTC Mall in San Diego, and then shortly thereafter also a video shared by Model AZ on the Cybertruck owners club forum of the Cybertruck at the Santana Rose store in San Jose, California. Just like we had talked about for the Cybertruck that was on display at the Barron Fund's conference a week or two ago, the fit and finish on both of these vehicles looks great, of course they are display vehicles, so Tesla likely put a little bit of extra care into them, but nevertheless nice to see what Tesla is capable of doing with the production Cybertrucks. Tesla does still have both of these display vehicles roped off, so it's not like they're fully on display quite yet. I'm guessing we'll have to wait until after the delivery event for that.
However, Tesla did have some in-store marketing, a sign for the Cybertruck on display at the San Diego store, and that does give us some new information. Tesla says the Cybertruck is designed to be the world's toughest truck, and then they highlight a number of different areas, including the ultra-hard stainless steel exoskeleton, a little bit of a typo on that point, but nevertheless they also highlight the shatter-resistant glass, so that's something that we haven't heard a whole lot about since the unveiling of course the infamous steel ball moments, but still a point of emphasis for Tesla. They highlight the adaptive air suspension with on-road and off-road drive modes, and then a couple of statistics they say ultra-tough SMC bed, that means sheep molding compound, that's the material for the bed, resin-based composite material, then they say up to 2,500 pound payload and 11,000 pounds of towing power. So both of those are numbers that we have seen rumors about recently.
If we go back to the unveiling event though, Tesla at the time said that the top-level towing capacity would be over 14,000 pounds on the Cybertruck, and up to 3,500 pounds of payload. It is worth noting that at the unveiling event Tesla had different tow ratings listed for each configuration, the single motor that was 7,500 pounds, the dual motor 10,000 pounds, only the tri-motor at 14,000 pounds. So it could either be under target or over target on towing capacity depending on which configuration Tesla is highlighting here, and of course that could change in the future, but for the payload all of those had been listed at the time at 3,500 pounds. For that towing capacity of 11,000 pounds though, this does match the rumors that we had previously had from the TFL EV channel that also had a lot of other dimensions and details about the Cybertruck, so this being a matching number so far makes it more likely that those other numbers are also credible as well.
As for the payload, we had already talked about the likelihood of this number coming in a little bit lower based off of the gross vehicle weight ratings from the Vindicoder, so not a huge surprise on that front. If we look at some comparisons to the F-150, the ICE vehicle version, as well as the F-150 Lightning, both the payload and the towing capacity for the Cybertruck kind of falling right in that range, so the F-150 ICE vehicle, that varies a lot based on the engine configuration. Payload ranging anywhere from 1,400 pounds up to 3,300 pounds, but of the seven configurations only two of them above 2,500 pounds, and then the max towing ranging from 8,200 pounds up to 14,000 pounds with three of the seven configurations exceeding 11,000 pounds. For the F-150 Lightning, looks like Tesla's got about a 10% advantage for both the payload and the towing capacity.
We do have one other detail then on the Cybertruck today, and that is a report on the battery size for the dual motor configuration of the Cybertruck. This comes from Ryan McCaffrey of the Ride the Lightning podcast. I've got a lot of respect for his reports, so I put this at high credibility. He is saying that 122 kilowatt-hours is the battery pack size for the dual motor configuration of the Cybertruck. That likely means for the dual motor version, a bit above 300 miles of range, like Tesla denounced at the unveiling event. Probably not quite enough information to extrapolate what it might take to do a 500 mile Cybertruck, but would seem to point to it being less.
关于Cybertruck,我们今天有一个新的细节,那就是关于Cybertruck双电机配置的电池大小的一份报道。这份报道来自于 Ride the Lightning播客的Ryan McCaffrey。我非常尊重他的报道,所以我认为这份报道非常可信。他提到Cybertruck双电机配置的电池包大小为122千瓦时。这可能意味着对于双电机版本,续航里程稍微超过300英里,就像特斯拉在发布会上宣布的那样。可能还没有足够的信息来推断出需要多少电力才能让Cybertruck行驶500英里,但似乎指向的可能性较小。
than 200 kilowatt-hours, although that shouldn't be too surprising. So quite a few new details there. We're quickly checking off the box of unknowns ahead of the delivery event, but of course, price still is a question.
Alright, next up, we've got a couple of interesting analyst notes. First from Jeffries, they've actually lowered their price target on Tesla from $250 previously to $210. They have maintained their hold ratings and no rating adjustment, and interestingly, they talk about the Cybertruck saying, quote, however unlikely just a few days before first deliveries, canceling Cybertruck would probably be positive for shares. With 2024 already a lost year for growth, it would help test the refocus on an edge that was built on simplicity, scale, and speed, end quote. Elon actually replied to a post about this on X today with simply a clown emoji in between the analysis from Jeffries and from Elon's, I think I got a side with Elon on this one. I think there are plenty of other counter arguments to be made against the Cybertruck that hold more weight than this one canceling the whole entire program a few days before they actually get it ready to start deliveries. All the design the R&D has been done, the CapEx has been spent, the production lines are ready and producing vehicles, and they have literally a million orders for the product, but I guess just cancel it so that they can refocus on simplicity, scale, and speed, which I guess is somehow being sacrificed because of Cybertruck production. Doesn't really make a lot of sense to say the least, and it presupposes a mistake that I frequently see with Tesla that they could somehow have accelerated the next generation vehicle and all that goes with that had they just not done the Cybertruck or something like that. That's not really how it works. Tesla is very capable of understanding that a next generation lower cost vehicle is going to have a bigger market than the Cybertruck, but just skipping over the Cybertruck doesn't miraculously accelerate the next generation vehicle platform timeline. So to imply that the Cybertruck has caused some lack of focus on those goals that Tesla has is just wrong.
Tesla even talked to the investor about steps that they are taking with the Cybertruck that will be more fully adopted in the next generation vehicle, including the voltage architecture and in-house controller design. Fortunately, I don't think we have to worry about Tesla taking this suggestion. The other analyst update that we have is from Alex Potter of Piper Sandler, says that last week four covered companies participated in our EV slash battery bus tour and he highlights eight takeaways for Tesla says regarding full self-driving Tesla thinks peers approach is of limited utility says electricity will ultimately be the number one FSD bottleneck Tesla must use silicon more efficiently. Elon has talked about that in terms of AI training capabilities and how he sees those bottlenecks changing year over year, then says Tesla's first ads will focus on cost per mile safety, etc. The public needs education targeted digital ads will hardly move the op-ex needle. Tesla is still in a learning phase. Cost of goods sold per unit has room to fall, but there are limits because Tesla will not de-content EV charger deals hopefully more to comment no info regarding economics beyond unit hardware. Then the last couple on capacity says to build 10,000 units per week Berlin would need to add a fourth shift, but that would increase cost of goods sold per unit and Shanghai capacity is maxed out. This makes it difficult to gain market share in China.
So for the most part there I think things that we have discussed previously caring for the ads part though we did see another version of a YouTube ad from Tesla. This one shared by Trevor Scott on X it looks like another repurposing of previous promotional videos from Tesla. This one focusing on supercharging the convenience of the trip planer and the navigation system and the more than 50,000 superchargers worldwide. Elon also commented on the release of these ads on X saying as promised.
Alright next up we've got some news and rumors on FSD that have come up over the weekend. The first I guess is more in the rumor category. This is being reported in China. I don't know how reliable these reports are but as we can see here fast technology is saying that some sources have said that Tesla's FSD is about to enter China and that everything is ready to go. Around the same time we also seem to have seen an adjustment to the international versions of Tesla's owner's manual which apparently for some countries previously had not had information about how to operate FSD and now that information has been added so it could be a hint that some more expansion is coming soon. So it would be exciting if this were the case certainly for those customers especially. I think this still falls firmly in the rumor category though I don't think we can add a whole lot of credibility to the reports at this stage. So I'll continue to wait and see on this but interesting rumors nonetheless.
Next then we've got a couple of regulatory updates first in Texas. Reddit user the Benzor has noticed that in Texas Tesla can now complete the registration process previously that paperwork had to be mailed to the buyer but now that can be handled with Tesla at the point of sale. The sales tax and the restoration fees those still need to be paid separately neither of those things can be rolled into financing so not completely seamless but sounds like an improvement over the previous structure.
Then Reuters reporting that a US District Judge has dismissed an antitrust lawsuit against Tesla which attempted to claim that Tesla forced customers to pay high prices and wait a long time for repairs by monopolizing the market for vehicle maintenance and replacement parts but the judge's dismissal says that there is no evidence that has been presented that the market conditions weren't apparent before any vehicles were purchased. That doesn't mean any agreement or disagreement with the claim just a problem with how it's presented and customers could choose to amend their complaint if they like.
So that catches us up on Tesla but a crazy weekend a lot of other relevant things going on. We talked on Friday about the out of nowhere firing of Sam Altman by OpenAI's board. That story just getting stranger and stranger seemingly by the hour over the weekend and it's still running. This will probably be out of date as soon as it's posted but to catch people up basically what happened was after the dismissal of Altman there was huge pushback from investors and from employees on the decision so I think less than a day later they decided to meet with Altman to discuss a possible return as CEO. A lot of uncertainty during that period a couple of missed deadlines and then seemingly talks breakdown and all of a sudden open AI names a new CEO but not just a CEO a new interim CEO so a third CEO in as many days for the company but again only on an interim basis.
At this point it's become very clear that this whole situation was handled incredibly poorly pretty much all stakeholders having turned against the board and compounded by the fact that that there is supposed to be reportedly a tender offer for employee shares allowing them to get some liquidity to take advantage of OpenAI's valuation or in other words probably make a whole lot of money in the next couple of weeks as long as nothing disrupted those plans but lo and behold looked like the board had different plans with the probably the most significant disruption you can make immediately prior to that so anyway talks breakdown new interim CEO then this morning before market open which isn't relevant for OpenAI but is relevant for their biggest partner their biggest investor Microsoft they want to stabilize all this uncertainty before market open so there's an announcement from their CEO with the typical stuff we remain committed to the partnership full confidence in the product roadmap but really announcing that they are excited to share that Sam Altman and Greg Brockman together with colleagues will be joining Microsoft to lead a new advanced AI research team while this happens there's a letter from OpenAI employees to the board demanding that they resign reinstate Sam Altman as CEO otherwise they're all going to quit and they're going to go to Microsoft as well and 95 percent now of employees have apparently signed this letter the craziest part is that signing the letter asking the board to resign is current board member and co-founder and chief scientist of OpenAI Elias Sitzkover who also posted on X quote I deeply regret my participation in the board's actions I never intended to harm OpenAI I love everything we've built together and I will do everything I can to reunite the company end quote so just an insane couple of days here and we're not done yet although there was the announcement about them joining Microsoft we don't have confirmation that that has been something that is signed yet it sounds like things could still go the other way with Altman returning to OpenAI but no matter what there is going to be a huge shake up here and we'll continue to keep an eye on that
in the midst of all of this we got big news from Cruz first there was an email sent out that was seen by Reuters that said that they were going to at least offer some liquidity to employees for Cruz stock remember we had talked about how they had paused those buybacks that they did consistently previously so it sounds like they didn't fully reinstate that but did so in a limited way and then following that we heard from Kyle vote on X that he is going to be resigning as Cruz CEO now not nearly as surprising as what went down with OpenAI I think we could all kind of anticipate something like this happening but vote making that official over the weekend says he plans to spend some time with family and explore new ideas so all this going down and at the same time of course we had SpaceX do the second test flight for Starship very very successful maybe not a perfect test flight but very very successful test flight here for SpaceX all 33 Raptor engines on the super heavy booster firing simultaneously and successfully taking Starship up to the point of stage separation SpaceX testing hot staging so still having engines on the booster running while attempting stage separation I think the first time SpaceX has ever tried this and they were able to do that and successfully separate from the booster shortly thereafter the booster activated the automated flight termination system so didn't make it all the way back for a test water landing but Starship all six Raptor engines working after that hot stage separation and actually the first time the Raptor vacuum engines have been operating in space so great to see that Starship traveled about five more minutes reaching a velocity of over 24 000 kilometers per hour and then the flight termination system was activated at some point we don't have full details on exactly why yet so also not completing the full ideal case test however huge huge success way farther than last time SpaceX will get a ton of valuable information from this and test flight three hopefully they'll get even further one of the best parts is that unlike with the first flight test the stage zero or launchpad area seems to be in really great shape so hopefully that will help expedite any licensing needs for that next test flight so hopefully something that we see a lot quicker than the period of time between the first and the second here so yeah big weekend congrats to SpaceX on that one but that are up at up for today so as always thank you for listening make sure you're subscribed and signed up for notifications and also find me on x at tesla podcast and we'll see you tomorrow for the Tuesday November 21st episode of tesla hui thank you