Oh, nonsense. The Tesla gross profit margins are cooked in ways that no other automaker’s are. They’re known to shift costs that belong in COGS over into SG&A, which distorts things.

Every time their sales go up, their losses go up.  The simple truth is that they’re losing money on each vehicle sold.

Tesla is already moving that way on the Model 3. If you go to their page, and select order now, they show an option for “$33,200" - but that includes tax credits and projected 6 year gas savings, with the actual price being $45,000. And we’ve already passed the date they said you had to order by to get the full $7,500…

No, they weren’t making a profit from the Model 3.  Operational losses increased as they jumped sales.  They claimed gross profit, but their gross margins aren’t calculated the same way as other makers and exclude costs that are true per-unit marginal costs.

Musk was very explicit that the model 3 would be $35k before the tax credit, and claimed superiority over the Bolt, which he said would only get to that price after tax credits.

Of course, you can get a Bolt today for $30k before tax credits, so he was wrong....

History is completely on my side, buddy. :)

Let’s be realistic. They’ve thrown the reservation order list out the window because they can’t make a profit at their current prices so they’re having to sell higher priced models, even if it means that I can walk in the store today and buy one ahead of everyone else that has been in line. They’re quickly running out…

Are you so certain that they could actually build it for that price by dropping the premium interior package?  Options are notoriously priced for huge margins.  They don’t state the premium interior is even a $10k option - and they have to knock  $10k off the price still before they’d get to $35k.

Sadly, the company is that poorly run that they might actually try some nonsense like that. :P

And 2 years ago they said in 12 months. 12 months ago they said 6 months. 6 months ago they said 3-5 months, etc.

Tesla has a LONG track record of not meeting these promises.

“We’re not sure how this will impact the $35,000 car coming in 2019"

Let’s be realistic. The $35k version won’t be coming in 2019. 

The law as it stands doesn’t give an incentive to delay. First entrants to the market always end up dominating the market. Later entrants are finding battery capacity is already snapped up and they face the exact same challenges as newer entrants did.

The existing law simply was set to aid manufacturers in making the…

They can compete on their own already. A small market share doesn’t mean they’re uncompetitive.

The current subsidy scheme should continue, but WITH the phaseouts as already planned. Tesla doesn’t need any more subsidies. Hell, they’ve been pulling in near $20k in subsidies per vehicle - if they can’t afford to lose…

Yes, but even at the discounts, GM is clearly making money when factoring in ZEV credits.

And Model 3s are evidently selling at a gross profit, but clearly not a net one yet.

Why should late comers not get any subsidy? We’re talking about massive restructuring costs.

Early adopters get plenty of reward both through the time value of money but also by grabbing market share.  As with most industries, the early entrants grab marketshare that is difficult for late adopters to recover.  Look at…

Yes, we should get rid of subsidies for oil and gas. ALL of them. That includes not applying any penalties for pollution and emissions. We know CO2 emissions have a cost of roughly $36 per ton on the low end, so that cost should be borne by those emitting the CO2. Right now we let that sort of pollution go out for…

I don’t disagree with encouraging electric vehicle adoption. But right now we have companies that couldn’t possibly exist without the subsidies, and they need to be phased out at some point. We have a fair system in the phase out as it is. We’ve given Tesla $1.5 billion in cash to establish their production and…

Autolatina was a pretty massive failure, though... 

Yes, the requirements are more recent than that.

Actually, UBS has each Bolt estimated to run $28,700 on average to build. The estimates for losses come from complete amortized costs of all development - a measure by which Tesla is also losing a huge hit on each vehicle. But none of those loss projections for the Bolt include the ZEV credits from California, which…

“ but I’ll just note that Ford, historically, has not played well with others.”

Um, there are plenty of examples of success playing with others. Mazda actually is a pretty good example. Without Ford’s investment, Mazda likely would have gone out of business. And thanks to Mazda, Ford got refocused on producing some…