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For those catching up on Tesla news - there's a PR war going on between Tesla Inc. and many hedge funds who are short TSLA stock. As a result, it's tough to tel

For those catching up on Tesla news - there's a PR war going on between Tesla Inc. and many hedge funds who are short TSLA stock. As a result, it's tough to tell what's truth and what's imaginary. Tesla wants people to believe in them in order to continue selling cars to customers (who probably wouldn't buy if they thought the company was going bankrupt) and stock/bonds already issued to investors. Short sellers want to give people doubt to cause a decrease in stock price in order to benefit from their short position. Both parties are probably acting in good faith - Tesla wants people to see how good they are and short sellers want people to see how risky they are. But as a result the news is crowded and it's generally hard to know the truth. Just remember, in the US the Supreme Court has ruled that it's legal for news publications to lie to their readers/viewers.

GuiA 9y ago
> Just remember, in the US the Supreme Court has ruled that it's legal for news publications to lie to their readers/viewers. Link please?
- sschueller 9y ago
  Isn't that ruling just allowing news stations to segment certain time frames as news and others as entertainment? They still can't make stuff up during news segments.
  - icegreentea2 9y ago
    No, I don't think that's it. I think OP is referring to "NEW YORK TIMES CO. v. SULLIVAN" where the Supreme Court placed the bar of something being libel as the accused having 'actual malice' which is in itself is somewhat slipperly defined as having knowledge that they were lying, or recklessly not investigating what they were publishing.
    - Lazare 9y ago
      I dunno if that's what OP meant or not, but either way I'd note the actual malice standard only applies to public officials and public figures, which is defined fairly narrowly. I certainly don't think that qualifies as a decision that "the news media can lie". In fact, to the extent you can prove the news media was lying in a report about a public figure (that is, the news media published something they knew to be false), that's explicitly covered. That's the opposite of what OP claimed.
- ceejayoz 9y ago
  Sounds like a variant on this urban legend: https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/fox-skews/ https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/fox-skews/ http://www.politifact.com/punditfact/statements/2014/sep/10/facebook-posts/facebook-post-claims-fox-admits-they-lie-have-righ/ http://www.politifact.com/punditfact/statements/2014/sep/10/...
- jws 9y ago
  Frequently this is a reference to a suit between a Fox affiliate station and a pair of their reporters who were terminated amid editorial conflicts and whistleblower actions. It is a complicated suit with a number of claims. There are enough bits which if extracted and held up alone can support the grandparent's claim, but on a whole doesn't really say that. It is a bit hard to google about because a lot of the people who choose to write about it are partisan, but you can get a feel for the mess in the Snopes article†. As with lots of law, part of it turns on technical definitions. The Appeals Court (not Supreme) found that the FCC policy against falsification did not meet the legal definition of "law, rule, or regulation" in a particular section of relevant law. Remember, three of those four quoted words probably don't mean what you think they do unless you are a legal scholar. It's like having a variable in a program named "loop_count". Maybe it is a count of the looping, maybe not, unless you read all the referencing code. The wikipedia article‡ is currently ok too, but who knows by the time you read it. † https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/fox-skews/ https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/fox-skews/ ‡ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Akre https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Akre
dragontamer 9y ago
You've missed one important group: union forces. Tesla Employees have been fired en-mass in what was allegedly a union-busting attempt. Since Tesla employees are unhappy, a lot of them are demonstrating flaws with Tesla's manufacturing process, potentially in an attempt to strongarm their bosses into getting better pay or unionization prospects. Anyway, there's more than just "bulls vs bears" going on here. In any case, Elon Musk's 20,000 Model 3 manufactured per month target for late 2017 is incredibly late (See: https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/881757617416056832 https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/881757617416056832). A lot of Tesla bulls don't seem to care however and continue to throw money at the company. Tesla isn't even at 2000 cars a month, and we're well into 2018. A lot of people are interested in "why" this is happening. Yes, short-sellers are interested, but I'm sure normal investors are wondering why Musk isn't even hitting 10% of his target months later. The article suggests that the QA group is finding flaws in the manufacturing process. So... yeah. That makes sense for why the Model 3 is late with very, very low production numbers. There's been a lot of speculation in different groups for the failure, but ultimately, the core is that Tesla is not making enough Model 3.
- mephitix 9y ago
  >> Since Tesla employees are unhappy, a lot of them are demonstrating flaws with Tesla's manufacturing process, potentially in an attempt to strongarm their bosses into getting better pay or unionization prospects This seems like a pretty big/dangerous jump to make with little-to-no evidence. >> In any case, Elon Musk's 20,000 Model 3 manufactured per month target for late 2017 is incredibly late (See: https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/881757617416056832 https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/881757617416056832). A lot of Tesla bulls don't seem to care however and continue to throw money at the company. I really hate that Musk publicly underestimates the amount of work and deadlines in this process. It's especially annoying for me because I've worked for people who publicly underestimate and it put way more ridiculous work on me and my coworkers. That said, I also hate this "fraud-boy" FUD. I think Tesla could eventually pull this off. The ramp will obviously be slower than what Musk expects. I, like many bears, take what Elon says with a grain of salt. But cars are rolling off the production line. At this point, the Model 3 is now the best-selling EV in the US. (https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2018-tesla-tracker/ https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2018-tesla-tracker/). Tesla has proven itself with the Model S. People in general love the cars. Tesla will get there, and I think that's why bulls are holding.
rlayton2 9y ago
Specifics of this case aside, it must feel great to hold short positions, where you are hoping others fail...
- hendzen 9y ago
  Short sellers, villainized though they may be, provide a valuable service to the market and society as a whole. It’s a good thing that people are incentivized to spot companies that are financially overstretched (or worse) - it keeps companies honest and penalizes bad actors. See the story of Valeant for a good example.
- Erlich_Bachman 9y ago
  If hypothetically their position is that the thing that will fail is bad (based on a bad technology, bad management, bad presuppositions, etc.) - then what's so bad about shorting it? They are hoping that the bad thing will fail so that more resources (money, news, workers, scientists, mind-space of the public) will go to other projects that better deserve it? If they can make some money at the same time - then why not? Is the same as going long (investing in) some other projects that they predict will succeed. (Not saying Tesla is a "bad" company, the comment was about shorting.)
  - caconym_ 9y ago
    If you're shorting something then you're incentivized to spread negative sentiment about it, possibly in bad faith. Of course, you could say the converse thing about standard investments, but in the former case you risk otherwise viable ventures being sunk by profit-seeking bad faith actors. In the latter case, maybe some naive and irresponsible investors will lose their money. The latter seems much more acceptable to me than the former.
    - Erlich_Bachman 9y ago
      If they spread good news about a bad company (ie, spreading sentiment in bad faith, as you called it), after acquiring a long position for that company - it means they are pushing resources into that company. Those resources are not endless. There is only a limited amount of capital flowing out there. If the capital goes to a bad company, it means that a good company somewhere did not get the capital that they would have otherwise gotten. It's just as bad. The issue here is spreading sentiment in bad faith. If someone is doing it, they are affecting the market and enterprises in it, in a bad way. The good guys make less (and go out of business sometimes), and the bad guys make more money and get more attention, stealing it from the ones who truly deserve it. The downside is not that some naive investors lose money. The downside is that a better project will not get the money it really needs, and instead that money will go to a worse project with better false marketing - thus slowing down the overall progress. Whether this happens while going long or short positions - doesn't make much difference.
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
Lazare 9y ago
> Just remember, in the US the Supreme Court has ruled that it's legal for news publications to lie to their readers/viewers. Citation please. If you're talking about the Jane Akre/Steve Wilson lawsuit, that's factually inaccurate.

GuiA 9y ago

> Just remember, in the US the Supreme Court has ruled that it's legal for news publications to lie to their readers/viewers. Link please?

sschueller 9y ago
Isn't that ruling just allowing news stations to segment certain time frames as news and others as entertainment? They still can't make stuff up during news segments.
- icegreentea2 9y ago
  No, I don't think that's it. I think OP is referring to "NEW YORK TIMES CO. v. SULLIVAN" where the Supreme Court placed the bar of something being libel as the accused having 'actual malice' which is in itself is somewhat slipperly defined as having knowledge that they were lying, or recklessly not investigating what they were publishing.
  - Lazare 9y ago
    I dunno if that's what OP meant or not, but either way I'd note the actual malice standard only applies to public officials and public figures, which is defined fairly narrowly. I certainly don't think that qualifies as a decision that "the news media can lie". In fact, to the extent you can prove the news media was lying in a report about a public figure (that is, the news media published something they knew to be false), that's explicitly covered. That's the opposite of what OP claimed.
ceejayoz 9y ago
Sounds like a variant on this urban legend: https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/fox-skews/ https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/fox-skews/ http://www.politifact.com/punditfact/statements/2014/sep/10/facebook-posts/facebook-post-claims-fox-admits-they-lie-have-righ/ http://www.politifact.com/punditfact/statements/2014/sep/10/...
jws 9y ago
Frequently this is a reference to a suit between a Fox affiliate station and a pair of their reporters who were terminated amid editorial conflicts and whistleblower actions. It is a complicated suit with a number of claims. There are enough bits which if extracted and held up alone can support the grandparent's claim, but on a whole doesn't really say that. It is a bit hard to google about because a lot of the people who choose to write about it are partisan, but you can get a feel for the mess in the Snopes article†. As with lots of law, part of it turns on technical definitions. The Appeals Court (not Supreme) found that the FCC policy against falsification did not meet the legal definition of "law, rule, or regulation" in a particular section of relevant law. Remember, three of those four quoted words probably don't mean what you think they do unless you are a legal scholar. It's like having a variable in a program named "loop_count". Maybe it is a count of the looping, maybe not, unless you read all the referencing code. The wikipedia article‡ is currently ok too, but who knows by the time you read it. † https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/fox-skews/ https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/fox-skews/ ‡ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Akre https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Akre

dragontamer 9y ago

You've missed one important group: union forces. Tesla Employees have been fired en-mass in what was allegedly a union-busting attempt. Since Tesla employees are unhappy, a lot of them are demonstrating flaws with Tesla's manufacturing process, potentially in an attempt to strongarm their bosses into getting better pay or unionization prospects. Anyway, there's more than just "bulls vs bears" going on here. In any case, Elon Musk's 20,000 Model 3 manufactured per month target for late 2017 is incredibly late (See: https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/881757617416056832 https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/881757617416056832). A lot of Tesla bulls don't seem to care however and continue to throw money at the company. Tesla isn't even at 2000 cars a month, and we're well into 2018. A lot of people are interested in "why" this is happening. Yes, short-sellers are interested, but I'm sure normal investors are wondering why Musk isn't even hitting 10% of his target months later. The article suggests that the QA group is finding flaws in the manufacturing process. So... yeah. That makes sense for why the Model 3 is late with very, very low production numbers. There's been a lot of speculation in different groups for the failure, but ultimately, the core is that Tesla is not making enough Model 3.

mephitix 9y ago
>> Since Tesla employees are unhappy, a lot of them are demonstrating flaws with Tesla's manufacturing process, potentially in an attempt to strongarm their bosses into getting better pay or unionization prospects This seems like a pretty big/dangerous jump to make with little-to-no evidence. >> In any case, Elon Musk's 20,000 Model 3 manufactured per month target for late 2017 is incredibly late (See: https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/881757617416056832 https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/881757617416056832). A lot of Tesla bulls don't seem to care however and continue to throw money at the company. I really hate that Musk publicly underestimates the amount of work and deadlines in this process. It's especially annoying for me because I've worked for people who publicly underestimate and it put way more ridiculous work on me and my coworkers. That said, I also hate this "fraud-boy" FUD. I think Tesla could eventually pull this off. The ramp will obviously be slower than what Musk expects. I, like many bears, take what Elon says with a grain of salt. But cars are rolling off the production line. At this point, the Model 3 is now the best-selling EV in the US. (https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2018-tesla-tracker/ https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2018-tesla-tracker/). Tesla has proven itself with the Model S. People in general love the cars. Tesla will get there, and I think that's why bulls are holding.

rlayton2 9y ago

Specifics of this case aside, it must feel great to hold short positions, where you are hoping others fail...

hendzen 9y ago
Short sellers, villainized though they may be, provide a valuable service to the market and society as a whole. It’s a good thing that people are incentivized to spot companies that are financially overstretched (or worse) - it keeps companies honest and penalizes bad actors. See the story of Valeant for a good example.
Erlich_Bachman 9y ago
If hypothetically their position is that the thing that will fail is bad (based on a bad technology, bad management, bad presuppositions, etc.) - then what's so bad about shorting it? They are hoping that the bad thing will fail so that more resources (money, news, workers, scientists, mind-space of the public) will go to other projects that better deserve it? If they can make some money at the same time - then why not? Is the same as going long (investing in) some other projects that they predict will succeed. (Not saying Tesla is a "bad" company, the comment was about shorting.)
- caconym_ 9y ago
  If you're shorting something then you're incentivized to spread negative sentiment about it, possibly in bad faith. Of course, you could say the converse thing about standard investments, but in the former case you risk otherwise viable ventures being sunk by profit-seeking bad faith actors. In the latter case, maybe some naive and irresponsible investors will lose their money. The latter seems much more acceptable to me than the former.
  - Erlich_Bachman 9y ago
    If they spread good news about a bad company (ie, spreading sentiment in bad faith, as you called it), after acquiring a long position for that company - it means they are pushing resources into that company. Those resources are not endless. There is only a limited amount of capital flowing out there. If the capital goes to a bad company, it means that a good company somewhere did not get the capital that they would have otherwise gotten. It's just as bad. The issue here is spreading sentiment in bad faith. If someone is doing it, they are affecting the market and enterprises in it, in a bad way. The good guys make less (and go out of business sometimes), and the bad guys make more money and get more attention, stealing it from the ones who truly deserve it. The downside is not that some naive investors lose money. The downside is that a better project will not get the money it really needs, and instead that money will go to a worse project with better false marketing - thus slowing down the overall progress. Whether this happens while going long or short positions - doesn't make much difference.

deleted 9y ago

[deleted]

Lazare 9y ago

> Just remember, in the US the Supreme Court has ruled that it's legal for news publications to lie to their readers/viewers. Citation please. If you're talking about the Jane Akre/Steve Wilson lawsuit, that's factually inaccurate.