Tesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors

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Tesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors

seekingalpha2021-06-03

Summary As long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion. Shareholders assuming Tesla's ...

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疲劳Fatigued
·2021-06-04
1
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Jetblackeyes
·2021-06-04
pls like and comment @yvneyng
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AlanGoh
·2021-06-04
Given the recent news about the drop in market share and the potential of over-provisioning of production capacity in China, do u guys think they are just short term headwinds ?
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mQ
·2021-06-04
Sounds complicated.
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HH浩
·2021-06-04
Both factors also depends on price.
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rocketship
·2021-06-04
lkea nd comment
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- HH浩:
  Reciprocate
  2021-06-04
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DingDang
·2021-06-04
Buy and hold!! Please like and comment!
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- Peiqi:
  [爱你]
  2021-06-05
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- DingDang:
  Yes!!
  2021-06-05
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THOMAX
·2021-06-04
?
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Kiranaar
·2021-06-04
Is it a buy now?
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- AliceQuah:
  I'm not interested
  2021-06-04
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- DingDang:
  MTL!!! Please lIke and comment!
  2021-06-04
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AJ1977
·2021-06-04
Gggggggg
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- kino318:
  yes
  2021-06-04
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- T2C:
  Yes
  2021-06-04
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Auggylol
·2021-06-04
Nice
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- TANJH:
  yup
  2021-06-04
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KLok
·2021-06-04
That's window dressing.......
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keithwxy
·2021-06-04
Like and comment!
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- 堵神:
  done.. please reply thanks ☺️
  2021-06-04
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ty91
·2021-06-04
Sad
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Slee49
·2021-06-04
Nice
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e13v3n
·2021-06-04
pl like n comment
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- Auggylol:
  comment
  2021-06-04
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- Chimpsey:
  Comment
  2021-06-04
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Tesladudesg
·2021-06-04
?
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- Laus:
  Nice and good
  2021-06-04
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Xylta
·2021-06-04
[Great]
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- Xylta:
  [Cool]
  2021-06-04
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- Xylta:
  [Great]
  2021-06-04
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afht
·2021-06-04
Great read!
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- joleenng:
  [Happy]
  2021-06-04
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- Kingggg:
  ?
  2021-06-04
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Andrisgho
·2021-06-03
Please help to like and comment
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- Andrisgho:
  Replied
  2021-06-07
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- e13v3n:
  pls like n comment
  2021-06-04
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As long as zero dividends are expected, a TSLA shareholder's total return will, by definition, be defined by the growth of Tesla's book value per share crossed against the change in the Price/Book (P/B) multiple of those shares. After looking at some numbers underlying TSLA's book value per share, and how much it will have to grow for current TSLA shareholders to make money, I conclude with three actionable option strategies based on expectations for how these numbers may change in the medium term. This article also can be seen as a follow up to the 2041 breakeven projection of Tesla I published last year.\nTesla Share Price Rise Follows Book Value\nThe first chart here shows how the rise in Tesla's share price has moved remarkably in line with TSLA's growth in book value per share. TSLA has so far never paid a dividend.\nData by YCharts\nMultiple Expansion and Contraction\nThe above chart, which is on a log scale, is far smoother than that of the (P/B) ratio between these two numbers. The multiple seemed to have stabilized between 2017 and late 2019, but its rise from below 7 in mid-2019 to over 40 in late 2020 and back to around 26 today explains much of TSLA's recent surge and volatility. Another way of thinking about it: TSLA's book value per share is up roughly 4-fold in the past two years, and its P/B is up about 4-fold over the past two years, which together explain why TSLA's shares are up about 16-fold over the past two years. The big question for investors at these levels is: What future combination of book value growth and P/B expansion or contraction can be expected to produce a satisfactory rate of return?\nData by YCharts\nUnderstanding Tesla's Book Value Growth\nAlthough the title of my Marketplace serviceLong Run Incomeimplies a preference for dividends, we believe high-quality book value growth is the best kind of \"dividend alternative\" for companies who can reinvest cash profits internally at far higher rates of return than I can externally. I would challenge any investor to explain why else to buy a low-dividend or no-dividend stock except for the expectation of higher returns from book value growth. For that reason, I have come to focus my analysis of growth companies on how well they seem able to grow book value per share.\nI break down Tesla's book value trajectory into two main parts: Retained Earnings, and Additional Paid In Capital. Although Tesla seems to have \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability, having reported 7 consecutive quarters of positive earnings since September 2019, accumulated profits still fall short of accumulated losses by over $4 billion.\nData by YCharts\nThe other \"half\" (actually over 100%) of Tesla's book value comes from the money paid in by investors. TSLA has continuously raised capital over the past several years by issuing new shares, and the higher the valuation multiple at which TSLA can issue new shares, the more it can accumulate in Additional Paid In Capital. These share issuances also raise the number of shares outstanding, which has the dual effect of raising Tesla's overall market value (since the price per share is now multiplied by more shares), and diluting each share's per-share book value. This increase in book value per share and decline in Price/Book in every recent new share issuance effectively reflects a \"profit\" earlier shareholders enjoy for having later investors pay a higher valuation to get into the company.\nData by YCharts\nPutting these above two charts together, we see that so far Tesla has \"made\" over $27 billion selling shares of its stock to investors, vs. losing over $4 billion in trying to sell cars and batteries to customers, and of course the latter eventually needs to overtake the former for investors to start making their money back.\nHow Tesla's Earnings Projections Add Up\nIf we assume that Tesla stops issuing new shares (a big assumption, but necessary to keep the math simple), then we can add up projected earnings per share to the book value per share to accumulate a projection of future book value per share. Projections of Tesla's future earnings deserve their own article or research report, so for the purposes of this update, I'll use the low vs high analyst forecasts on Tesla'sSeeking Alphaearnings page:\nSource:SeekingAlpha Earnings Page For TSLA\nNote that between 2025 and 2025, the low and median EPS estimates jump as the number of analysts covering the stock that far out falls from 11 to two, implying that the two analysts projecting TSLA's earnings out to 2030 are on the more optimistic end of the street. If we add up the low and high EPS estimates to today's starting book value per share of $23.90, we get a forecast of TSLA's book value of between $160 and $235 per share for the end of 2030. From today's price of around $623.90 per share, that means if TSLA's book value grows to around $200 (the middle of that optimistic range), then a contraction in TSLA's P/B from today's level of 26 to a still \"high for hardware\" multiple of 3 would mean shareholders would earn a 0% return between now and 2030. In other words, someone buying TSLA today would have to believe that either:\n\nTesla will grow its earnings and book value even faster than the most optimistic analyst estimates, or\nThat investors will continue paying P/B multiples well above 3 for the stock.\n\nOn forecasting what TSLA's P/B might be by 2030, there are three ways I can see expecting a multiple of 3 or higher:\n\nAnother valuation bubble: The P/B of Toyota Motor Corp. (TM), charted below, reached highs around 3 in Japan's late 1980s bubble, and again in the late 1990s \"echo bubble,\" and that was its high. If TSLA becomes like TM by 2030, this sort of broader stock valuation bubble may be needed to provide an attractive return on the exit price.\nBusiness transformation: The biggest TSLA bulls I speak to are those who believe TSLA may either remain a premium hardware maker with services on top like Apple Inc. (AAPL), or as a more asset-light, high return software platform like Microsoft (MSFT), whose P/B ratios are charted below Toyota's.\nFinancial engineering: One other driver of Apple's P/B expansion is buybacks, as I explained in this example with McDonald's. Buybacks at high P/B multiples reduce book value per share and raise the P/B multiple, all else equal, in ways exactly opposite to how Tesla has been only issuing (not buying back) shares so far.\n\nData by YCharts\nData by YCharts\nAnother way of comparing Tesla's $36 billion in annual sales vs. Toyota's $257 billion is on a revenue per capital basis. In other words, Tesla currently grosses around $5/year per person on the planet, vs. Toyota's roughly $37/year per human on earth. The growth question for 2030 is whether Tesla can still reach Toyota's number, especially given that:\n\nDemand for transportation, in terms of global population times the percentage of the global population that can afford a car, is likely to grow at a slower pace than historically, especially after 2030, and\nSelf-driving cars that aren't owned by one person, and so don't need to be parked idle most of the time, might actually decrease demand for new cars.\n\nWithout continued high growth past 2030, even 3x book might be on the high end for a car or battery company.\nData byYCharts\nTrading a TSLA P/B Contraction\nMy favorite actionable strategies on a stock like TSLA, which I don't expect to fundamentally collapse, but do expect to experience a significant multiple contraction, generally involve some form of option put spread. The option strategy described below works both for bears wanting to profit from an outright 20%-30% decline, or long-term bulls wanting to protect their shares' value against such a decline.\nOne challenge with simply buying put spreads on TSLA is that its option prices imply a significant \"positive skew,\" which makes put spreads relatively expensive to call spreads. In other words, the market is implying an expectation that TSLA shares are more likely than not to fall a little, offset by a smaller chance of a much larger upside move. Most of the near-the-money put spreads on TSLA cost more than 50% of the maximum payoff, even with longer-dated options or lower strike prices.\nFor the time horizon, I'm choosing the June 17, 2022, expiry date, which as of this writing is a little more than one year out. The main reasons I find first the expiry after one year to be a \"sweet spot\" for this type of strategy include:\n\nAs opposed to outright short selling, buying a put spread to profit from a decline in a share price may qualify for long-term capital gains tax treatment, as we would be holding a long position in a put spread longer than one year.\nAs opposed to even longer-dated options (say the two-year options expiring June 2023), rolling one-year options forces us to reevaluate our valuation and strike prices and decide if and in what form to roll the strategy after four more quarterly book value updates.\n\nIn this strategy, we buy 1x 650 strike put around 150 and then sell 2x 500 puts around 75 each, for roughly zero net up-front premium. Payoff scenarios based on TSLA's closing price at expiry include:\nSource: My Own Excel Calculation and Chart\nThe maximum payout ($150/share) divided by the maximum loss ($350/share) presents a \"maximum rate of return\" on this strategy is +42.8%, though getting that exact maximum payout is nearly impossible (as it requires TSLA to close at exactly $500/share on the expiry date). More likely, this option strategy would deliver a rate of return of more than 14.2% on the maximum loss if TSLA closes between 400-600 at expiry. If we follow the earlier earnings estimates and project TSLA's book value per share to be around $30/share by then, that means we expect a contract in P/B to between 13-20 by next summer.\nConclusion\nFor high-growth, non-dividend paying stocks like Tesla, return expectations break down into expectations of book value growth times expectation of P/B multiple expansion or contraction. Now that it's \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability and reached a respectable level of sales, I believe Tesla is less likely to be the next DeLorean Motor Company, and at best like Microsoft in 2000. To summarize an example I often reference inLong Run Income, from 2000 to 2010, Microsoft's business continued to grow, but investors who bought at the beginning of 2000 were still down over 36% 10 years later because Microsoft's P/B multiple declined by that much more than the business grew. Here is one chart showing that \"lost decade\" for MSFT shareholders.\nData by YCharts\nFor investors who want to hedge a decline in TSLA shares from here to $500, or those who believe TSLA may be a good company that is just wildly overvalued at these levels and may be worth buying below $500, the 1x2 put spread strategy described above may be worth considering.","kind":null,"is_publish_news":true,"is_publish_highlight":true,"is_publish_live":false,"is_publish_wemedia":null,"editions":null,"column":"","sentiment":"0","news_tag":"","news_rank":0,"symbols":[],"gpt_button":1},"commentList":[{"id":116887042,"gmtCreate":1622788692986,"gmtModify":1704191221174,"author":{"id":"3578383896178212","authorId":"3578383896178212","authorIdStr":"3578383896178212","name":"疲劳Fatigued","avatar":"https://static.laohu8.com/default-avatar.jpg","vip":1,"crmLevel":2,"crmLevelSwitch":0,"idStr":"3578383896178212"},"htmlText":"1","listText":"1","text":"1","images":[],"top":1,"highlighted":1,"essential":1,"paper":1,"likeSize":0,"commentSize":0,"repostSize":0,"link":"https://ttm.financial/post/116887042","repostId":1152573638,"repostType":4,"repost":{"id":"1152573638","pubTimestamp":1622732138,"share":"https://ttm.financial/m/news/1152573638?lang=&edition=fundamental","pubTime":"2021-06-03 22:55","market":"us","language":"en","title":"Tesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors","url":"https://stock-news.laohu8.com/highlight/detail?id=1152573638","media":"seekingalpha","summary":"Summary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very hi","content":"Summary\n<ul>\n <li>As long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.</li>\n <li>Shareholders assuming Tesla's Price/Book multiple deflates from around 25 to 5 over the next 10 years need book value per share to grow 5x just to break even.</li>\n <li>So far, Tesla's growth in book value is mostly from \"Additional Paid-In Capital\" (issuing new shares at high prices), rather than retained earnings.</li>\n <li>Long-term earnings estimates imply book value per share sums up to 150-250 by the end of 2030, meaning a breakeven Price/Book of 2.5-4x, which is well above most mature autos.</li>\n <li>I present a 1x2 put spread as an attractive trade both for long investors concerned about overvaluation, as well as those seeking to bet on a Price/Book multiple contraction.</li>\n</ul>\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/c329e23b2762c47b11d11d95ec584959\" tg-width=\"768\" tg-height=\"512\">Photo by Jag_cz/iStock Editorial via Getty Images\nBook value per share is likely not the first metric that comes to mind when you think of a \"growth company of the future\" like Tesla (TSLA), but in this article, I will explain why book value per share is the most important bottom line number long-term investors in this company should watch. As long as zero dividends are expected, a TSLA shareholder's total return will, by definition, be defined by the growth of Tesla's book value per share crossed against the change in the Price/Book (P/B) multiple of those shares. After looking at some numbers underlying TSLA's book value per share, and how much it will have to grow for current TSLA shareholders to make money, I conclude with three actionable option strategies based on expectations for how these numbers may change in the medium term. This article also can be seen as a follow up to the&nbsp;2041 breakeven projection of Tesla I published last year.\nTesla Share Price Rise Follows Book Value\nThe first chart here shows how the rise in Tesla's share price has moved remarkably in line with TSLA's growth in book value per share. TSLA has so far never paid a dividend.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/c1f994d62f1ec67c3b95ae15c3791fa8\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"458\">Data by YCharts\nMultiple Expansion and Contraction\nThe above chart, which is on a log scale, is far smoother than that of the (P/B) ratio between these two numbers. The multiple seemed to have stabilized between 2017 and late 2019, but its rise from below 7 in mid-2019 to over 40 in late 2020 and back to around 26 today explains much of TSLA's recent surge and volatility. Another way of thinking about it: TSLA's book value per share is up roughly 4-fold in the past two years, and its P/B is up about 4-fold over the past two years, which together explain why TSLA's shares are up about 16-fold over the past two years. The big question for investors at these levels is: What future combination of book value growth and P/B expansion or contraction can be expected to produce a satisfactory rate of return?\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/b8eb71b806f59aaabd5d09a6eb4b1606\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\nUnderstanding Tesla's Book Value Growth\nAlthough the title of my Marketplace serviceLong Run Incomeimplies a preference for dividends, we believe high-quality book value growth is the best kind of \"dividend alternative\" for companies who can reinvest cash profits internally at far higher rates of return than I can externally. I would challenge any investor to explain why else to buy a low-dividend or no-dividend stock except for the expectation of higher returns from book value growth. For that reason, I have come to focus my analysis of growth companies on how well they seem able to grow book value per share.\nI break down Tesla's book value trajectory into two main parts: Retained Earnings, and Additional Paid In Capital. Although Tesla seems to have \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability, having reported&nbsp;7 consecutive quarters of positive earnings since September 2019, accumulated profits still fall short of accumulated losses by over $4 billion.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/08701c599a8c6fa7a66efde3c0a12cac\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\nThe other \"half\" (actually over 100%) of Tesla's book value comes from the money paid in by investors. TSLA has continuously raised capital over the past several years by issuing new shares, and the higher the valuation multiple at which TSLA can issue new shares, the more it can accumulate in Additional Paid In Capital. These share issuances also raise the number of shares outstanding, which has the dual effect of raising Tesla's overall market value (since the price per share is now multiplied by more shares), and diluting each share's per-share book value. This increase in book value per share and decline in Price/Book in every recent new share issuance effectively reflects a \"profit\" earlier shareholders enjoy for having later investors pay a higher valuation to get into the company.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/971bf86f3d08fe938af2845121be8d4c\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"441\">Data by YCharts\nPutting these above two charts together, we see that so far Tesla has \"made\" over $27 billion selling shares of its stock to investors, vs. losing over $4 billion in trying to sell cars and batteries to customers, and of course the latter eventually needs to overtake the former for investors to start making their money back.\nHow Tesla's Earnings Projections Add Up\nIf we assume that Tesla stops issuing new shares (a big assumption, but necessary to keep the math simple), then we can add up projected earnings per share to the book value per share to accumulate a projection of future book value per share. Projections of Tesla's future earnings deserve their own article or research report, so for the purposes of this update, I'll use the low vs high analyst forecasts on Tesla'sSeeking Alphaearnings page:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/f36166f6653fb8e11941e3c58b313ccb\" tg-width=\"640\" tg-height=\"312\">Source:SeekingAlpha Earnings Page For TSLA\nNote that between 2025 and 2025, the low and median EPS estimates jump as the number of analysts covering the stock that far out falls from 11 to two, implying that the two analysts projecting TSLA's earnings out to 2030 are on the more optimistic end of the street. If we add up the low and high EPS estimates to today's starting book value per share of $23.90, we get a forecast of TSLA's book value of between $160 and $235 per share for the end of 2030. From today's price of around $623.90 per share, that means if TSLA's book value grows to around $200 (the middle of that optimistic range), then a contraction in TSLA's P/B from today's level of 26 to a still \"high for hardware\" multiple of 3 would mean shareholders would earn a 0% return between now and 2030. In other words, someone buying TSLA today would have to believe that either:\n<ol>\n <li>Tesla will grow its earnings and book value even faster than the most optimistic analyst estimates, or</li>\n <li>That investors will continue paying P/B multiples well above 3 for the stock.</li>\n</ol>\nOn forecasting what TSLA's P/B might be by 2030, there are three ways I can see expecting a multiple of 3 or higher:\n<ol>\n <li>Another valuation bubble: The P/B of Toyota Motor Corp. (TM), charted below, reached highs around 3 in Japan's late 1980s bubble, and again in the late 1990s \"echo bubble,\" and that was its high. If TSLA becomes like TM by 2030, this sort of broader stock valuation bubble may be needed to provide an attractive return on the exit price.</li>\n <li>Business transformation: The biggest TSLA bulls I speak to are those who believe TSLA may either remain a premium hardware maker with services on top like Apple Inc. (AAPL), or as a more asset-light, high return software platform like Microsoft (MSFT), whose P/B ratios are charted below Toyota's.</li>\n <li>Financial engineering: One other driver of Apple's&nbsp;P/B expansion is buybacks, as I explained in this example with McDonald's. Buybacks at high P/B multiples reduce book value per share and raise the P/B multiple, all else equal, in ways exactly opposite to how Tesla has been only issuing (not buying back) shares so far.</li>\n</ol>\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/59e353b1112fb465bf275bfd2e2f5c38\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/7432d2c24afe124c70d139e0320f2d0c\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"441\">Data by YCharts\nAnother way of comparing Tesla's $36 billion in annual sales vs. Toyota's $257 billion is on a revenue per capital basis. In other words, Tesla currently grosses around $5/year per person on the planet, vs. Toyota's roughly $37/year per human on earth. The growth question for 2030 is whether Tesla can still reach Toyota's number, especially given that:\n<ol>\n <li>Demand for transportation, in terms of global population times the percentage of the global population that can afford a car, is likely to grow at a slower pace than historically, especially after 2030, and</li>\n <li>Self-driving cars that aren't owned by one person, and so don't need to be parked idle most of the time, might actually decrease demand for new cars.</li>\n</ol>\nWithout continued high growth past 2030, even 3x book might be on the high end for a car or battery company.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/ed6900c059b599cc5885a2184ad6db05\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"537\">Data byYCharts\nTrading a TSLA P/B Contraction\nMy favorite actionable strategies on a stock like TSLA, which I don't expect to fundamentally collapse, but do expect to experience a significant multiple contraction, generally involve some form of option put spread. The option strategy described below works both for bears wanting to profit from an outright 20%-30% decline, or long-term bulls wanting to protect their shares' value against such a decline.\nOne challenge with simply buying put spreads on TSLA is that its option prices imply a significant \"positive skew,\" which makes put spreads relatively expensive to call spreads. In other words, the market is implying an expectation that TSLA shares are more likely than not to fall a little, offset by a smaller chance of a much larger upside move. Most of the near-the-money put spreads on TSLA cost more than 50% of the maximum payoff, even with longer-dated options or lower strike prices.\nFor the time horizon, I'm choosing the June 17, 2022, expiry date, which as of this writing is a little more than one year out. The main reasons I find first the expiry after one year to be a \"sweet spot\" for this type of strategy include:\n<ol>\n <li>As opposed to outright short selling, buying a put spread to profit from a decline in a share price may qualify for long-term capital gains tax treatment, as we would be holding a long position in a put spread longer than one year.</li>\n <li>As opposed to even longer-dated options (say the two-year options expiring June 2023), rolling one-year options forces us to reevaluate our valuation and strike prices and decide if and in what form to roll the strategy after four more quarterly book value updates.</li>\n</ol>\nIn this strategy, we buy 1x 650 strike put around 150 and then sell 2x 500 puts around 75 each, for roughly zero net up-front premium. Payoff scenarios based on TSLA's closing price at expiry include:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/d8d415689c4d898bc75eba42b9f79152\" tg-width=\"640\" tg-height=\"452\">Source: My Own Excel Calculation and Chart\nThe maximum payout ($150/share) divided by the maximum loss ($350/share) presents a \"maximum rate of return\" on this strategy is +42.8%, though getting that exact maximum payout is nearly impossible (as it requires TSLA to close at exactly $500/share on the expiry date). More likely, this option strategy would deliver a rate of return of more than 14.2% on the maximum loss if TSLA closes between 400-600 at expiry. If we follow the earlier earnings estimates and project TSLA's book value per share to be around $30/share by then, that means we expect a contract in P/B to between 13-20 by next summer.\nConclusion\nFor high-growth, non-dividend paying stocks like Tesla, return expectations break down into expectations of book value growth times expectation of P/B multiple expansion or contraction. Now that it's \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability and reached a respectable level of sales, I believe Tesla is less likely to be the next&nbsp;DeLorean Motor Company, and at best like Microsoft in 2000. To summarize an example I often reference inLong Run Income, from 2000 to 2010, Microsoft's business continued to grow, but investors who bought at the beginning of 2000 were still down over 36% 10 years later because Microsoft's P/B multiple declined by that much more than the business grew. Here is one chart showing that \"lost decade\" for MSFT shareholders.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/faaf554d7a7744d36d27ea7f92e9a9e2\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"475\">Data by YCharts\nFor investors who want to hedge a decline in TSLA shares from here to $500, or those who believe TSLA may be a good company that is just wildly overvalued at these levels and may be worth buying below $500, the 1x2 put spread strategy described above may be worth considering.","collect":0,"html":"<!DOCTYPE html>\n<html>\n<head>\n<meta http-equiv=\"Content-Type\" content=\"text/html; charset=utf-8\" />\n<meta name=\"viewport\" content=\"width=device-width,initial-scale=1.0,minimum-scale=1.0,maximum-scale=1.0,user-scalable=no\"/>\n<meta name=\"format-detection\" content=\"telephone=no,email=no,address=no\" />\n<title>Tesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors</title>\n<style type=\"text/css\">\na,abbr,acronym,address,applet,article,aside,audio,b,big,blockquote,body,canvas,caption,center,cite,code,dd,del,details,dfn,div,dl,dt,\nem,embed,fieldset,figcaption,figure,footer,form,h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6,header,hgroup,html,i,iframe,img,ins,kbd,label,legend,li,mark,menu,nav,\nobject,ol,output,p,pre,q,ruby,s,samp,section,small,span,strike,strong,sub,summary,sup,table,tbody,td,tfoot,th,thead,time,tr,tt,u,ul,var,video{ font:inherit;margin:0;padding:0;vertical-align:baseline;border:0 }\nbody{ font-size:16px; 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}\n.meta {color:#5e5c6d;font-size:13px;margin:0 0 .5em; }\na{text-decoration:none; color:#2a4b87;}\n.meta .head { display: inline-block; overflow: hidden}\n.head .h-thumb { width: 30px; height: 30px; margin: 0; padding: 0; border-radius: 50%; float: left;}\n.head .h-content { margin: 0; padding: 0 0 0 9px; float: left;}\n.head .h-name {font-size: 13px; color: #eee; margin: 0;}\n.head .h-time {font-size: 11px; color: #7E829C; margin: 0;line-height: 11px;}\n.small {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.9); -webkit-transform: scale(0.9); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.smaller {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.8); -webkit-transform: scale(0.8); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.bt-text {font-size: 12px;margin: 1.5em 0 0 0}\n.bt-text p {margin: 0}\n</style>\n</head>\n<body>\n<div class=\"wrapper\">\n<header>\n<h2 class=\"title\">\nTesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors\n</h2>\n\n<h4 class=\"meta\">\n\n\n2021-06-03 22:55 GMT+8&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<a href=https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors>seekingalpha</a>\n\n\n</h4>\n\n</header>\n<article>\n<div>\nSummary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.\nShareholders assuming Tesla's ...\n\n<a href=\"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors\">Web Link</a>\n\n</div>\n\n\n</article>\n</div>\n</body>\n</html>\n","type":0,"thumbnail":"","relate_stocks":{"TSLA":"特斯拉"},"source_url":"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors","is_english":true,"share_image_url":"https://static.laohu8.com/e9f99090a1c2ed51c021029395664489","article_id":"1152573638","content_text":"Summary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.\nShareholders assuming Tesla's Price/Book multiple deflates from around 25 to 5 over the next 10 years need book value per share to grow 5x just to break even.\nSo far, Tesla's growth in book value is mostly from \"Additional Paid-In Capital\" (issuing new shares at high prices), rather than retained earnings.\nLong-term earnings estimates imply book value per share sums up to 150-250 by the end of 2030, meaning a breakeven Price/Book of 2.5-4x, which is well above most mature autos.\nI present a 1x2 put spread as an attractive trade both for long investors concerned about overvaluation, as well as those seeking to bet on a Price/Book multiple contraction.\n\nPhoto by Jag_cz/iStock Editorial via Getty Images\nBook value per share is likely not the first metric that comes to mind when you think of a \"growth company of the future\" like Tesla (TSLA), but in this article, I will explain why book value per share is the most important bottom line number long-term investors in this company should watch. As long as zero dividends are expected, a TSLA shareholder's total return will, by definition, be defined by the growth of Tesla's book value per share crossed against the change in the Price/Book (P/B) multiple of those shares. After looking at some numbers underlying TSLA's book value per share, and how much it will have to grow for current TSLA shareholders to make money, I conclude with three actionable option strategies based on expectations for how these numbers may change in the medium term. This article also can be seen as a follow up to the 2041 breakeven projection of Tesla I published last year.\nTesla Share Price Rise Follows Book Value\nThe first chart here shows how the rise in Tesla's share price has moved remarkably in line with TSLA's growth in book value per share. TSLA has so far never paid a dividend.\nData by YCharts\nMultiple Expansion and Contraction\nThe above chart, which is on a log scale, is far smoother than that of the (P/B) ratio between these two numbers. The multiple seemed to have stabilized between 2017 and late 2019, but its rise from below 7 in mid-2019 to over 40 in late 2020 and back to around 26 today explains much of TSLA's recent surge and volatility. Another way of thinking about it: TSLA's book value per share is up roughly 4-fold in the past two years, and its P/B is up about 4-fold over the past two years, which together explain why TSLA's shares are up about 16-fold over the past two years. The big question for investors at these levels is: What future combination of book value growth and P/B expansion or contraction can be expected to produce a satisfactory rate of return?\nData by YCharts\nUnderstanding Tesla's Book Value Growth\nAlthough the title of my Marketplace serviceLong Run Incomeimplies a preference for dividends, we believe high-quality book value growth is the best kind of \"dividend alternative\" for companies who can reinvest cash profits internally at far higher rates of return than I can externally. I would challenge any investor to explain why else to buy a low-dividend or no-dividend stock except for the expectation of higher returns from book value growth. For that reason, I have come to focus my analysis of growth companies on how well they seem able to grow book value per share.\nI break down Tesla's book value trajectory into two main parts: Retained Earnings, and Additional Paid In Capital. Although Tesla seems to have \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability, having reported 7 consecutive quarters of positive earnings since September 2019, accumulated profits still fall short of accumulated losses by over $4 billion.\nData by YCharts\nThe other \"half\" (actually over 100%) of Tesla's book value comes from the money paid in by investors. TSLA has continuously raised capital over the past several years by issuing new shares, and the higher the valuation multiple at which TSLA can issue new shares, the more it can accumulate in Additional Paid In Capital. These share issuances also raise the number of shares outstanding, which has the dual effect of raising Tesla's overall market value (since the price per share is now multiplied by more shares), and diluting each share's per-share book value. This increase in book value per share and decline in Price/Book in every recent new share issuance effectively reflects a \"profit\" earlier shareholders enjoy for having later investors pay a higher valuation to get into the company.\nData by YCharts\nPutting these above two charts together, we see that so far Tesla has \"made\" over $27 billion selling shares of its stock to investors, vs. losing over $4 billion in trying to sell cars and batteries to customers, and of course the latter eventually needs to overtake the former for investors to start making their money back.\nHow Tesla's Earnings Projections Add Up\nIf we assume that Tesla stops issuing new shares (a big assumption, but necessary to keep the math simple), then we can add up projected earnings per share to the book value per share to accumulate a projection of future book value per share. Projections of Tesla's future earnings deserve their own article or research report, so for the purposes of this update, I'll use the low vs high analyst forecasts on Tesla'sSeeking Alphaearnings page:\nSource:SeekingAlpha Earnings Page For TSLA\nNote that between 2025 and 2025, the low and median EPS estimates jump as the number of analysts covering the stock that far out falls from 11 to two, implying that the two analysts projecting TSLA's earnings out to 2030 are on the more optimistic end of the street. If we add up the low and high EPS estimates to today's starting book value per share of $23.90, we get a forecast of TSLA's book value of between $160 and $235 per share for the end of 2030. From today's price of around $623.90 per share, that means if TSLA's book value grows to around $200 (the middle of that optimistic range), then a contraction in TSLA's P/B from today's level of 26 to a still \"high for hardware\" multiple of 3 would mean shareholders would earn a 0% return between now and 2030. In other words, someone buying TSLA today would have to believe that either:\n\nTesla will grow its earnings and book value even faster than the most optimistic analyst estimates, or\nThat investors will continue paying P/B multiples well above 3 for the stock.\n\nOn forecasting what TSLA's P/B might be by 2030, there are three ways I can see expecting a multiple of 3 or higher:\n\nAnother valuation bubble: The P/B of Toyota Motor Corp. (TM), charted below, reached highs around 3 in Japan's late 1980s bubble, and again in the late 1990s \"echo bubble,\" and that was its high. If TSLA becomes like TM by 2030, this sort of broader stock valuation bubble may be needed to provide an attractive return on the exit price.\nBusiness transformation: The biggest TSLA bulls I speak to are those who believe TSLA may either remain a premium hardware maker with services on top like Apple Inc. (AAPL), or as a more asset-light, high return software platform like Microsoft (MSFT), whose P/B ratios are charted below Toyota's.\nFinancial engineering: One other driver of Apple's P/B expansion is buybacks, as I explained in this example with McDonald's. Buybacks at high P/B multiples reduce book value per share and raise the P/B multiple, all else equal, in ways exactly opposite to how Tesla has been only issuing (not buying back) shares so far.\n\nData by YCharts\nData by YCharts\nAnother way of comparing Tesla's $36 billion in annual sales vs. Toyota's $257 billion is on a revenue per capital basis. In other words, Tesla currently grosses around $5/year per person on the planet, vs. Toyota's roughly $37/year per human on earth. The growth question for 2030 is whether Tesla can still reach Toyota's number, especially given that:\n\nDemand for transportation, in terms of global population times the percentage of the global population that can afford a car, is likely to grow at a slower pace than historically, especially after 2030, and\nSelf-driving cars that aren't owned by one person, and so don't need to be parked idle most of the time, might actually decrease demand for new cars.\n\nWithout continued high growth past 2030, even 3x book might be on the high end for a car or battery company.\nData byYCharts\nTrading a TSLA P/B Contraction\nMy favorite actionable strategies on a stock like TSLA, which I don't expect to fundamentally collapse, but do expect to experience a significant multiple contraction, generally involve some form of option put spread. The option strategy described below works both for bears wanting to profit from an outright 20%-30% decline, or long-term bulls wanting to protect their shares' value against such a decline.\nOne challenge with simply buying put spreads on TSLA is that its option prices imply a significant \"positive skew,\" which makes put spreads relatively expensive to call spreads. In other words, the market is implying an expectation that TSLA shares are more likely than not to fall a little, offset by a smaller chance of a much larger upside move. Most of the near-the-money put spreads on TSLA cost more than 50% of the maximum payoff, even with longer-dated options or lower strike prices.\nFor the time horizon, I'm choosing the June 17, 2022, expiry date, which as of this writing is a little more than one year out. The main reasons I find first the expiry after one year to be a \"sweet spot\" for this type of strategy include:\n\nAs opposed to outright short selling, buying a put spread to profit from a decline in a share price may qualify for long-term capital gains tax treatment, as we would be holding a long position in a put spread longer than one year.\nAs opposed to even longer-dated options (say the two-year options expiring June 2023), rolling one-year options forces us to reevaluate our valuation and strike prices and decide if and in what form to roll the strategy after four more quarterly book value updates.\n\nIn this strategy, we buy 1x 650 strike put around 150 and then sell 2x 500 puts around 75 each, for roughly zero net up-front premium. Payoff scenarios based on TSLA's closing price at expiry include:\nSource: My Own Excel Calculation and Chart\nThe maximum payout ($150/share) divided by the maximum loss ($350/share) presents a \"maximum rate of return\" on this strategy is +42.8%, though getting that exact maximum payout is nearly impossible (as it requires TSLA to close at exactly $500/share on the expiry date). More likely, this option strategy would deliver a rate of return of more than 14.2% on the maximum loss if TSLA closes between 400-600 at expiry. If we follow the earlier earnings estimates and project TSLA's book value per share to be around $30/share by then, that means we expect a contract in P/B to between 13-20 by next summer.\nConclusion\nFor high-growth, non-dividend paying stocks like Tesla, return expectations break down into expectations of book value growth times expectation of P/B multiple expansion or contraction. Now that it's \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability and reached a respectable level of sales, I believe Tesla is less likely to be the next DeLorean Motor Company, and at best like Microsoft in 2000. To summarize an example I often reference inLong Run Income, from 2000 to 2010, Microsoft's business continued to grow, but investors who bought at the beginning of 2000 were still down over 36% 10 years later because Microsoft's P/B multiple declined by that much more than the business grew. Here is one chart showing that \"lost decade\" for MSFT shareholders.\nData by YCharts\nFor investors who want to hedge a decline in TSLA shares from here to $500, or those who believe TSLA may be a good company that is just wildly overvalued at these levels and may be worth buying below $500, the 1x2 put spread strategy described above may be worth considering.","news_type":1},"isVote":1,"likeStatus":false,"favoriteStatus":false,"reportStatus":false,"tweetType":1,"langContent":"EN"},{"id":116024140,"gmtCreate":1622767031380,"gmtModify":1704190699735,"author":{"id":"3584322535335724","authorId":"3584322535335724","authorIdStr":"3584322535335724","name":"Jetblackeyes","avatar":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/227c87d3e8eaa258f98f85885dd9173d","vip":1,"crmLevel":2,"crmLevelSwitch":0,"idStr":"3584322535335724"},"htmlText":"pls like and comment&nbsp;<a href=\"https://laohu8.com/U/3585192718156791\">@yvneyng</a>","listText":"pls like and comment&nbsp;<a href=\"https://laohu8.com/U/3585192718156791\">@yvneyng</a>","text":"pls like and comment @yvneyng","images":[],"top":1,"highlighted":1,"essential":1,"paper":1,"likeSize":1,"commentSize":0,"repostSize":0,"link":"https://ttm.financial/post/116024140","repostId":1152573638,"repostType":4,"repost":{"id":"1152573638","pubTimestamp":1622732138,"share":"https://ttm.financial/m/news/1152573638?lang=&edition=fundamental","pubTime":"2021-06-03 22:55","market":"us","language":"en","title":"Tesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors","url":"https://stock-news.laohu8.com/highlight/detail?id=1152573638","media":"seekingalpha","summary":"Summary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very hi","content":"Summary\n<ul>\n <li>As long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.</li>\n <li>Shareholders assuming Tesla's Price/Book multiple deflates from around 25 to 5 over the next 10 years need book value per share to grow 5x just to break even.</li>\n <li>So far, Tesla's growth in book value is mostly from \"Additional Paid-In Capital\" (issuing new shares at high prices), rather than retained earnings.</li>\n <li>Long-term earnings estimates imply book value per share sums up to 150-250 by the end of 2030, meaning a breakeven Price/Book of 2.5-4x, which is well above most mature autos.</li>\n <li>I present a 1x2 put spread as an attractive trade both for long investors concerned about overvaluation, as well as those seeking to bet on a Price/Book multiple contraction.</li>\n</ul>\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/c329e23b2762c47b11d11d95ec584959\" tg-width=\"768\" tg-height=\"512\">Photo by Jag_cz/iStock Editorial via Getty Images\nBook value per share is likely not the first metric that comes to mind when you think of a \"growth company of the future\" like Tesla (TSLA), but in this article, I will explain why book value per share is the most important bottom line number long-term investors in this company should watch. As long as zero dividends are expected, a TSLA shareholder's total return will, by definition, be defined by the growth of Tesla's book value per share crossed against the change in the Price/Book (P/B) multiple of those shares. After looking at some numbers underlying TSLA's book value per share, and how much it will have to grow for current TSLA shareholders to make money, I conclude with three actionable option strategies based on expectations for how these numbers may change in the medium term. This article also can be seen as a follow up to the&nbsp;2041 breakeven projection of Tesla I published last year.\nTesla Share Price Rise Follows Book Value\nThe first chart here shows how the rise in Tesla's share price has moved remarkably in line with TSLA's growth in book value per share. TSLA has so far never paid a dividend.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/c1f994d62f1ec67c3b95ae15c3791fa8\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"458\">Data by YCharts\nMultiple Expansion and Contraction\nThe above chart, which is on a log scale, is far smoother than that of the (P/B) ratio between these two numbers. The multiple seemed to have stabilized between 2017 and late 2019, but its rise from below 7 in mid-2019 to over 40 in late 2020 and back to around 26 today explains much of TSLA's recent surge and volatility. Another way of thinking about it: TSLA's book value per share is up roughly 4-fold in the past two years, and its P/B is up about 4-fold over the past two years, which together explain why TSLA's shares are up about 16-fold over the past two years. The big question for investors at these levels is: What future combination of book value growth and P/B expansion or contraction can be expected to produce a satisfactory rate of return?\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/b8eb71b806f59aaabd5d09a6eb4b1606\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\nUnderstanding Tesla's Book Value Growth\nAlthough the title of my Marketplace serviceLong Run Incomeimplies a preference for dividends, we believe high-quality book value growth is the best kind of \"dividend alternative\" for companies who can reinvest cash profits internally at far higher rates of return than I can externally. I would challenge any investor to explain why else to buy a low-dividend or no-dividend stock except for the expectation of higher returns from book value growth. For that reason, I have come to focus my analysis of growth companies on how well they seem able to grow book value per share.\nI break down Tesla's book value trajectory into two main parts: Retained Earnings, and Additional Paid In Capital. Although Tesla seems to have \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability, having reported&nbsp;7 consecutive quarters of positive earnings since September 2019, accumulated profits still fall short of accumulated losses by over $4 billion.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/08701c599a8c6fa7a66efde3c0a12cac\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\nThe other \"half\" (actually over 100%) of Tesla's book value comes from the money paid in by investors. TSLA has continuously raised capital over the past several years by issuing new shares, and the higher the valuation multiple at which TSLA can issue new shares, the more it can accumulate in Additional Paid In Capital. These share issuances also raise the number of shares outstanding, which has the dual effect of raising Tesla's overall market value (since the price per share is now multiplied by more shares), and diluting each share's per-share book value. This increase in book value per share and decline in Price/Book in every recent new share issuance effectively reflects a \"profit\" earlier shareholders enjoy for having later investors pay a higher valuation to get into the company.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/971bf86f3d08fe938af2845121be8d4c\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"441\">Data by YCharts\nPutting these above two charts together, we see that so far Tesla has \"made\" over $27 billion selling shares of its stock to investors, vs. losing over $4 billion in trying to sell cars and batteries to customers, and of course the latter eventually needs to overtake the former for investors to start making their money back.\nHow Tesla's Earnings Projections Add Up\nIf we assume that Tesla stops issuing new shares (a big assumption, but necessary to keep the math simple), then we can add up projected earnings per share to the book value per share to accumulate a projection of future book value per share. Projections of Tesla's future earnings deserve their own article or research report, so for the purposes of this update, I'll use the low vs high analyst forecasts on Tesla'sSeeking Alphaearnings page:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/f36166f6653fb8e11941e3c58b313ccb\" tg-width=\"640\" tg-height=\"312\">Source:SeekingAlpha Earnings Page For TSLA\nNote that between 2025 and 2025, the low and median EPS estimates jump as the number of analysts covering the stock that far out falls from 11 to two, implying that the two analysts projecting TSLA's earnings out to 2030 are on the more optimistic end of the street. If we add up the low and high EPS estimates to today's starting book value per share of $23.90, we get a forecast of TSLA's book value of between $160 and $235 per share for the end of 2030. From today's price of around $623.90 per share, that means if TSLA's book value grows to around $200 (the middle of that optimistic range), then a contraction in TSLA's P/B from today's level of 26 to a still \"high for hardware\" multiple of 3 would mean shareholders would earn a 0% return between now and 2030. In other words, someone buying TSLA today would have to believe that either:\n<ol>\n <li>Tesla will grow its earnings and book value even faster than the most optimistic analyst estimates, or</li>\n <li>That investors will continue paying P/B multiples well above 3 for the stock.</li>\n</ol>\nOn forecasting what TSLA's P/B might be by 2030, there are three ways I can see expecting a multiple of 3 or higher:\n<ol>\n <li>Another valuation bubble: The P/B of Toyota Motor Corp. (TM), charted below, reached highs around 3 in Japan's late 1980s bubble, and again in the late 1990s \"echo bubble,\" and that was its high. If TSLA becomes like TM by 2030, this sort of broader stock valuation bubble may be needed to provide an attractive return on the exit price.</li>\n <li>Business transformation: The biggest TSLA bulls I speak to are those who believe TSLA may either remain a premium hardware maker with services on top like Apple Inc. (AAPL), or as a more asset-light, high return software platform like Microsoft (MSFT), whose P/B ratios are charted below Toyota's.</li>\n <li>Financial engineering: One other driver of Apple's&nbsp;P/B expansion is buybacks, as I explained in this example with McDonald's. Buybacks at high P/B multiples reduce book value per share and raise the P/B multiple, all else equal, in ways exactly opposite to how Tesla has been only issuing (not buying back) shares so far.</li>\n</ol>\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/59e353b1112fb465bf275bfd2e2f5c38\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/7432d2c24afe124c70d139e0320f2d0c\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"441\">Data by YCharts\nAnother way of comparing Tesla's $36 billion in annual sales vs. Toyota's $257 billion is on a revenue per capital basis. In other words, Tesla currently grosses around $5/year per person on the planet, vs. Toyota's roughly $37/year per human on earth. The growth question for 2030 is whether Tesla can still reach Toyota's number, especially given that:\n<ol>\n <li>Demand for transportation, in terms of global population times the percentage of the global population that can afford a car, is likely to grow at a slower pace than historically, especially after 2030, and</li>\n <li>Self-driving cars that aren't owned by one person, and so don't need to be parked idle most of the time, might actually decrease demand for new cars.</li>\n</ol>\nWithout continued high growth past 2030, even 3x book might be on the high end for a car or battery company.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/ed6900c059b599cc5885a2184ad6db05\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"537\">Data byYCharts\nTrading a TSLA P/B Contraction\nMy favorite actionable strategies on a stock like TSLA, which I don't expect to fundamentally collapse, but do expect to experience a significant multiple contraction, generally involve some form of option put spread. The option strategy described below works both for bears wanting to profit from an outright 20%-30% decline, or long-term bulls wanting to protect their shares' value against such a decline.\nOne challenge with simply buying put spreads on TSLA is that its option prices imply a significant \"positive skew,\" which makes put spreads relatively expensive to call spreads. In other words, the market is implying an expectation that TSLA shares are more likely than not to fall a little, offset by a smaller chance of a much larger upside move. Most of the near-the-money put spreads on TSLA cost more than 50% of the maximum payoff, even with longer-dated options or lower strike prices.\nFor the time horizon, I'm choosing the June 17, 2022, expiry date, which as of this writing is a little more than one year out. The main reasons I find first the expiry after one year to be a \"sweet spot\" for this type of strategy include:\n<ol>\n <li>As opposed to outright short selling, buying a put spread to profit from a decline in a share price may qualify for long-term capital gains tax treatment, as we would be holding a long position in a put spread longer than one year.</li>\n <li>As opposed to even longer-dated options (say the two-year options expiring June 2023), rolling one-year options forces us to reevaluate our valuation and strike prices and decide if and in what form to roll the strategy after four more quarterly book value updates.</li>\n</ol>\nIn this strategy, we buy 1x 650 strike put around 150 and then sell 2x 500 puts around 75 each, for roughly zero net up-front premium. Payoff scenarios based on TSLA's closing price at expiry include:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/d8d415689c4d898bc75eba42b9f79152\" tg-width=\"640\" tg-height=\"452\">Source: My Own Excel Calculation and Chart\nThe maximum payout ($150/share) divided by the maximum loss ($350/share) presents a \"maximum rate of return\" on this strategy is +42.8%, though getting that exact maximum payout is nearly impossible (as it requires TSLA to close at exactly $500/share on the expiry date). More likely, this option strategy would deliver a rate of return of more than 14.2% on the maximum loss if TSLA closes between 400-600 at expiry. If we follow the earlier earnings estimates and project TSLA's book value per share to be around $30/share by then, that means we expect a contract in P/B to between 13-20 by next summer.\nConclusion\nFor high-growth, non-dividend paying stocks like Tesla, return expectations break down into expectations of book value growth times expectation of P/B multiple expansion or contraction. Now that it's \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability and reached a respectable level of sales, I believe Tesla is less likely to be the next&nbsp;DeLorean Motor Company, and at best like Microsoft in 2000. To summarize an example I often reference inLong Run Income, from 2000 to 2010, Microsoft's business continued to grow, but investors who bought at the beginning of 2000 were still down over 36% 10 years later because Microsoft's P/B multiple declined by that much more than the business grew. Here is one chart showing that \"lost decade\" for MSFT shareholders.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/faaf554d7a7744d36d27ea7f92e9a9e2\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"475\">Data by YCharts\nFor investors who want to hedge a decline in TSLA shares from here to $500, or those who believe TSLA may be a good company that is just wildly overvalued at these levels and may be worth buying below $500, the 1x2 put spread strategy described above may be worth considering.","collect":0,"html":"<!DOCTYPE html>\n<html>\n<head>\n<meta http-equiv=\"Content-Type\" content=\"text/html; charset=utf-8\" />\n<meta name=\"viewport\" content=\"width=device-width,initial-scale=1.0,minimum-scale=1.0,maximum-scale=1.0,user-scalable=no\"/>\n<meta name=\"format-detection\" content=\"telephone=no,email=no,address=no\" />\n<title>Tesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors</title>\n<style type=\"text/css\">\na,abbr,acronym,address,applet,article,aside,audio,b,big,blockquote,body,canvas,caption,center,cite,code,dd,del,details,dfn,div,dl,dt,\nem,embed,fieldset,figcaption,figure,footer,form,h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6,header,hgroup,html,i,iframe,img,ins,kbd,label,legend,li,mark,menu,nav,\nobject,ol,output,p,pre,q,ruby,s,samp,section,small,span,strike,strong,sub,summary,sup,table,tbody,td,tfoot,th,thead,time,tr,tt,u,ul,var,video{ font:inherit;margin:0;padding:0;vertical-align:baseline;border:0 }\nbody{ font-size:16px; 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}\n.meta {color:#5e5c6d;font-size:13px;margin:0 0 .5em; }\na{text-decoration:none; color:#2a4b87;}\n.meta .head { display: inline-block; overflow: hidden}\n.head .h-thumb { width: 30px; height: 30px; margin: 0; padding: 0; border-radius: 50%; float: left;}\n.head .h-content { margin: 0; padding: 0 0 0 9px; float: left;}\n.head .h-name {font-size: 13px; color: #eee; margin: 0;}\n.head .h-time {font-size: 11px; color: #7E829C; margin: 0;line-height: 11px;}\n.small {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.9); -webkit-transform: scale(0.9); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.smaller {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.8); -webkit-transform: scale(0.8); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.bt-text {font-size: 12px;margin: 1.5em 0 0 0}\n.bt-text p {margin: 0}\n</style>\n</head>\n<body>\n<div class=\"wrapper\">\n<header>\n<h2 class=\"title\">\nTesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors\n</h2>\n\n<h4 class=\"meta\">\n\n\n2021-06-03 22:55 GMT+8&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<a href=https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors>seekingalpha</a>\n\n\n</h4>\n\n</header>\n<article>\n<div>\nSummary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.\nShareholders assuming Tesla's ...\n\n<a href=\"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors\">Web Link</a>\n\n</div>\n\n\n</article>\n</div>\n</body>\n</html>\n","type":0,"thumbnail":"","relate_stocks":{"TSLA":"特斯拉"},"source_url":"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors","is_english":true,"share_image_url":"https://static.laohu8.com/e9f99090a1c2ed51c021029395664489","article_id":"1152573638","content_text":"Summary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.\nShareholders assuming Tesla's Price/Book multiple deflates from around 25 to 5 over the next 10 years need book value per share to grow 5x just to break even.\nSo far, Tesla's growth in book value is mostly from \"Additional Paid-In Capital\" (issuing new shares at high prices), rather than retained earnings.\nLong-term earnings estimates imply book value per share sums up to 150-250 by the end of 2030, meaning a breakeven Price/Book of 2.5-4x, which is well above most mature autos.\nI present a 1x2 put spread as an attractive trade both for long investors concerned about overvaluation, as well as those seeking to bet on a Price/Book multiple contraction.\n\nPhoto by Jag_cz/iStock Editorial via Getty Images\nBook value per share is likely not the first metric that comes to mind when you think of a \"growth company of the future\" like Tesla (TSLA), but in this article, I will explain why book value per share is the most important bottom line number long-term investors in this company should watch. As long as zero dividends are expected, a TSLA shareholder's total return will, by definition, be defined by the growth of Tesla's book value per share crossed against the change in the Price/Book (P/B) multiple of those shares. After looking at some numbers underlying TSLA's book value per share, and how much it will have to grow for current TSLA shareholders to make money, I conclude with three actionable option strategies based on expectations for how these numbers may change in the medium term. This article also can be seen as a follow up to the 2041 breakeven projection of Tesla I published last year.\nTesla Share Price Rise Follows Book Value\nThe first chart here shows how the rise in Tesla's share price has moved remarkably in line with TSLA's growth in book value per share. TSLA has so far never paid a dividend.\nData by YCharts\nMultiple Expansion and Contraction\nThe above chart, which is on a log scale, is far smoother than that of the (P/B) ratio between these two numbers. The multiple seemed to have stabilized between 2017 and late 2019, but its rise from below 7 in mid-2019 to over 40 in late 2020 and back to around 26 today explains much of TSLA's recent surge and volatility. Another way of thinking about it: TSLA's book value per share is up roughly 4-fold in the past two years, and its P/B is up about 4-fold over the past two years, which together explain why TSLA's shares are up about 16-fold over the past two years. The big question for investors at these levels is: What future combination of book value growth and P/B expansion or contraction can be expected to produce a satisfactory rate of return?\nData by YCharts\nUnderstanding Tesla's Book Value Growth\nAlthough the title of my Marketplace serviceLong Run Incomeimplies a preference for dividends, we believe high-quality book value growth is the best kind of \"dividend alternative\" for companies who can reinvest cash profits internally at far higher rates of return than I can externally. I would challenge any investor to explain why else to buy a low-dividend or no-dividend stock except for the expectation of higher returns from book value growth. For that reason, I have come to focus my analysis of growth companies on how well they seem able to grow book value per share.\nI break down Tesla's book value trajectory into two main parts: Retained Earnings, and Additional Paid In Capital. Although Tesla seems to have \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability, having reported 7 consecutive quarters of positive earnings since September 2019, accumulated profits still fall short of accumulated losses by over $4 billion.\nData by YCharts\nThe other \"half\" (actually over 100%) of Tesla's book value comes from the money paid in by investors. TSLA has continuously raised capital over the past several years by issuing new shares, and the higher the valuation multiple at which TSLA can issue new shares, the more it can accumulate in Additional Paid In Capital. These share issuances also raise the number of shares outstanding, which has the dual effect of raising Tesla's overall market value (since the price per share is now multiplied by more shares), and diluting each share's per-share book value. This increase in book value per share and decline in Price/Book in every recent new share issuance effectively reflects a \"profit\" earlier shareholders enjoy for having later investors pay a higher valuation to get into the company.\nData by YCharts\nPutting these above two charts together, we see that so far Tesla has \"made\" over $27 billion selling shares of its stock to investors, vs. losing over $4 billion in trying to sell cars and batteries to customers, and of course the latter eventually needs to overtake the former for investors to start making their money back.\nHow Tesla's Earnings Projections Add Up\nIf we assume that Tesla stops issuing new shares (a big assumption, but necessary to keep the math simple), then we can add up projected earnings per share to the book value per share to accumulate a projection of future book value per share. Projections of Tesla's future earnings deserve their own article or research report, so for the purposes of this update, I'll use the low vs high analyst forecasts on Tesla'sSeeking Alphaearnings page:\nSource:SeekingAlpha Earnings Page For TSLA\nNote that between 2025 and 2025, the low and median EPS estimates jump as the number of analysts covering the stock that far out falls from 11 to two, implying that the two analysts projecting TSLA's earnings out to 2030 are on the more optimistic end of the street. If we add up the low and high EPS estimates to today's starting book value per share of $23.90, we get a forecast of TSLA's book value of between $160 and $235 per share for the end of 2030. From today's price of around $623.90 per share, that means if TSLA's book value grows to around $200 (the middle of that optimistic range), then a contraction in TSLA's P/B from today's level of 26 to a still \"high for hardware\" multiple of 3 would mean shareholders would earn a 0% return between now and 2030. In other words, someone buying TSLA today would have to believe that either:\n\nTesla will grow its earnings and book value even faster than the most optimistic analyst estimates, or\nThat investors will continue paying P/B multiples well above 3 for the stock.\n\nOn forecasting what TSLA's P/B might be by 2030, there are three ways I can see expecting a multiple of 3 or higher:\n\nAnother valuation bubble: The P/B of Toyota Motor Corp. (TM), charted below, reached highs around 3 in Japan's late 1980s bubble, and again in the late 1990s \"echo bubble,\" and that was its high. If TSLA becomes like TM by 2030, this sort of broader stock valuation bubble may be needed to provide an attractive return on the exit price.\nBusiness transformation: The biggest TSLA bulls I speak to are those who believe TSLA may either remain a premium hardware maker with services on top like Apple Inc. (AAPL), or as a more asset-light, high return software platform like Microsoft (MSFT), whose P/B ratios are charted below Toyota's.\nFinancial engineering: One other driver of Apple's P/B expansion is buybacks, as I explained in this example with McDonald's. Buybacks at high P/B multiples reduce book value per share and raise the P/B multiple, all else equal, in ways exactly opposite to how Tesla has been only issuing (not buying back) shares so far.\n\nData by YCharts\nData by YCharts\nAnother way of comparing Tesla's $36 billion in annual sales vs. Toyota's $257 billion is on a revenue per capital basis. In other words, Tesla currently grosses around $5/year per person on the planet, vs. Toyota's roughly $37/year per human on earth. The growth question for 2030 is whether Tesla can still reach Toyota's number, especially given that:\n\nDemand for transportation, in terms of global population times the percentage of the global population that can afford a car, is likely to grow at a slower pace than historically, especially after 2030, and\nSelf-driving cars that aren't owned by one person, and so don't need to be parked idle most of the time, might actually decrease demand for new cars.\n\nWithout continued high growth past 2030, even 3x book might be on the high end for a car or battery company.\nData byYCharts\nTrading a TSLA P/B Contraction\nMy favorite actionable strategies on a stock like TSLA, which I don't expect to fundamentally collapse, but do expect to experience a significant multiple contraction, generally involve some form of option put spread. The option strategy described below works both for bears wanting to profit from an outright 20%-30% decline, or long-term bulls wanting to protect their shares' value against such a decline.\nOne challenge with simply buying put spreads on TSLA is that its option prices imply a significant \"positive skew,\" which makes put spreads relatively expensive to call spreads. In other words, the market is implying an expectation that TSLA shares are more likely than not to fall a little, offset by a smaller chance of a much larger upside move. Most of the near-the-money put spreads on TSLA cost more than 50% of the maximum payoff, even with longer-dated options or lower strike prices.\nFor the time horizon, I'm choosing the June 17, 2022, expiry date, which as of this writing is a little more than one year out. The main reasons I find first the expiry after one year to be a \"sweet spot\" for this type of strategy include:\n\nAs opposed to outright short selling, buying a put spread to profit from a decline in a share price may qualify for long-term capital gains tax treatment, as we would be holding a long position in a put spread longer than one year.\nAs opposed to even longer-dated options (say the two-year options expiring June 2023), rolling one-year options forces us to reevaluate our valuation and strike prices and decide if and in what form to roll the strategy after four more quarterly book value updates.\n\nIn this strategy, we buy 1x 650 strike put around 150 and then sell 2x 500 puts around 75 each, for roughly zero net up-front premium. Payoff scenarios based on TSLA's closing price at expiry include:\nSource: My Own Excel Calculation and Chart\nThe maximum payout ($150/share) divided by the maximum loss ($350/share) presents a \"maximum rate of return\" on this strategy is +42.8%, though getting that exact maximum payout is nearly impossible (as it requires TSLA to close at exactly $500/share on the expiry date). More likely, this option strategy would deliver a rate of return of more than 14.2% on the maximum loss if TSLA closes between 400-600 at expiry. If we follow the earlier earnings estimates and project TSLA's book value per share to be around $30/share by then, that means we expect a contract in P/B to between 13-20 by next summer.\nConclusion\nFor high-growth, non-dividend paying stocks like Tesla, return expectations break down into expectations of book value growth times expectation of P/B multiple expansion or contraction. Now that it's \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability and reached a respectable level of sales, I believe Tesla is less likely to be the next DeLorean Motor Company, and at best like Microsoft in 2000. To summarize an example I often reference inLong Run Income, from 2000 to 2010, Microsoft's business continued to grow, but investors who bought at the beginning of 2000 were still down over 36% 10 years later because Microsoft's P/B multiple declined by that much more than the business grew. Here is one chart showing that \"lost decade\" for MSFT shareholders.\nData by YCharts\nFor investors who want to hedge a decline in TSLA shares from here to $500, or those who believe TSLA may be a good company that is just wildly overvalued at these levels and may be worth buying below $500, the 1x2 put spread strategy described above may be worth considering.","news_type":1},"isVote":1,"likeStatus":false,"favoriteStatus":false,"reportStatus":false,"tweetType":1,"langContent":"EN"},{"id":116080104,"gmtCreate":1622765876208,"gmtModify":1704190662849,"author":{"id":"3570187411453325","authorId":"3570187411453325","authorIdStr":"3570187411453325","name":"AlanGoh","avatar":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/de7c3c15ca8d800dc8cfed7fb85ee1b3","vip":1,"hat":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/b073a07f77dbe6b3bec6b12311fde6bd","crmLevel":5,"crmLevelSwitch":1,"idStr":"3570187411453325"},"htmlText":"Given the recent news about the drop in market share and the potential of&nbsp;over-provisioning of production&nbsp;capacity in China, do u guys think they are just short term headwinds ?","listText":"Given the recent news about the drop in market share and the potential of&nbsp;over-provisioning of production&nbsp;capacity in China, do u guys think they are just short term headwinds ?","text":"Given the recent news about the drop in market share and the potential of over-provisioning of production capacity in China, do u guys think they are just short term headwinds ?","images":[],"top":1,"highlighted":1,"essential":1,"paper":1,"likeSize":0,"commentSize":0,"repostSize":0,"link":"https://ttm.financial/post/116080104","repostId":1152573638,"repostType":2,"repost":{"id":"1152573638","pubTimestamp":1622732138,"share":"https://ttm.financial/m/news/1152573638?lang=&edition=fundamental","pubTime":"2021-06-03 22:55","market":"us","language":"en","title":"Tesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors","url":"https://stock-news.laohu8.com/highlight/detail?id=1152573638","media":"seekingalpha","summary":"Summary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very hi","content":"Summary\n<ul>\n <li>As long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.</li>\n <li>Shareholders assuming Tesla's Price/Book multiple deflates from around 25 to 5 over the next 10 years need book value per share to grow 5x just to break even.</li>\n <li>So far, Tesla's growth in book value is mostly from \"Additional Paid-In Capital\" (issuing new shares at high prices), rather than retained earnings.</li>\n <li>Long-term earnings estimates imply book value per share sums up to 150-250 by the end of 2030, meaning a breakeven Price/Book of 2.5-4x, which is well above most mature autos.</li>\n <li>I present a 1x2 put spread as an attractive trade both for long investors concerned about overvaluation, as well as those seeking to bet on a Price/Book multiple contraction.</li>\n</ul>\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/c329e23b2762c47b11d11d95ec584959\" tg-width=\"768\" tg-height=\"512\">Photo by Jag_cz/iStock Editorial via Getty Images\nBook value per share is likely not the first metric that comes to mind when you think of a \"growth company of the future\" like Tesla (TSLA), but in this article, I will explain why book value per share is the most important bottom line number long-term investors in this company should watch. As long as zero dividends are expected, a TSLA shareholder's total return will, by definition, be defined by the growth of Tesla's book value per share crossed against the change in the Price/Book (P/B) multiple of those shares. After looking at some numbers underlying TSLA's book value per share, and how much it will have to grow for current TSLA shareholders to make money, I conclude with three actionable option strategies based on expectations for how these numbers may change in the medium term. This article also can be seen as a follow up to the&nbsp;2041 breakeven projection of Tesla I published last year.\nTesla Share Price Rise Follows Book Value\nThe first chart here shows how the rise in Tesla's share price has moved remarkably in line with TSLA's growth in book value per share. TSLA has so far never paid a dividend.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/c1f994d62f1ec67c3b95ae15c3791fa8\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"458\">Data by YCharts\nMultiple Expansion and Contraction\nThe above chart, which is on a log scale, is far smoother than that of the (P/B) ratio between these two numbers. The multiple seemed to have stabilized between 2017 and late 2019, but its rise from below 7 in mid-2019 to over 40 in late 2020 and back to around 26 today explains much of TSLA's recent surge and volatility. Another way of thinking about it: TSLA's book value per share is up roughly 4-fold in the past two years, and its P/B is up about 4-fold over the past two years, which together explain why TSLA's shares are up about 16-fold over the past two years. The big question for investors at these levels is: What future combination of book value growth and P/B expansion or contraction can be expected to produce a satisfactory rate of return?\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/b8eb71b806f59aaabd5d09a6eb4b1606\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\nUnderstanding Tesla's Book Value Growth\nAlthough the title of my Marketplace serviceLong Run Incomeimplies a preference for dividends, we believe high-quality book value growth is the best kind of \"dividend alternative\" for companies who can reinvest cash profits internally at far higher rates of return than I can externally. I would challenge any investor to explain why else to buy a low-dividend or no-dividend stock except for the expectation of higher returns from book value growth. For that reason, I have come to focus my analysis of growth companies on how well they seem able to grow book value per share.\nI break down Tesla's book value trajectory into two main parts: Retained Earnings, and Additional Paid In Capital. Although Tesla seems to have \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability, having reported&nbsp;7 consecutive quarters of positive earnings since September 2019, accumulated profits still fall short of accumulated losses by over $4 billion.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/08701c599a8c6fa7a66efde3c0a12cac\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\nThe other \"half\" (actually over 100%) of Tesla's book value comes from the money paid in by investors. TSLA has continuously raised capital over the past several years by issuing new shares, and the higher the valuation multiple at which TSLA can issue new shares, the more it can accumulate in Additional Paid In Capital. These share issuances also raise the number of shares outstanding, which has the dual effect of raising Tesla's overall market value (since the price per share is now multiplied by more shares), and diluting each share's per-share book value. This increase in book value per share and decline in Price/Book in every recent new share issuance effectively reflects a \"profit\" earlier shareholders enjoy for having later investors pay a higher valuation to get into the company.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/971bf86f3d08fe938af2845121be8d4c\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"441\">Data by YCharts\nPutting these above two charts together, we see that so far Tesla has \"made\" over $27 billion selling shares of its stock to investors, vs. losing over $4 billion in trying to sell cars and batteries to customers, and of course the latter eventually needs to overtake the former for investors to start making their money back.\nHow Tesla's Earnings Projections Add Up\nIf we assume that Tesla stops issuing new shares (a big assumption, but necessary to keep the math simple), then we can add up projected earnings per share to the book value per share to accumulate a projection of future book value per share. Projections of Tesla's future earnings deserve their own article or research report, so for the purposes of this update, I'll use the low vs high analyst forecasts on Tesla'sSeeking Alphaearnings page:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/f36166f6653fb8e11941e3c58b313ccb\" tg-width=\"640\" tg-height=\"312\">Source:SeekingAlpha Earnings Page For TSLA\nNote that between 2025 and 2025, the low and median EPS estimates jump as the number of analysts covering the stock that far out falls from 11 to two, implying that the two analysts projecting TSLA's earnings out to 2030 are on the more optimistic end of the street. If we add up the low and high EPS estimates to today's starting book value per share of $23.90, we get a forecast of TSLA's book value of between $160 and $235 per share for the end of 2030. From today's price of around $623.90 per share, that means if TSLA's book value grows to around $200 (the middle of that optimistic range), then a contraction in TSLA's P/B from today's level of 26 to a still \"high for hardware\" multiple of 3 would mean shareholders would earn a 0% return between now and 2030. In other words, someone buying TSLA today would have to believe that either:\n<ol>\n <li>Tesla will grow its earnings and book value even faster than the most optimistic analyst estimates, or</li>\n <li>That investors will continue paying P/B multiples well above 3 for the stock.</li>\n</ol>\nOn forecasting what TSLA's P/B might be by 2030, there are three ways I can see expecting a multiple of 3 or higher:\n<ol>\n <li>Another valuation bubble: The P/B of Toyota Motor Corp. (TM), charted below, reached highs around 3 in Japan's late 1980s bubble, and again in the late 1990s \"echo bubble,\" and that was its high. If TSLA becomes like TM by 2030, this sort of broader stock valuation bubble may be needed to provide an attractive return on the exit price.</li>\n <li>Business transformation: The biggest TSLA bulls I speak to are those who believe TSLA may either remain a premium hardware maker with services on top like Apple Inc. (AAPL), or as a more asset-light, high return software platform like Microsoft (MSFT), whose P/B ratios are charted below Toyota's.</li>\n <li>Financial engineering: One other driver of Apple's&nbsp;P/B expansion is buybacks, as I explained in this example with McDonald's. Buybacks at high P/B multiples reduce book value per share and raise the P/B multiple, all else equal, in ways exactly opposite to how Tesla has been only issuing (not buying back) shares so far.</li>\n</ol>\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/59e353b1112fb465bf275bfd2e2f5c38\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/7432d2c24afe124c70d139e0320f2d0c\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"441\">Data by YCharts\nAnother way of comparing Tesla's $36 billion in annual sales vs. Toyota's $257 billion is on a revenue per capital basis. In other words, Tesla currently grosses around $5/year per person on the planet, vs. Toyota's roughly $37/year per human on earth. The growth question for 2030 is whether Tesla can still reach Toyota's number, especially given that:\n<ol>\n <li>Demand for transportation, in terms of global population times the percentage of the global population that can afford a car, is likely to grow at a slower pace than historically, especially after 2030, and</li>\n <li>Self-driving cars that aren't owned by one person, and so don't need to be parked idle most of the time, might actually decrease demand for new cars.</li>\n</ol>\nWithout continued high growth past 2030, even 3x book might be on the high end for a car or battery company.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/ed6900c059b599cc5885a2184ad6db05\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"537\">Data byYCharts\nTrading a TSLA P/B Contraction\nMy favorite actionable strategies on a stock like TSLA, which I don't expect to fundamentally collapse, but do expect to experience a significant multiple contraction, generally involve some form of option put spread. The option strategy described below works both for bears wanting to profit from an outright 20%-30% decline, or long-term bulls wanting to protect their shares' value against such a decline.\nOne challenge with simply buying put spreads on TSLA is that its option prices imply a significant \"positive skew,\" which makes put spreads relatively expensive to call spreads. In other words, the market is implying an expectation that TSLA shares are more likely than not to fall a little, offset by a smaller chance of a much larger upside move. Most of the near-the-money put spreads on TSLA cost more than 50% of the maximum payoff, even with longer-dated options or lower strike prices.\nFor the time horizon, I'm choosing the June 17, 2022, expiry date, which as of this writing is a little more than one year out. The main reasons I find first the expiry after one year to be a \"sweet spot\" for this type of strategy include:\n<ol>\n <li>As opposed to outright short selling, buying a put spread to profit from a decline in a share price may qualify for long-term capital gains tax treatment, as we would be holding a long position in a put spread longer than one year.</li>\n <li>As opposed to even longer-dated options (say the two-year options expiring June 2023), rolling one-year options forces us to reevaluate our valuation and strike prices and decide if and in what form to roll the strategy after four more quarterly book value updates.</li>\n</ol>\nIn this strategy, we buy 1x 650 strike put around 150 and then sell 2x 500 puts around 75 each, for roughly zero net up-front premium. Payoff scenarios based on TSLA's closing price at expiry include:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/d8d415689c4d898bc75eba42b9f79152\" tg-width=\"640\" tg-height=\"452\">Source: My Own Excel Calculation and Chart\nThe maximum payout ($150/share) divided by the maximum loss ($350/share) presents a \"maximum rate of return\" on this strategy is +42.8%, though getting that exact maximum payout is nearly impossible (as it requires TSLA to close at exactly $500/share on the expiry date). More likely, this option strategy would deliver a rate of return of more than 14.2% on the maximum loss if TSLA closes between 400-600 at expiry. If we follow the earlier earnings estimates and project TSLA's book value per share to be around $30/share by then, that means we expect a contract in P/B to between 13-20 by next summer.\nConclusion\nFor high-growth, non-dividend paying stocks like Tesla, return expectations break down into expectations of book value growth times expectation of P/B multiple expansion or contraction. Now that it's \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability and reached a respectable level of sales, I believe Tesla is less likely to be the next&nbsp;DeLorean Motor Company, and at best like Microsoft in 2000. To summarize an example I often reference inLong Run Income, from 2000 to 2010, Microsoft's business continued to grow, but investors who bought at the beginning of 2000 were still down over 36% 10 years later because Microsoft's P/B multiple declined by that much more than the business grew. Here is one chart showing that \"lost decade\" for MSFT shareholders.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/faaf554d7a7744d36d27ea7f92e9a9e2\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"475\">Data by YCharts\nFor investors who want to hedge a decline in TSLA shares from here to $500, or those who believe TSLA may be a good company that is just wildly overvalued at these levels and may be worth buying below $500, the 1x2 put spread strategy described above may be worth considering.","collect":0,"html":"<!DOCTYPE html>\n<html>\n<head>\n<meta http-equiv=\"Content-Type\" content=\"text/html; charset=utf-8\" />\n<meta name=\"viewport\" content=\"width=device-width,initial-scale=1.0,minimum-scale=1.0,maximum-scale=1.0,user-scalable=no\"/>\n<meta name=\"format-detection\" content=\"telephone=no,email=no,address=no\" />\n<title>Tesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors</title>\n<style type=\"text/css\">\na,abbr,acronym,address,applet,article,aside,audio,b,big,blockquote,body,canvas,caption,center,cite,code,dd,del,details,dfn,div,dl,dt,\nem,embed,fieldset,figcaption,figure,footer,form,h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6,header,hgroup,html,i,iframe,img,ins,kbd,label,legend,li,mark,menu,nav,\nobject,ol,output,p,pre,q,ruby,s,samp,section,small,span,strike,strong,sub,summary,sup,table,tbody,td,tfoot,th,thead,time,tr,tt,u,ul,var,video{ font:inherit;margin:0;padding:0;vertical-align:baseline;border:0 }\nbody{ font-size:16px; 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}\n.meta {color:#5e5c6d;font-size:13px;margin:0 0 .5em; }\na{text-decoration:none; color:#2a4b87;}\n.meta .head { display: inline-block; overflow: hidden}\n.head .h-thumb { width: 30px; height: 30px; margin: 0; padding: 0; border-radius: 50%; float: left;}\n.head .h-content { margin: 0; padding: 0 0 0 9px; float: left;}\n.head .h-name {font-size: 13px; color: #eee; margin: 0;}\n.head .h-time {font-size: 11px; color: #7E829C; margin: 0;line-height: 11px;}\n.small {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.9); -webkit-transform: scale(0.9); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.smaller {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.8); -webkit-transform: scale(0.8); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.bt-text {font-size: 12px;margin: 1.5em 0 0 0}\n.bt-text p {margin: 0}\n</style>\n</head>\n<body>\n<div class=\"wrapper\">\n<header>\n<h2 class=\"title\">\nTesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors\n</h2>\n\n<h4 class=\"meta\">\n\n\n2021-06-03 22:55 GMT+8&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<a href=https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors>seekingalpha</a>\n\n\n</h4>\n\n</header>\n<article>\n<div>\nSummary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.\nShareholders assuming Tesla's ...\n\n<a href=\"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors\">Web Link</a>\n\n</div>\n\n\n</article>\n</div>\n</body>\n</html>\n","type":0,"thumbnail":"","relate_stocks":{"TSLA":"特斯拉"},"source_url":"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors","is_english":true,"share_image_url":"https://static.laohu8.com/e9f99090a1c2ed51c021029395664489","article_id":"1152573638","content_text":"Summary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.\nShareholders assuming Tesla's Price/Book multiple deflates from around 25 to 5 over the next 10 years need book value per share to grow 5x just to break even.\nSo far, Tesla's growth in book value is mostly from \"Additional Paid-In Capital\" (issuing new shares at high prices), rather than retained earnings.\nLong-term earnings estimates imply book value per share sums up to 150-250 by the end of 2030, meaning a breakeven Price/Book of 2.5-4x, which is well above most mature autos.\nI present a 1x2 put spread as an attractive trade both for long investors concerned about overvaluation, as well as those seeking to bet on a Price/Book multiple contraction.\n\nPhoto by Jag_cz/iStock Editorial via Getty Images\nBook value per share is likely not the first metric that comes to mind when you think of a \"growth company of the future\" like Tesla (TSLA), but in this article, I will explain why book value per share is the most important bottom line number long-term investors in this company should watch. As long as zero dividends are expected, a TSLA shareholder's total return will, by definition, be defined by the growth of Tesla's book value per share crossed against the change in the Price/Book (P/B) multiple of those shares. After looking at some numbers underlying TSLA's book value per share, and how much it will have to grow for current TSLA shareholders to make money, I conclude with three actionable option strategies based on expectations for how these numbers may change in the medium term. This article also can be seen as a follow up to the 2041 breakeven projection of Tesla I published last year.\nTesla Share Price Rise Follows Book Value\nThe first chart here shows how the rise in Tesla's share price has moved remarkably in line with TSLA's growth in book value per share. TSLA has so far never paid a dividend.\nData by YCharts\nMultiple Expansion and Contraction\nThe above chart, which is on a log scale, is far smoother than that of the (P/B) ratio between these two numbers. The multiple seemed to have stabilized between 2017 and late 2019, but its rise from below 7 in mid-2019 to over 40 in late 2020 and back to around 26 today explains much of TSLA's recent surge and volatility. Another way of thinking about it: TSLA's book value per share is up roughly 4-fold in the past two years, and its P/B is up about 4-fold over the past two years, which together explain why TSLA's shares are up about 16-fold over the past two years. The big question for investors at these levels is: What future combination of book value growth and P/B expansion or contraction can be expected to produce a satisfactory rate of return?\nData by YCharts\nUnderstanding Tesla's Book Value Growth\nAlthough the title of my Marketplace serviceLong Run Incomeimplies a preference for dividends, we believe high-quality book value growth is the best kind of \"dividend alternative\" for companies who can reinvest cash profits internally at far higher rates of return than I can externally. I would challenge any investor to explain why else to buy a low-dividend or no-dividend stock except for the expectation of higher returns from book value growth. For that reason, I have come to focus my analysis of growth companies on how well they seem able to grow book value per share.\nI break down Tesla's book value trajectory into two main parts: Retained Earnings, and Additional Paid In Capital. Although Tesla seems to have \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability, having reported 7 consecutive quarters of positive earnings since September 2019, accumulated profits still fall short of accumulated losses by over $4 billion.\nData by YCharts\nThe other \"half\" (actually over 100%) of Tesla's book value comes from the money paid in by investors. TSLA has continuously raised capital over the past several years by issuing new shares, and the higher the valuation multiple at which TSLA can issue new shares, the more it can accumulate in Additional Paid In Capital. These share issuances also raise the number of shares outstanding, which has the dual effect of raising Tesla's overall market value (since the price per share is now multiplied by more shares), and diluting each share's per-share book value. This increase in book value per share and decline in Price/Book in every recent new share issuance effectively reflects a \"profit\" earlier shareholders enjoy for having later investors pay a higher valuation to get into the company.\nData by YCharts\nPutting these above two charts together, we see that so far Tesla has \"made\" over $27 billion selling shares of its stock to investors, vs. losing over $4 billion in trying to sell cars and batteries to customers, and of course the latter eventually needs to overtake the former for investors to start making their money back.\nHow Tesla's Earnings Projections Add Up\nIf we assume that Tesla stops issuing new shares (a big assumption, but necessary to keep the math simple), then we can add up projected earnings per share to the book value per share to accumulate a projection of future book value per share. Projections of Tesla's future earnings deserve their own article or research report, so for the purposes of this update, I'll use the low vs high analyst forecasts on Tesla'sSeeking Alphaearnings page:\nSource:SeekingAlpha Earnings Page For TSLA\nNote that between 2025 and 2025, the low and median EPS estimates jump as the number of analysts covering the stock that far out falls from 11 to two, implying that the two analysts projecting TSLA's earnings out to 2030 are on the more optimistic end of the street. If we add up the low and high EPS estimates to today's starting book value per share of $23.90, we get a forecast of TSLA's book value of between $160 and $235 per share for the end of 2030. From today's price of around $623.90 per share, that means if TSLA's book value grows to around $200 (the middle of that optimistic range), then a contraction in TSLA's P/B from today's level of 26 to a still \"high for hardware\" multiple of 3 would mean shareholders would earn a 0% return between now and 2030. In other words, someone buying TSLA today would have to believe that either:\n\nTesla will grow its earnings and book value even faster than the most optimistic analyst estimates, or\nThat investors will continue paying P/B multiples well above 3 for the stock.\n\nOn forecasting what TSLA's P/B might be by 2030, there are three ways I can see expecting a multiple of 3 or higher:\n\nAnother valuation bubble: The P/B of Toyota Motor Corp. (TM), charted below, reached highs around 3 in Japan's late 1980s bubble, and again in the late 1990s \"echo bubble,\" and that was its high. If TSLA becomes like TM by 2030, this sort of broader stock valuation bubble may be needed to provide an attractive return on the exit price.\nBusiness transformation: The biggest TSLA bulls I speak to are those who believe TSLA may either remain a premium hardware maker with services on top like Apple Inc. (AAPL), or as a more asset-light, high return software platform like Microsoft (MSFT), whose P/B ratios are charted below Toyota's.\nFinancial engineering: One other driver of Apple's P/B expansion is buybacks, as I explained in this example with McDonald's. Buybacks at high P/B multiples reduce book value per share and raise the P/B multiple, all else equal, in ways exactly opposite to how Tesla has been only issuing (not buying back) shares so far.\n\nData by YCharts\nData by YCharts\nAnother way of comparing Tesla's $36 billion in annual sales vs. Toyota's $257 billion is on a revenue per capital basis. In other words, Tesla currently grosses around $5/year per person on the planet, vs. Toyota's roughly $37/year per human on earth. The growth question for 2030 is whether Tesla can still reach Toyota's number, especially given that:\n\nDemand for transportation, in terms of global population times the percentage of the global population that can afford a car, is likely to grow at a slower pace than historically, especially after 2030, and\nSelf-driving cars that aren't owned by one person, and so don't need to be parked idle most of the time, might actually decrease demand for new cars.\n\nWithout continued high growth past 2030, even 3x book might be on the high end for a car or battery company.\nData byYCharts\nTrading a TSLA P/B Contraction\nMy favorite actionable strategies on a stock like TSLA, which I don't expect to fundamentally collapse, but do expect to experience a significant multiple contraction, generally involve some form of option put spread. The option strategy described below works both for bears wanting to profit from an outright 20%-30% decline, or long-term bulls wanting to protect their shares' value against such a decline.\nOne challenge with simply buying put spreads on TSLA is that its option prices imply a significant \"positive skew,\" which makes put spreads relatively expensive to call spreads. In other words, the market is implying an expectation that TSLA shares are more likely than not to fall a little, offset by a smaller chance of a much larger upside move. Most of the near-the-money put spreads on TSLA cost more than 50% of the maximum payoff, even with longer-dated options or lower strike prices.\nFor the time horizon, I'm choosing the June 17, 2022, expiry date, which as of this writing is a little more than one year out. The main reasons I find first the expiry after one year to be a \"sweet spot\" for this type of strategy include:\n\nAs opposed to outright short selling, buying a put spread to profit from a decline in a share price may qualify for long-term capital gains tax treatment, as we would be holding a long position in a put spread longer than one year.\nAs opposed to even longer-dated options (say the two-year options expiring June 2023), rolling one-year options forces us to reevaluate our valuation and strike prices and decide if and in what form to roll the strategy after four more quarterly book value updates.\n\nIn this strategy, we buy 1x 650 strike put around 150 and then sell 2x 500 puts around 75 each, for roughly zero net up-front premium. Payoff scenarios based on TSLA's closing price at expiry include:\nSource: My Own Excel Calculation and Chart\nThe maximum payout ($150/share) divided by the maximum loss ($350/share) presents a \"maximum rate of return\" on this strategy is +42.8%, though getting that exact maximum payout is nearly impossible (as it requires TSLA to close at exactly $500/share on the expiry date). More likely, this option strategy would deliver a rate of return of more than 14.2% on the maximum loss if TSLA closes between 400-600 at expiry. If we follow the earlier earnings estimates and project TSLA's book value per share to be around $30/share by then, that means we expect a contract in P/B to between 13-20 by next summer.\nConclusion\nFor high-growth, non-dividend paying stocks like Tesla, return expectations break down into expectations of book value growth times expectation of P/B multiple expansion or contraction. Now that it's \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability and reached a respectable level of sales, I believe Tesla is less likely to be the next DeLorean Motor Company, and at best like Microsoft in 2000. To summarize an example I often reference inLong Run Income, from 2000 to 2010, Microsoft's business continued to grow, but investors who bought at the beginning of 2000 were still down over 36% 10 years later because Microsoft's P/B multiple declined by that much more than the business grew. Here is one chart showing that \"lost decade\" for MSFT shareholders.\nData by YCharts\nFor investors who want to hedge a decline in TSLA shares from here to $500, or those who believe TSLA may be a good company that is just wildly overvalued at these levels and may be worth buying below $500, the 1x2 put spread strategy described above may be worth considering.","news_type":1},"isVote":1,"likeStatus":false,"favoriteStatus":false,"reportStatus":false,"tweetType":1,"langContent":"EN"},{"id":116037659,"gmtCreate":1622765344271,"gmtModify":1704190647719,"author":{"id":"3575883708634905","authorId":"3575883708634905","authorIdStr":"3575883708634905","name":"mQ","avatar":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/f15c6544cce801bf2702a439bc97d760","vip":1,"crmLevel":5,"crmLevelSwitch":0,"idStr":"3575883708634905"},"htmlText":"Sounds complicated.","listText":"Sounds complicated.","text":"Sounds complicated.","images":[],"top":1,"highlighted":1,"essential":1,"paper":1,"likeSize":0,"commentSize":0,"repostSize":0,"link":"https://ttm.financial/post/116037659","repostId":1152573638,"repostType":4,"repost":{"id":"1152573638","pubTimestamp":1622732138,"share":"https://ttm.financial/m/news/1152573638?lang=&edition=fundamental","pubTime":"2021-06-03 22:55","market":"us","language":"en","title":"Tesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors","url":"https://stock-news.laohu8.com/highlight/detail?id=1152573638","media":"seekingalpha","summary":"Summary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very hi","content":"Summary\n<ul>\n <li>As long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.</li>\n <li>Shareholders assuming Tesla's Price/Book multiple deflates from around 25 to 5 over the next 10 years need book value per share to grow 5x just to break even.</li>\n <li>So far, Tesla's growth in book value is mostly from \"Additional Paid-In Capital\" (issuing new shares at high prices), rather than retained earnings.</li>\n <li>Long-term earnings estimates imply book value per share sums up to 150-250 by the end of 2030, meaning a breakeven Price/Book of 2.5-4x, which is well above most mature autos.</li>\n <li>I present a 1x2 put spread as an attractive trade both for long investors concerned about overvaluation, as well as those seeking to bet on a Price/Book multiple contraction.</li>\n</ul>\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/c329e23b2762c47b11d11d95ec584959\" tg-width=\"768\" tg-height=\"512\">Photo by Jag_cz/iStock Editorial via Getty Images\nBook value per share is likely not the first metric that comes to mind when you think of a \"growth company of the future\" like Tesla (TSLA), but in this article, I will explain why book value per share is the most important bottom line number long-term investors in this company should watch. As long as zero dividends are expected, a TSLA shareholder's total return will, by definition, be defined by the growth of Tesla's book value per share crossed against the change in the Price/Book (P/B) multiple of those shares. After looking at some numbers underlying TSLA's book value per share, and how much it will have to grow for current TSLA shareholders to make money, I conclude with three actionable option strategies based on expectations for how these numbers may change in the medium term. This article also can be seen as a follow up to the&nbsp;2041 breakeven projection of Tesla I published last year.\nTesla Share Price Rise Follows Book Value\nThe first chart here shows how the rise in Tesla's share price has moved remarkably in line with TSLA's growth in book value per share. TSLA has so far never paid a dividend.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/c1f994d62f1ec67c3b95ae15c3791fa8\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"458\">Data by YCharts\nMultiple Expansion and Contraction\nThe above chart, which is on a log scale, is far smoother than that of the (P/B) ratio between these two numbers. The multiple seemed to have stabilized between 2017 and late 2019, but its rise from below 7 in mid-2019 to over 40 in late 2020 and back to around 26 today explains much of TSLA's recent surge and volatility. Another way of thinking about it: TSLA's book value per share is up roughly 4-fold in the past two years, and its P/B is up about 4-fold over the past two years, which together explain why TSLA's shares are up about 16-fold over the past two years. The big question for investors at these levels is: What future combination of book value growth and P/B expansion or contraction can be expected to produce a satisfactory rate of return?\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/b8eb71b806f59aaabd5d09a6eb4b1606\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\nUnderstanding Tesla's Book Value Growth\nAlthough the title of my Marketplace serviceLong Run Incomeimplies a preference for dividends, we believe high-quality book value growth is the best kind of \"dividend alternative\" for companies who can reinvest cash profits internally at far higher rates of return than I can externally. I would challenge any investor to explain why else to buy a low-dividend or no-dividend stock except for the expectation of higher returns from book value growth. For that reason, I have come to focus my analysis of growth companies on how well they seem able to grow book value per share.\nI break down Tesla's book value trajectory into two main parts: Retained Earnings, and Additional Paid In Capital. Although Tesla seems to have \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability, having reported&nbsp;7 consecutive quarters of positive earnings since September 2019, accumulated profits still fall short of accumulated losses by over $4 billion.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/08701c599a8c6fa7a66efde3c0a12cac\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\nThe other \"half\" (actually over 100%) of Tesla's book value comes from the money paid in by investors. TSLA has continuously raised capital over the past several years by issuing new shares, and the higher the valuation multiple at which TSLA can issue new shares, the more it can accumulate in Additional Paid In Capital. These share issuances also raise the number of shares outstanding, which has the dual effect of raising Tesla's overall market value (since the price per share is now multiplied by more shares), and diluting each share's per-share book value. This increase in book value per share and decline in Price/Book in every recent new share issuance effectively reflects a \"profit\" earlier shareholders enjoy for having later investors pay a higher valuation to get into the company.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/971bf86f3d08fe938af2845121be8d4c\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"441\">Data by YCharts\nPutting these above two charts together, we see that so far Tesla has \"made\" over $27 billion selling shares of its stock to investors, vs. losing over $4 billion in trying to sell cars and batteries to customers, and of course the latter eventually needs to overtake the former for investors to start making their money back.\nHow Tesla's Earnings Projections Add Up\nIf we assume that Tesla stops issuing new shares (a big assumption, but necessary to keep the math simple), then we can add up projected earnings per share to the book value per share to accumulate a projection of future book value per share. Projections of Tesla's future earnings deserve their own article or research report, so for the purposes of this update, I'll use the low vs high analyst forecasts on Tesla'sSeeking Alphaearnings page:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/f36166f6653fb8e11941e3c58b313ccb\" tg-width=\"640\" tg-height=\"312\">Source:SeekingAlpha Earnings Page For TSLA\nNote that between 2025 and 2025, the low and median EPS estimates jump as the number of analysts covering the stock that far out falls from 11 to two, implying that the two analysts projecting TSLA's earnings out to 2030 are on the more optimistic end of the street. If we add up the low and high EPS estimates to today's starting book value per share of $23.90, we get a forecast of TSLA's book value of between $160 and $235 per share for the end of 2030. From today's price of around $623.90 per share, that means if TSLA's book value grows to around $200 (the middle of that optimistic range), then a contraction in TSLA's P/B from today's level of 26 to a still \"high for hardware\" multiple of 3 would mean shareholders would earn a 0% return between now and 2030. In other words, someone buying TSLA today would have to believe that either:\n<ol>\n <li>Tesla will grow its earnings and book value even faster than the most optimistic analyst estimates, or</li>\n <li>That investors will continue paying P/B multiples well above 3 for the stock.</li>\n</ol>\nOn forecasting what TSLA's P/B might be by 2030, there are three ways I can see expecting a multiple of 3 or higher:\n<ol>\n <li>Another valuation bubble: The P/B of Toyota Motor Corp. (TM), charted below, reached highs around 3 in Japan's late 1980s bubble, and again in the late 1990s \"echo bubble,\" and that was its high. If TSLA becomes like TM by 2030, this sort of broader stock valuation bubble may be needed to provide an attractive return on the exit price.</li>\n <li>Business transformation: The biggest TSLA bulls I speak to are those who believe TSLA may either remain a premium hardware maker with services on top like Apple Inc. (AAPL), or as a more asset-light, high return software platform like Microsoft (MSFT), whose P/B ratios are charted below Toyota's.</li>\n <li>Financial engineering: One other driver of Apple's&nbsp;P/B expansion is buybacks, as I explained in this example with McDonald's. Buybacks at high P/B multiples reduce book value per share and raise the P/B multiple, all else equal, in ways exactly opposite to how Tesla has been only issuing (not buying back) shares so far.</li>\n</ol>\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/59e353b1112fb465bf275bfd2e2f5c38\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/7432d2c24afe124c70d139e0320f2d0c\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"441\">Data by YCharts\nAnother way of comparing Tesla's $36 billion in annual sales vs. Toyota's $257 billion is on a revenue per capital basis. In other words, Tesla currently grosses around $5/year per person on the planet, vs. Toyota's roughly $37/year per human on earth. The growth question for 2030 is whether Tesla can still reach Toyota's number, especially given that:\n<ol>\n <li>Demand for transportation, in terms of global population times the percentage of the global population that can afford a car, is likely to grow at a slower pace than historically, especially after 2030, and</li>\n <li>Self-driving cars that aren't owned by one person, and so don't need to be parked idle most of the time, might actually decrease demand for new cars.</li>\n</ol>\nWithout continued high growth past 2030, even 3x book might be on the high end for a car or battery company.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/ed6900c059b599cc5885a2184ad6db05\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"537\">Data byYCharts\nTrading a TSLA P/B Contraction\nMy favorite actionable strategies on a stock like TSLA, which I don't expect to fundamentally collapse, but do expect to experience a significant multiple contraction, generally involve some form of option put spread. The option strategy described below works both for bears wanting to profit from an outright 20%-30% decline, or long-term bulls wanting to protect their shares' value against such a decline.\nOne challenge with simply buying put spreads on TSLA is that its option prices imply a significant \"positive skew,\" which makes put spreads relatively expensive to call spreads. In other words, the market is implying an expectation that TSLA shares are more likely than not to fall a little, offset by a smaller chance of a much larger upside move. Most of the near-the-money put spreads on TSLA cost more than 50% of the maximum payoff, even with longer-dated options or lower strike prices.\nFor the time horizon, I'm choosing the June 17, 2022, expiry date, which as of this writing is a little more than one year out. The main reasons I find first the expiry after one year to be a \"sweet spot\" for this type of strategy include:\n<ol>\n <li>As opposed to outright short selling, buying a put spread to profit from a decline in a share price may qualify for long-term capital gains tax treatment, as we would be holding a long position in a put spread longer than one year.</li>\n <li>As opposed to even longer-dated options (say the two-year options expiring June 2023), rolling one-year options forces us to reevaluate our valuation and strike prices and decide if and in what form to roll the strategy after four more quarterly book value updates.</li>\n</ol>\nIn this strategy, we buy 1x 650 strike put around 150 and then sell 2x 500 puts around 75 each, for roughly zero net up-front premium. Payoff scenarios based on TSLA's closing price at expiry include:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/d8d415689c4d898bc75eba42b9f79152\" tg-width=\"640\" tg-height=\"452\">Source: My Own Excel Calculation and Chart\nThe maximum payout ($150/share) divided by the maximum loss ($350/share) presents a \"maximum rate of return\" on this strategy is +42.8%, though getting that exact maximum payout is nearly impossible (as it requires TSLA to close at exactly $500/share on the expiry date). More likely, this option strategy would deliver a rate of return of more than 14.2% on the maximum loss if TSLA closes between 400-600 at expiry. If we follow the earlier earnings estimates and project TSLA's book value per share to be around $30/share by then, that means we expect a contract in P/B to between 13-20 by next summer.\nConclusion\nFor high-growth, non-dividend paying stocks like Tesla, return expectations break down into expectations of book value growth times expectation of P/B multiple expansion or contraction. Now that it's \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability and reached a respectable level of sales, I believe Tesla is less likely to be the next&nbsp;DeLorean Motor Company, and at best like Microsoft in 2000. To summarize an example I often reference inLong Run Income, from 2000 to 2010, Microsoft's business continued to grow, but investors who bought at the beginning of 2000 were still down over 36% 10 years later because Microsoft's P/B multiple declined by that much more than the business grew. Here is one chart showing that \"lost decade\" for MSFT shareholders.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/faaf554d7a7744d36d27ea7f92e9a9e2\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"475\">Data by YCharts\nFor investors who want to hedge a decline in TSLA shares from here to $500, or those who believe TSLA may be a good company that is just wildly overvalued at these levels and may be worth buying below $500, the 1x2 put spread strategy described above may be worth considering.","collect":0,"html":"<!DOCTYPE html>\n<html>\n<head>\n<meta http-equiv=\"Content-Type\" content=\"text/html; charset=utf-8\" />\n<meta name=\"viewport\" content=\"width=device-width,initial-scale=1.0,minimum-scale=1.0,maximum-scale=1.0,user-scalable=no\"/>\n<meta name=\"format-detection\" content=\"telephone=no,email=no,address=no\" />\n<title>Tesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors</title>\n<style type=\"text/css\">\na,abbr,acronym,address,applet,article,aside,audio,b,big,blockquote,body,canvas,caption,center,cite,code,dd,del,details,dfn,div,dl,dt,\nem,embed,fieldset,figcaption,figure,footer,form,h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6,header,hgroup,html,i,iframe,img,ins,kbd,label,legend,li,mark,menu,nav,\nobject,ol,output,p,pre,q,ruby,s,samp,section,small,span,strike,strong,sub,summary,sup,table,tbody,td,tfoot,th,thead,time,tr,tt,u,ul,var,video{ font:inherit;margin:0;padding:0;vertical-align:baseline;border:0 }\nbody{ font-size:16px; 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}\n.meta {color:#5e5c6d;font-size:13px;margin:0 0 .5em; }\na{text-decoration:none; color:#2a4b87;}\n.meta .head { display: inline-block; overflow: hidden}\n.head .h-thumb { width: 30px; height: 30px; margin: 0; padding: 0; border-radius: 50%; float: left;}\n.head .h-content { margin: 0; padding: 0 0 0 9px; float: left;}\n.head .h-name {font-size: 13px; color: #eee; margin: 0;}\n.head .h-time {font-size: 11px; color: #7E829C; margin: 0;line-height: 11px;}\n.small {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.9); -webkit-transform: scale(0.9); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.smaller {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.8); -webkit-transform: scale(0.8); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.bt-text {font-size: 12px;margin: 1.5em 0 0 0}\n.bt-text p {margin: 0}\n</style>\n</head>\n<body>\n<div class=\"wrapper\">\n<header>\n<h2 class=\"title\">\nTesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors\n</h2>\n\n<h4 class=\"meta\">\n\n\n2021-06-03 22:55 GMT+8&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<a href=https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors>seekingalpha</a>\n\n\n</h4>\n\n</header>\n<article>\n<div>\nSummary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.\nShareholders assuming Tesla's ...\n\n<a href=\"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors\">Web Link</a>\n\n</div>\n\n\n</article>\n</div>\n</body>\n</html>\n","type":0,"thumbnail":"","relate_stocks":{"TSLA":"特斯拉"},"source_url":"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors","is_english":true,"share_image_url":"https://static.laohu8.com/e9f99090a1c2ed51c021029395664489","article_id":"1152573638","content_text":"Summary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.\nShareholders assuming Tesla's Price/Book multiple deflates from around 25 to 5 over the next 10 years need book value per share to grow 5x just to break even.\nSo far, Tesla's growth in book value is mostly from \"Additional Paid-In Capital\" (issuing new shares at high prices), rather than retained earnings.\nLong-term earnings estimates imply book value per share sums up to 150-250 by the end of 2030, meaning a breakeven Price/Book of 2.5-4x, which is well above most mature autos.\nI present a 1x2 put spread as an attractive trade both for long investors concerned about overvaluation, as well as those seeking to bet on a Price/Book multiple contraction.\n\nPhoto by Jag_cz/iStock Editorial via Getty Images\nBook value per share is likely not the first metric that comes to mind when you think of a \"growth company of the future\" like Tesla (TSLA), but in this article, I will explain why book value per share is the most important bottom line number long-term investors in this company should watch. As long as zero dividends are expected, a TSLA shareholder's total return will, by definition, be defined by the growth of Tesla's book value per share crossed against the change in the Price/Book (P/B) multiple of those shares. After looking at some numbers underlying TSLA's book value per share, and how much it will have to grow for current TSLA shareholders to make money, I conclude with three actionable option strategies based on expectations for how these numbers may change in the medium term. This article also can be seen as a follow up to the 2041 breakeven projection of Tesla I published last year.\nTesla Share Price Rise Follows Book Value\nThe first chart here shows how the rise in Tesla's share price has moved remarkably in line with TSLA's growth in book value per share. TSLA has so far never paid a dividend.\nData by YCharts\nMultiple Expansion and Contraction\nThe above chart, which is on a log scale, is far smoother than that of the (P/B) ratio between these two numbers. The multiple seemed to have stabilized between 2017 and late 2019, but its rise from below 7 in mid-2019 to over 40 in late 2020 and back to around 26 today explains much of TSLA's recent surge and volatility. Another way of thinking about it: TSLA's book value per share is up roughly 4-fold in the past two years, and its P/B is up about 4-fold over the past two years, which together explain why TSLA's shares are up about 16-fold over the past two years. The big question for investors at these levels is: What future combination of book value growth and P/B expansion or contraction can be expected to produce a satisfactory rate of return?\nData by YCharts\nUnderstanding Tesla's Book Value Growth\nAlthough the title of my Marketplace serviceLong Run Incomeimplies a preference for dividends, we believe high-quality book value growth is the best kind of \"dividend alternative\" for companies who can reinvest cash profits internally at far higher rates of return than I can externally. I would challenge any investor to explain why else to buy a low-dividend or no-dividend stock except for the expectation of higher returns from book value growth. For that reason, I have come to focus my analysis of growth companies on how well they seem able to grow book value per share.\nI break down Tesla's book value trajectory into two main parts: Retained Earnings, and Additional Paid In Capital. Although Tesla seems to have \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability, having reported 7 consecutive quarters of positive earnings since September 2019, accumulated profits still fall short of accumulated losses by over $4 billion.\nData by YCharts\nThe other \"half\" (actually over 100%) of Tesla's book value comes from the money paid in by investors. TSLA has continuously raised capital over the past several years by issuing new shares, and the higher the valuation multiple at which TSLA can issue new shares, the more it can accumulate in Additional Paid In Capital. These share issuances also raise the number of shares outstanding, which has the dual effect of raising Tesla's overall market value (since the price per share is now multiplied by more shares), and diluting each share's per-share book value. This increase in book value per share and decline in Price/Book in every recent new share issuance effectively reflects a \"profit\" earlier shareholders enjoy for having later investors pay a higher valuation to get into the company.\nData by YCharts\nPutting these above two charts together, we see that so far Tesla has \"made\" over $27 billion selling shares of its stock to investors, vs. losing over $4 billion in trying to sell cars and batteries to customers, and of course the latter eventually needs to overtake the former for investors to start making their money back.\nHow Tesla's Earnings Projections Add Up\nIf we assume that Tesla stops issuing new shares (a big assumption, but necessary to keep the math simple), then we can add up projected earnings per share to the book value per share to accumulate a projection of future book value per share. Projections of Tesla's future earnings deserve their own article or research report, so for the purposes of this update, I'll use the low vs high analyst forecasts on Tesla'sSeeking Alphaearnings page:\nSource:SeekingAlpha Earnings Page For TSLA\nNote that between 2025 and 2025, the low and median EPS estimates jump as the number of analysts covering the stock that far out falls from 11 to two, implying that the two analysts projecting TSLA's earnings out to 2030 are on the more optimistic end of the street. If we add up the low and high EPS estimates to today's starting book value per share of $23.90, we get a forecast of TSLA's book value of between $160 and $235 per share for the end of 2030. From today's price of around $623.90 per share, that means if TSLA's book value grows to around $200 (the middle of that optimistic range), then a contraction in TSLA's P/B from today's level of 26 to a still \"high for hardware\" multiple of 3 would mean shareholders would earn a 0% return between now and 2030. In other words, someone buying TSLA today would have to believe that either:\n\nTesla will grow its earnings and book value even faster than the most optimistic analyst estimates, or\nThat investors will continue paying P/B multiples well above 3 for the stock.\n\nOn forecasting what TSLA's P/B might be by 2030, there are three ways I can see expecting a multiple of 3 or higher:\n\nAnother valuation bubble: The P/B of Toyota Motor Corp. (TM), charted below, reached highs around 3 in Japan's late 1980s bubble, and again in the late 1990s \"echo bubble,\" and that was its high. If TSLA becomes like TM by 2030, this sort of broader stock valuation bubble may be needed to provide an attractive return on the exit price.\nBusiness transformation: The biggest TSLA bulls I speak to are those who believe TSLA may either remain a premium hardware maker with services on top like Apple Inc. (AAPL), or as a more asset-light, high return software platform like Microsoft (MSFT), whose P/B ratios are charted below Toyota's.\nFinancial engineering: One other driver of Apple's P/B expansion is buybacks, as I explained in this example with McDonald's. Buybacks at high P/B multiples reduce book value per share and raise the P/B multiple, all else equal, in ways exactly opposite to how Tesla has been only issuing (not buying back) shares so far.\n\nData by YCharts\nData by YCharts\nAnother way of comparing Tesla's $36 billion in annual sales vs. Toyota's $257 billion is on a revenue per capital basis. In other words, Tesla currently grosses around $5/year per person on the planet, vs. Toyota's roughly $37/year per human on earth. The growth question for 2030 is whether Tesla can still reach Toyota's number, especially given that:\n\nDemand for transportation, in terms of global population times the percentage of the global population that can afford a car, is likely to grow at a slower pace than historically, especially after 2030, and\nSelf-driving cars that aren't owned by one person, and so don't need to be parked idle most of the time, might actually decrease demand for new cars.\n\nWithout continued high growth past 2030, even 3x book might be on the high end for a car or battery company.\nData byYCharts\nTrading a TSLA P/B Contraction\nMy favorite actionable strategies on a stock like TSLA, which I don't expect to fundamentally collapse, but do expect to experience a significant multiple contraction, generally involve some form of option put spread. The option strategy described below works both for bears wanting to profit from an outright 20%-30% decline, or long-term bulls wanting to protect their shares' value against such a decline.\nOne challenge with simply buying put spreads on TSLA is that its option prices imply a significant \"positive skew,\" which makes put spreads relatively expensive to call spreads. In other words, the market is implying an expectation that TSLA shares are more likely than not to fall a little, offset by a smaller chance of a much larger upside move. Most of the near-the-money put spreads on TSLA cost more than 50% of the maximum payoff, even with longer-dated options or lower strike prices.\nFor the time horizon, I'm choosing the June 17, 2022, expiry date, which as of this writing is a little more than one year out. The main reasons I find first the expiry after one year to be a \"sweet spot\" for this type of strategy include:\n\nAs opposed to outright short selling, buying a put spread to profit from a decline in a share price may qualify for long-term capital gains tax treatment, as we would be holding a long position in a put spread longer than one year.\nAs opposed to even longer-dated options (say the two-year options expiring June 2023), rolling one-year options forces us to reevaluate our valuation and strike prices and decide if and in what form to roll the strategy after four more quarterly book value updates.\n\nIn this strategy, we buy 1x 650 strike put around 150 and then sell 2x 500 puts around 75 each, for roughly zero net up-front premium. Payoff scenarios based on TSLA's closing price at expiry include:\nSource: My Own Excel Calculation and Chart\nThe maximum payout ($150/share) divided by the maximum loss ($350/share) presents a \"maximum rate of return\" on this strategy is +42.8%, though getting that exact maximum payout is nearly impossible (as it requires TSLA to close at exactly $500/share on the expiry date). More likely, this option strategy would deliver a rate of return of more than 14.2% on the maximum loss if TSLA closes between 400-600 at expiry. If we follow the earlier earnings estimates and project TSLA's book value per share to be around $30/share by then, that means we expect a contract in P/B to between 13-20 by next summer.\nConclusion\nFor high-growth, non-dividend paying stocks like Tesla, return expectations break down into expectations of book value growth times expectation of P/B multiple expansion or contraction. Now that it's \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability and reached a respectable level of sales, I believe Tesla is less likely to be the next DeLorean Motor Company, and at best like Microsoft in 2000. To summarize an example I often reference inLong Run Income, from 2000 to 2010, Microsoft's business continued to grow, but investors who bought at the beginning of 2000 were still down over 36% 10 years later because Microsoft's P/B multiple declined by that much more than the business grew. Here is one chart showing that \"lost decade\" for MSFT shareholders.\nData by YCharts\nFor investors who want to hedge a decline in TSLA shares from here to $500, or those who believe TSLA may be a good company that is just wildly overvalued at these levels and may be worth buying below $500, the 1x2 put spread strategy described above may be worth considering.","news_type":1},"isVote":1,"likeStatus":false,"favoriteStatus":false,"reportStatus":false,"tweetType":1,"langContent":"EN"},{"id":118778340,"gmtCreate":1622764067180,"gmtModify":1704190601651,"author":{"id":"3582015516749888","authorId":"3582015516749888","authorIdStr":"3582015516749888","name":"HH浩","avatar":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/2639351c97027c6f71c4d9729ef216d8","vip":1,"crmLevel":3,"crmLevelSwitch":0,"idStr":"3582015516749888"},"htmlText":"Both factors also depends on price.&nbsp;","listText":"Both factors also depends on price.&nbsp;","text":"Both factors also depends on price.","images":[],"top":1,"highlighted":1,"essential":1,"paper":1,"likeSize":2,"commentSize":0,"repostSize":0,"link":"https://ttm.financial/post/118778340","repostId":1152573638,"repostType":4,"repost":{"id":"1152573638","pubTimestamp":1622732138,"share":"https://ttm.financial/m/news/1152573638?lang=&edition=fundamental","pubTime":"2021-06-03 22:55","market":"us","language":"en","title":"Tesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors","url":"https://stock-news.laohu8.com/highlight/detail?id=1152573638","media":"seekingalpha","summary":"Summary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very hi","content":"Summary\n<ul>\n <li>As long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.</li>\n <li>Shareholders assuming Tesla's Price/Book multiple deflates from around 25 to 5 over the next 10 years need book value per share to grow 5x just to break even.</li>\n <li>So far, Tesla's growth in book value is mostly from \"Additional Paid-In Capital\" (issuing new shares at high prices), rather than retained earnings.</li>\n <li>Long-term earnings estimates imply book value per share sums up to 150-250 by the end of 2030, meaning a breakeven Price/Book of 2.5-4x, which is well above most mature autos.</li>\n <li>I present a 1x2 put spread as an attractive trade both for long investors concerned about overvaluation, as well as those seeking to bet on a Price/Book multiple contraction.</li>\n</ul>\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/c329e23b2762c47b11d11d95ec584959\" tg-width=\"768\" tg-height=\"512\">Photo by Jag_cz/iStock Editorial via Getty Images\nBook value per share is likely not the first metric that comes to mind when you think of a \"growth company of the future\" like Tesla (TSLA), but in this article, I will explain why book value per share is the most important bottom line number long-term investors in this company should watch. As long as zero dividends are expected, a TSLA shareholder's total return will, by definition, be defined by the growth of Tesla's book value per share crossed against the change in the Price/Book (P/B) multiple of those shares. After looking at some numbers underlying TSLA's book value per share, and how much it will have to grow for current TSLA shareholders to make money, I conclude with three actionable option strategies based on expectations for how these numbers may change in the medium term. This article also can be seen as a follow up to the&nbsp;2041 breakeven projection of Tesla I published last year.\nTesla Share Price Rise Follows Book Value\nThe first chart here shows how the rise in Tesla's share price has moved remarkably in line with TSLA's growth in book value per share. TSLA has so far never paid a dividend.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/c1f994d62f1ec67c3b95ae15c3791fa8\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"458\">Data by YCharts\nMultiple Expansion and Contraction\nThe above chart, which is on a log scale, is far smoother than that of the (P/B) ratio between these two numbers. The multiple seemed to have stabilized between 2017 and late 2019, but its rise from below 7 in mid-2019 to over 40 in late 2020 and back to around 26 today explains much of TSLA's recent surge and volatility. Another way of thinking about it: TSLA's book value per share is up roughly 4-fold in the past two years, and its P/B is up about 4-fold over the past two years, which together explain why TSLA's shares are up about 16-fold over the past two years. The big question for investors at these levels is: What future combination of book value growth and P/B expansion or contraction can be expected to produce a satisfactory rate of return?\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/b8eb71b806f59aaabd5d09a6eb4b1606\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\nUnderstanding Tesla's Book Value Growth\nAlthough the title of my Marketplace serviceLong Run Incomeimplies a preference for dividends, we believe high-quality book value growth is the best kind of \"dividend alternative\" for companies who can reinvest cash profits internally at far higher rates of return than I can externally. I would challenge any investor to explain why else to buy a low-dividend or no-dividend stock except for the expectation of higher returns from book value growth. For that reason, I have come to focus my analysis of growth companies on how well they seem able to grow book value per share.\nI break down Tesla's book value trajectory into two main parts: Retained Earnings, and Additional Paid In Capital. Although Tesla seems to have \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability, having reported&nbsp;7 consecutive quarters of positive earnings since September 2019, accumulated profits still fall short of accumulated losses by over $4 billion.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/08701c599a8c6fa7a66efde3c0a12cac\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\nThe other \"half\" (actually over 100%) of Tesla's book value comes from the money paid in by investors. TSLA has continuously raised capital over the past several years by issuing new shares, and the higher the valuation multiple at which TSLA can issue new shares, the more it can accumulate in Additional Paid In Capital. These share issuances also raise the number of shares outstanding, which has the dual effect of raising Tesla's overall market value (since the price per share is now multiplied by more shares), and diluting each share's per-share book value. This increase in book value per share and decline in Price/Book in every recent new share issuance effectively reflects a \"profit\" earlier shareholders enjoy for having later investors pay a higher valuation to get into the company.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/971bf86f3d08fe938af2845121be8d4c\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"441\">Data by YCharts\nPutting these above two charts together, we see that so far Tesla has \"made\" over $27 billion selling shares of its stock to investors, vs. losing over $4 billion in trying to sell cars and batteries to customers, and of course the latter eventually needs to overtake the former for investors to start making their money back.\nHow Tesla's Earnings Projections Add Up\nIf we assume that Tesla stops issuing new shares (a big assumption, but necessary to keep the math simple), then we can add up projected earnings per share to the book value per share to accumulate a projection of future book value per share. Projections of Tesla's future earnings deserve their own article or research report, so for the purposes of this update, I'll use the low vs high analyst forecasts on Tesla'sSeeking Alphaearnings page:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/f36166f6653fb8e11941e3c58b313ccb\" tg-width=\"640\" tg-height=\"312\">Source:SeekingAlpha Earnings Page For TSLA\nNote that between 2025 and 2025, the low and median EPS estimates jump as the number of analysts covering the stock that far out falls from 11 to two, implying that the two analysts projecting TSLA's earnings out to 2030 are on the more optimistic end of the street. If we add up the low and high EPS estimates to today's starting book value per share of $23.90, we get a forecast of TSLA's book value of between $160 and $235 per share for the end of 2030. From today's price of around $623.90 per share, that means if TSLA's book value grows to around $200 (the middle of that optimistic range), then a contraction in TSLA's P/B from today's level of 26 to a still \"high for hardware\" multiple of 3 would mean shareholders would earn a 0% return between now and 2030. In other words, someone buying TSLA today would have to believe that either:\n<ol>\n <li>Tesla will grow its earnings and book value even faster than the most optimistic analyst estimates, or</li>\n <li>That investors will continue paying P/B multiples well above 3 for the stock.</li>\n</ol>\nOn forecasting what TSLA's P/B might be by 2030, there are three ways I can see expecting a multiple of 3 or higher:\n<ol>\n <li>Another valuation bubble: The P/B of Toyota Motor Corp. (TM), charted below, reached highs around 3 in Japan's late 1980s bubble, and again in the late 1990s \"echo bubble,\" and that was its high. If TSLA becomes like TM by 2030, this sort of broader stock valuation bubble may be needed to provide an attractive return on the exit price.</li>\n <li>Business transformation: The biggest TSLA bulls I speak to are those who believe TSLA may either remain a premium hardware maker with services on top like Apple Inc. (AAPL), or as a more asset-light, high return software platform like Microsoft (MSFT), whose P/B ratios are charted below Toyota's.</li>\n <li>Financial engineering: One other driver of Apple's&nbsp;P/B expansion is buybacks, as I explained in this example with McDonald's. Buybacks at high P/B multiples reduce book value per share and raise the P/B multiple, all else equal, in ways exactly opposite to how Tesla has been only issuing (not buying back) shares so far.</li>\n</ol>\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/59e353b1112fb465bf275bfd2e2f5c38\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/7432d2c24afe124c70d139e0320f2d0c\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"441\">Data by YCharts\nAnother way of comparing Tesla's $36 billion in annual sales vs. Toyota's $257 billion is on a revenue per capital basis. In other words, Tesla currently grosses around $5/year per person on the planet, vs. Toyota's roughly $37/year per human on earth. The growth question for 2030 is whether Tesla can still reach Toyota's number, especially given that:\n<ol>\n <li>Demand for transportation, in terms of global population times the percentage of the global population that can afford a car, is likely to grow at a slower pace than historically, especially after 2030, and</li>\n <li>Self-driving cars that aren't owned by one person, and so don't need to be parked idle most of the time, might actually decrease demand for new cars.</li>\n</ol>\nWithout continued high growth past 2030, even 3x book might be on the high end for a car or battery company.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/ed6900c059b599cc5885a2184ad6db05\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"537\">Data byYCharts\nTrading a TSLA P/B Contraction\nMy favorite actionable strategies on a stock like TSLA, which I don't expect to fundamentally collapse, but do expect to experience a significant multiple contraction, generally involve some form of option put spread. The option strategy described below works both for bears wanting to profit from an outright 20%-30% decline, or long-term bulls wanting to protect their shares' value against such a decline.\nOne challenge with simply buying put spreads on TSLA is that its option prices imply a significant \"positive skew,\" which makes put spreads relatively expensive to call spreads. In other words, the market is implying an expectation that TSLA shares are more likely than not to fall a little, offset by a smaller chance of a much larger upside move. Most of the near-the-money put spreads on TSLA cost more than 50% of the maximum payoff, even with longer-dated options or lower strike prices.\nFor the time horizon, I'm choosing the June 17, 2022, expiry date, which as of this writing is a little more than one year out. The main reasons I find first the expiry after one year to be a \"sweet spot\" for this type of strategy include:\n<ol>\n <li>As opposed to outright short selling, buying a put spread to profit from a decline in a share price may qualify for long-term capital gains tax treatment, as we would be holding a long position in a put spread longer than one year.</li>\n <li>As opposed to even longer-dated options (say the two-year options expiring June 2023), rolling one-year options forces us to reevaluate our valuation and strike prices and decide if and in what form to roll the strategy after four more quarterly book value updates.</li>\n</ol>\nIn this strategy, we buy 1x 650 strike put around 150 and then sell 2x 500 puts around 75 each, for roughly zero net up-front premium. Payoff scenarios based on TSLA's closing price at expiry include:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/d8d415689c4d898bc75eba42b9f79152\" tg-width=\"640\" tg-height=\"452\">Source: My Own Excel Calculation and Chart\nThe maximum payout ($150/share) divided by the maximum loss ($350/share) presents a \"maximum rate of return\" on this strategy is +42.8%, though getting that exact maximum payout is nearly impossible (as it requires TSLA to close at exactly $500/share on the expiry date). More likely, this option strategy would deliver a rate of return of more than 14.2% on the maximum loss if TSLA closes between 400-600 at expiry. If we follow the earlier earnings estimates and project TSLA's book value per share to be around $30/share by then, that means we expect a contract in P/B to between 13-20 by next summer.\nConclusion\nFor high-growth, non-dividend paying stocks like Tesla, return expectations break down into expectations of book value growth times expectation of P/B multiple expansion or contraction. Now that it's \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability and reached a respectable level of sales, I believe Tesla is less likely to be the next&nbsp;DeLorean Motor Company, and at best like Microsoft in 2000. To summarize an example I often reference inLong Run Income, from 2000 to 2010, Microsoft's business continued to grow, but investors who bought at the beginning of 2000 were still down over 36% 10 years later because Microsoft's P/B multiple declined by that much more than the business grew. Here is one chart showing that \"lost decade\" for MSFT shareholders.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/faaf554d7a7744d36d27ea7f92e9a9e2\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"475\">Data by YCharts\nFor investors who want to hedge a decline in TSLA shares from here to $500, or those who believe TSLA may be a good company that is just wildly overvalued at these levels and may be worth buying below $500, the 1x2 put spread strategy described above may be worth considering.","collect":0,"html":"<!DOCTYPE html>\n<html>\n<head>\n<meta http-equiv=\"Content-Type\" content=\"text/html; charset=utf-8\" />\n<meta name=\"viewport\" content=\"width=device-width,initial-scale=1.0,minimum-scale=1.0,maximum-scale=1.0,user-scalable=no\"/>\n<meta name=\"format-detection\" content=\"telephone=no,email=no,address=no\" />\n<title>Tesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors</title>\n<style type=\"text/css\">\na,abbr,acronym,address,applet,article,aside,audio,b,big,blockquote,body,canvas,caption,center,cite,code,dd,del,details,dfn,div,dl,dt,\nem,embed,fieldset,figcaption,figure,footer,form,h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6,header,hgroup,html,i,iframe,img,ins,kbd,label,legend,li,mark,menu,nav,\nobject,ol,output,p,pre,q,ruby,s,samp,section,small,span,strike,strong,sub,summary,sup,table,tbody,td,tfoot,th,thead,time,tr,tt,u,ul,var,video{ font:inherit;margin:0;padding:0;vertical-align:baseline;border:0 }\nbody{ font-size:16px; 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}\n.meta {color:#5e5c6d;font-size:13px;margin:0 0 .5em; }\na{text-decoration:none; color:#2a4b87;}\n.meta .head { display: inline-block; overflow: hidden}\n.head .h-thumb { width: 30px; height: 30px; margin: 0; padding: 0; border-radius: 50%; float: left;}\n.head .h-content { margin: 0; padding: 0 0 0 9px; float: left;}\n.head .h-name {font-size: 13px; color: #eee; margin: 0;}\n.head .h-time {font-size: 11px; color: #7E829C; margin: 0;line-height: 11px;}\n.small {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.9); -webkit-transform: scale(0.9); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.smaller {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.8); -webkit-transform: scale(0.8); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.bt-text {font-size: 12px;margin: 1.5em 0 0 0}\n.bt-text p {margin: 0}\n</style>\n</head>\n<body>\n<div class=\"wrapper\">\n<header>\n<h2 class=\"title\">\nTesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors\n</h2>\n\n<h4 class=\"meta\">\n\n\n2021-06-03 22:55 GMT+8&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<a href=https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors>seekingalpha</a>\n\n\n</h4>\n\n</header>\n<article>\n<div>\nSummary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.\nShareholders assuming Tesla's ...\n\n<a href=\"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors\">Web Link</a>\n\n</div>\n\n\n</article>\n</div>\n</body>\n</html>\n","type":0,"thumbnail":"","relate_stocks":{"TSLA":"特斯拉"},"source_url":"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors","is_english":true,"share_image_url":"https://static.laohu8.com/e9f99090a1c2ed51c021029395664489","article_id":"1152573638","content_text":"Summary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.\nShareholders assuming Tesla's Price/Book multiple deflates from around 25 to 5 over the next 10 years need book value per share to grow 5x just to break even.\nSo far, Tesla's growth in book value is mostly from \"Additional Paid-In Capital\" (issuing new shares at high prices), rather than retained earnings.\nLong-term earnings estimates imply book value per share sums up to 150-250 by the end of 2030, meaning a breakeven Price/Book of 2.5-4x, which is well above most mature autos.\nI present a 1x2 put spread as an attractive trade both for long investors concerned about overvaluation, as well as those seeking to bet on a Price/Book multiple contraction.\n\nPhoto by Jag_cz/iStock Editorial via Getty Images\nBook value per share is likely not the first metric that comes to mind when you think of a \"growth company of the future\" like Tesla (TSLA), but in this article, I will explain why book value per share is the most important bottom line number long-term investors in this company should watch. As long as zero dividends are expected, a TSLA shareholder's total return will, by definition, be defined by the growth of Tesla's book value per share crossed against the change in the Price/Book (P/B) multiple of those shares. After looking at some numbers underlying TSLA's book value per share, and how much it will have to grow for current TSLA shareholders to make money, I conclude with three actionable option strategies based on expectations for how these numbers may change in the medium term. This article also can be seen as a follow up to the 2041 breakeven projection of Tesla I published last year.\nTesla Share Price Rise Follows Book Value\nThe first chart here shows how the rise in Tesla's share price has moved remarkably in line with TSLA's growth in book value per share. TSLA has so far never paid a dividend.\nData by YCharts\nMultiple Expansion and Contraction\nThe above chart, which is on a log scale, is far smoother than that of the (P/B) ratio between these two numbers. The multiple seemed to have stabilized between 2017 and late 2019, but its rise from below 7 in mid-2019 to over 40 in late 2020 and back to around 26 today explains much of TSLA's recent surge and volatility. Another way of thinking about it: TSLA's book value per share is up roughly 4-fold in the past two years, and its P/B is up about 4-fold over the past two years, which together explain why TSLA's shares are up about 16-fold over the past two years. The big question for investors at these levels is: What future combination of book value growth and P/B expansion or contraction can be expected to produce a satisfactory rate of return?\nData by YCharts\nUnderstanding Tesla's Book Value Growth\nAlthough the title of my Marketplace serviceLong Run Incomeimplies a preference for dividends, we believe high-quality book value growth is the best kind of \"dividend alternative\" for companies who can reinvest cash profits internally at far higher rates of return than I can externally. I would challenge any investor to explain why else to buy a low-dividend or no-dividend stock except for the expectation of higher returns from book value growth. For that reason, I have come to focus my analysis of growth companies on how well they seem able to grow book value per share.\nI break down Tesla's book value trajectory into two main parts: Retained Earnings, and Additional Paid In Capital. Although Tesla seems to have \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability, having reported 7 consecutive quarters of positive earnings since September 2019, accumulated profits still fall short of accumulated losses by over $4 billion.\nData by YCharts\nThe other \"half\" (actually over 100%) of Tesla's book value comes from the money paid in by investors. TSLA has continuously raised capital over the past several years by issuing new shares, and the higher the valuation multiple at which TSLA can issue new shares, the more it can accumulate in Additional Paid In Capital. These share issuances also raise the number of shares outstanding, which has the dual effect of raising Tesla's overall market value (since the price per share is now multiplied by more shares), and diluting each share's per-share book value. This increase in book value per share and decline in Price/Book in every recent new share issuance effectively reflects a \"profit\" earlier shareholders enjoy for having later investors pay a higher valuation to get into the company.\nData by YCharts\nPutting these above two charts together, we see that so far Tesla has \"made\" over $27 billion selling shares of its stock to investors, vs. losing over $4 billion in trying to sell cars and batteries to customers, and of course the latter eventually needs to overtake the former for investors to start making their money back.\nHow Tesla's Earnings Projections Add Up\nIf we assume that Tesla stops issuing new shares (a big assumption, but necessary to keep the math simple), then we can add up projected earnings per share to the book value per share to accumulate a projection of future book value per share. Projections of Tesla's future earnings deserve their own article or research report, so for the purposes of this update, I'll use the low vs high analyst forecasts on Tesla'sSeeking Alphaearnings page:\nSource:SeekingAlpha Earnings Page For TSLA\nNote that between 2025 and 2025, the low and median EPS estimates jump as the number of analysts covering the stock that far out falls from 11 to two, implying that the two analysts projecting TSLA's earnings out to 2030 are on the more optimistic end of the street. If we add up the low and high EPS estimates to today's starting book value per share of $23.90, we get a forecast of TSLA's book value of between $160 and $235 per share for the end of 2030. From today's price of around $623.90 per share, that means if TSLA's book value grows to around $200 (the middle of that optimistic range), then a contraction in TSLA's P/B from today's level of 26 to a still \"high for hardware\" multiple of 3 would mean shareholders would earn a 0% return between now and 2030. In other words, someone buying TSLA today would have to believe that either:\n\nTesla will grow its earnings and book value even faster than the most optimistic analyst estimates, or\nThat investors will continue paying P/B multiples well above 3 for the stock.\n\nOn forecasting what TSLA's P/B might be by 2030, there are three ways I can see expecting a multiple of 3 or higher:\n\nAnother valuation bubble: The P/B of Toyota Motor Corp. (TM), charted below, reached highs around 3 in Japan's late 1980s bubble, and again in the late 1990s \"echo bubble,\" and that was its high. If TSLA becomes like TM by 2030, this sort of broader stock valuation bubble may be needed to provide an attractive return on the exit price.\nBusiness transformation: The biggest TSLA bulls I speak to are those who believe TSLA may either remain a premium hardware maker with services on top like Apple Inc. (AAPL), or as a more asset-light, high return software platform like Microsoft (MSFT), whose P/B ratios are charted below Toyota's.\nFinancial engineering: One other driver of Apple's P/B expansion is buybacks, as I explained in this example with McDonald's. Buybacks at high P/B multiples reduce book value per share and raise the P/B multiple, all else equal, in ways exactly opposite to how Tesla has been only issuing (not buying back) shares so far.\n\nData by YCharts\nData by YCharts\nAnother way of comparing Tesla's $36 billion in annual sales vs. Toyota's $257 billion is on a revenue per capital basis. In other words, Tesla currently grosses around $5/year per person on the planet, vs. Toyota's roughly $37/year per human on earth. The growth question for 2030 is whether Tesla can still reach Toyota's number, especially given that:\n\nDemand for transportation, in terms of global population times the percentage of the global population that can afford a car, is likely to grow at a slower pace than historically, especially after 2030, and\nSelf-driving cars that aren't owned by one person, and so don't need to be parked idle most of the time, might actually decrease demand for new cars.\n\nWithout continued high growth past 2030, even 3x book might be on the high end for a car or battery company.\nData byYCharts\nTrading a TSLA P/B Contraction\nMy favorite actionable strategies on a stock like TSLA, which I don't expect to fundamentally collapse, but do expect to experience a significant multiple contraction, generally involve some form of option put spread. The option strategy described below works both for bears wanting to profit from an outright 20%-30% decline, or long-term bulls wanting to protect their shares' value against such a decline.\nOne challenge with simply buying put spreads on TSLA is that its option prices imply a significant \"positive skew,\" which makes put spreads relatively expensive to call spreads. In other words, the market is implying an expectation that TSLA shares are more likely than not to fall a little, offset by a smaller chance of a much larger upside move. Most of the near-the-money put spreads on TSLA cost more than 50% of the maximum payoff, even with longer-dated options or lower strike prices.\nFor the time horizon, I'm choosing the June 17, 2022, expiry date, which as of this writing is a little more than one year out. The main reasons I find first the expiry after one year to be a \"sweet spot\" for this type of strategy include:\n\nAs opposed to outright short selling, buying a put spread to profit from a decline in a share price may qualify for long-term capital gains tax treatment, as we would be holding a long position in a put spread longer than one year.\nAs opposed to even longer-dated options (say the two-year options expiring June 2023), rolling one-year options forces us to reevaluate our valuation and strike prices and decide if and in what form to roll the strategy after four more quarterly book value updates.\n\nIn this strategy, we buy 1x 650 strike put around 150 and then sell 2x 500 puts around 75 each, for roughly zero net up-front premium. Payoff scenarios based on TSLA's closing price at expiry include:\nSource: My Own Excel Calculation and Chart\nThe maximum payout ($150/share) divided by the maximum loss ($350/share) presents a \"maximum rate of return\" on this strategy is +42.8%, though getting that exact maximum payout is nearly impossible (as it requires TSLA to close at exactly $500/share on the expiry date). More likely, this option strategy would deliver a rate of return of more than 14.2% on the maximum loss if TSLA closes between 400-600 at expiry. If we follow the earlier earnings estimates and project TSLA's book value per share to be around $30/share by then, that means we expect a contract in P/B to between 13-20 by next summer.\nConclusion\nFor high-growth, non-dividend paying stocks like Tesla, return expectations break down into expectations of book value growth times expectation of P/B multiple expansion or contraction. Now that it's \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability and reached a respectable level of sales, I believe Tesla is less likely to be the next DeLorean Motor Company, and at best like Microsoft in 2000. To summarize an example I often reference inLong Run Income, from 2000 to 2010, Microsoft's business continued to grow, but investors who bought at the beginning of 2000 were still down over 36% 10 years later because Microsoft's P/B multiple declined by that much more than the business grew. Here is one chart showing that \"lost decade\" for MSFT shareholders.\nData by YCharts\nFor investors who want to hedge a decline in TSLA shares from here to $500, or those who believe TSLA may be a good company that is just wildly overvalued at these levels and may be worth buying below $500, the 1x2 put spread strategy described above may be worth considering.","news_type":1},"isVote":1,"likeStatus":false,"favoriteStatus":false,"reportStatus":false,"tweetType":1,"langContent":"EN"},{"id":118744179,"gmtCreate":1622763832291,"gmtModify":1704190593901,"author":{"id":"3580630968119097","authorId":"3580630968119097","authorIdStr":"3580630968119097","name":"rocketship","avatar":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/7c41ebba567ca6cd2688fe28243ce8ac","vip":1,"crmLevel":2,"crmLevelSwitch":0,"idStr":"3580630968119097"},"htmlText":"lkea nd comment","listText":"lkea nd comment","text":"lkea nd comment","images":[],"top":1,"highlighted":1,"essential":1,"paper":1,"likeSize":1,"commentSize":1,"repostSize":0,"link":"https://ttm.financial/post/118744179","repostId":1152573638,"repostType":2,"repost":{"id":"1152573638","pubTimestamp":1622732138,"share":"https://ttm.financial/m/news/1152573638?lang=&edition=fundamental","pubTime":"2021-06-03 22:55","market":"us","language":"en","title":"Tesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors","url":"https://stock-news.laohu8.com/highlight/detail?id=1152573638","media":"seekingalpha","summary":"Summary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very hi","content":"Summary\n<ul>\n <li>As long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.</li>\n <li>Shareholders assuming Tesla's Price/Book multiple deflates from around 25 to 5 over the next 10 years need book value per share to grow 5x just to break even.</li>\n <li>So far, Tesla's growth in book value is mostly from \"Additional Paid-In Capital\" (issuing new shares at high prices), rather than retained earnings.</li>\n <li>Long-term earnings estimates imply book value per share sums up to 150-250 by the end of 2030, meaning a breakeven Price/Book of 2.5-4x, which is well above most mature autos.</li>\n <li>I present a 1x2 put spread as an attractive trade both for long investors concerned about overvaluation, as well as those seeking to bet on a Price/Book multiple contraction.</li>\n</ul>\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/c329e23b2762c47b11d11d95ec584959\" tg-width=\"768\" tg-height=\"512\">Photo by Jag_cz/iStock Editorial via Getty Images\nBook value per share is likely not the first metric that comes to mind when you think of a \"growth company of the future\" like Tesla (TSLA), but in this article, I will explain why book value per share is the most important bottom line number long-term investors in this company should watch. As long as zero dividends are expected, a TSLA shareholder's total return will, by definition, be defined by the growth of Tesla's book value per share crossed against the change in the Price/Book (P/B) multiple of those shares. After looking at some numbers underlying TSLA's book value per share, and how much it will have to grow for current TSLA shareholders to make money, I conclude with three actionable option strategies based on expectations for how these numbers may change in the medium term. This article also can be seen as a follow up to the&nbsp;2041 breakeven projection of Tesla I published last year.\nTesla Share Price Rise Follows Book Value\nThe first chart here shows how the rise in Tesla's share price has moved remarkably in line with TSLA's growth in book value per share. TSLA has so far never paid a dividend.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/c1f994d62f1ec67c3b95ae15c3791fa8\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"458\">Data by YCharts\nMultiple Expansion and Contraction\nThe above chart, which is on a log scale, is far smoother than that of the (P/B) ratio between these two numbers. The multiple seemed to have stabilized between 2017 and late 2019, but its rise from below 7 in mid-2019 to over 40 in late 2020 and back to around 26 today explains much of TSLA's recent surge and volatility. Another way of thinking about it: TSLA's book value per share is up roughly 4-fold in the past two years, and its P/B is up about 4-fold over the past two years, which together explain why TSLA's shares are up about 16-fold over the past two years. The big question for investors at these levels is: What future combination of book value growth and P/B expansion or contraction can be expected to produce a satisfactory rate of return?\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/b8eb71b806f59aaabd5d09a6eb4b1606\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\nUnderstanding Tesla's Book Value Growth\nAlthough the title of my Marketplace serviceLong Run Incomeimplies a preference for dividends, we believe high-quality book value growth is the best kind of \"dividend alternative\" for companies who can reinvest cash profits internally at far higher rates of return than I can externally. I would challenge any investor to explain why else to buy a low-dividend or no-dividend stock except for the expectation of higher returns from book value growth. For that reason, I have come to focus my analysis of growth companies on how well they seem able to grow book value per share.\nI break down Tesla's book value trajectory into two main parts: Retained Earnings, and Additional Paid In Capital. Although Tesla seems to have \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability, having reported&nbsp;7 consecutive quarters of positive earnings since September 2019, accumulated profits still fall short of accumulated losses by over $4 billion.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/08701c599a8c6fa7a66efde3c0a12cac\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\nThe other \"half\" (actually over 100%) of Tesla's book value comes from the money paid in by investors. TSLA has continuously raised capital over the past several years by issuing new shares, and the higher the valuation multiple at which TSLA can issue new shares, the more it can accumulate in Additional Paid In Capital. These share issuances also raise the number of shares outstanding, which has the dual effect of raising Tesla's overall market value (since the price per share is now multiplied by more shares), and diluting each share's per-share book value. This increase in book value per share and decline in Price/Book in every recent new share issuance effectively reflects a \"profit\" earlier shareholders enjoy for having later investors pay a higher valuation to get into the company.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/971bf86f3d08fe938af2845121be8d4c\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"441\">Data by YCharts\nPutting these above two charts together, we see that so far Tesla has \"made\" over $27 billion selling shares of its stock to investors, vs. losing over $4 billion in trying to sell cars and batteries to customers, and of course the latter eventually needs to overtake the former for investors to start making their money back.\nHow Tesla's Earnings Projections Add Up\nIf we assume that Tesla stops issuing new shares (a big assumption, but necessary to keep the math simple), then we can add up projected earnings per share to the book value per share to accumulate a projection of future book value per share. Projections of Tesla's future earnings deserve their own article or research report, so for the purposes of this update, I'll use the low vs high analyst forecasts on Tesla'sSeeking Alphaearnings page:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/f36166f6653fb8e11941e3c58b313ccb\" tg-width=\"640\" tg-height=\"312\">Source:SeekingAlpha Earnings Page For TSLA\nNote that between 2025 and 2025, the low and median EPS estimates jump as the number of analysts covering the stock that far out falls from 11 to two, implying that the two analysts projecting TSLA's earnings out to 2030 are on the more optimistic end of the street. If we add up the low and high EPS estimates to today's starting book value per share of $23.90, we get a forecast of TSLA's book value of between $160 and $235 per share for the end of 2030. From today's price of around $623.90 per share, that means if TSLA's book value grows to around $200 (the middle of that optimistic range), then a contraction in TSLA's P/B from today's level of 26 to a still \"high for hardware\" multiple of 3 would mean shareholders would earn a 0% return between now and 2030. In other words, someone buying TSLA today would have to believe that either:\n<ol>\n <li>Tesla will grow its earnings and book value even faster than the most optimistic analyst estimates, or</li>\n <li>That investors will continue paying P/B multiples well above 3 for the stock.</li>\n</ol>\nOn forecasting what TSLA's P/B might be by 2030, there are three ways I can see expecting a multiple of 3 or higher:\n<ol>\n <li>Another valuation bubble: The P/B of Toyota Motor Corp. (TM), charted below, reached highs around 3 in Japan's late 1980s bubble, and again in the late 1990s \"echo bubble,\" and that was its high. If TSLA becomes like TM by 2030, this sort of broader stock valuation bubble may be needed to provide an attractive return on the exit price.</li>\n <li>Business transformation: The biggest TSLA bulls I speak to are those who believe TSLA may either remain a premium hardware maker with services on top like Apple Inc. (AAPL), or as a more asset-light, high return software platform like Microsoft (MSFT), whose P/B ratios are charted below Toyota's.</li>\n <li>Financial engineering: One other driver of Apple's&nbsp;P/B expansion is buybacks, as I explained in this example with McDonald's. Buybacks at high P/B multiples reduce book value per share and raise the P/B multiple, all else equal, in ways exactly opposite to how Tesla has been only issuing (not buying back) shares so far.</li>\n</ol>\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/59e353b1112fb465bf275bfd2e2f5c38\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/7432d2c24afe124c70d139e0320f2d0c\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"441\">Data by YCharts\nAnother way of comparing Tesla's $36 billion in annual sales vs. Toyota's $257 billion is on a revenue per capital basis. In other words, Tesla currently grosses around $5/year per person on the planet, vs. Toyota's roughly $37/year per human on earth. The growth question for 2030 is whether Tesla can still reach Toyota's number, especially given that:\n<ol>\n <li>Demand for transportation, in terms of global population times the percentage of the global population that can afford a car, is likely to grow at a slower pace than historically, especially after 2030, and</li>\n <li>Self-driving cars that aren't owned by one person, and so don't need to be parked idle most of the time, might actually decrease demand for new cars.</li>\n</ol>\nWithout continued high growth past 2030, even 3x book might be on the high end for a car or battery company.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/ed6900c059b599cc5885a2184ad6db05\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"537\">Data byYCharts\nTrading a TSLA P/B Contraction\nMy favorite actionable strategies on a stock like TSLA, which I don't expect to fundamentally collapse, but do expect to experience a significant multiple contraction, generally involve some form of option put spread. The option strategy described below works both for bears wanting to profit from an outright 20%-30% decline, or long-term bulls wanting to protect their shares' value against such a decline.\nOne challenge with simply buying put spreads on TSLA is that its option prices imply a significant \"positive skew,\" which makes put spreads relatively expensive to call spreads. In other words, the market is implying an expectation that TSLA shares are more likely than not to fall a little, offset by a smaller chance of a much larger upside move. Most of the near-the-money put spreads on TSLA cost more than 50% of the maximum payoff, even with longer-dated options or lower strike prices.\nFor the time horizon, I'm choosing the June 17, 2022, expiry date, which as of this writing is a little more than one year out. The main reasons I find first the expiry after one year to be a \"sweet spot\" for this type of strategy include:\n<ol>\n <li>As opposed to outright short selling, buying a put spread to profit from a decline in a share price may qualify for long-term capital gains tax treatment, as we would be holding a long position in a put spread longer than one year.</li>\n <li>As opposed to even longer-dated options (say the two-year options expiring June 2023), rolling one-year options forces us to reevaluate our valuation and strike prices and decide if and in what form to roll the strategy after four more quarterly book value updates.</li>\n</ol>\nIn this strategy, we buy 1x 650 strike put around 150 and then sell 2x 500 puts around 75 each, for roughly zero net up-front premium. Payoff scenarios based on TSLA's closing price at expiry include:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/d8d415689c4d898bc75eba42b9f79152\" tg-width=\"640\" tg-height=\"452\">Source: My Own Excel Calculation and Chart\nThe maximum payout ($150/share) divided by the maximum loss ($350/share) presents a \"maximum rate of return\" on this strategy is +42.8%, though getting that exact maximum payout is nearly impossible (as it requires TSLA to close at exactly $500/share on the expiry date). More likely, this option strategy would deliver a rate of return of more than 14.2% on the maximum loss if TSLA closes between 400-600 at expiry. If we follow the earlier earnings estimates and project TSLA's book value per share to be around $30/share by then, that means we expect a contract in P/B to between 13-20 by next summer.\nConclusion\nFor high-growth, non-dividend paying stocks like Tesla, return expectations break down into expectations of book value growth times expectation of P/B multiple expansion or contraction. Now that it's \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability and reached a respectable level of sales, I believe Tesla is less likely to be the next&nbsp;DeLorean Motor Company, and at best like Microsoft in 2000. To summarize an example I often reference inLong Run Income, from 2000 to 2010, Microsoft's business continued to grow, but investors who bought at the beginning of 2000 were still down over 36% 10 years later because Microsoft's P/B multiple declined by that much more than the business grew. Here is one chart showing that \"lost decade\" for MSFT shareholders.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/faaf554d7a7744d36d27ea7f92e9a9e2\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"475\">Data by YCharts\nFor investors who want to hedge a decline in TSLA shares from here to $500, or those who believe TSLA may be a good company that is just wildly overvalued at these levels and may be worth buying below $500, the 1x2 put spread strategy described above may be worth considering.","collect":0,"html":"<!DOCTYPE html>\n<html>\n<head>\n<meta http-equiv=\"Content-Type\" content=\"text/html; charset=utf-8\" />\n<meta name=\"viewport\" content=\"width=device-width,initial-scale=1.0,minimum-scale=1.0,maximum-scale=1.0,user-scalable=no\"/>\n<meta name=\"format-detection\" content=\"telephone=no,email=no,address=no\" />\n<title>Tesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors</title>\n<style type=\"text/css\">\na,abbr,acronym,address,applet,article,aside,audio,b,big,blockquote,body,canvas,caption,center,cite,code,dd,del,details,dfn,div,dl,dt,\nem,embed,fieldset,figcaption,figure,footer,form,h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6,header,hgroup,html,i,iframe,img,ins,kbd,label,legend,li,mark,menu,nav,\nobject,ol,output,p,pre,q,ruby,s,samp,section,small,span,strike,strong,sub,summary,sup,table,tbody,td,tfoot,th,thead,time,tr,tt,u,ul,var,video{ font:inherit;margin:0;padding:0;vertical-align:baseline;border:0 }\nbody{ font-size:16px; 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}\n.meta {color:#5e5c6d;font-size:13px;margin:0 0 .5em; }\na{text-decoration:none; color:#2a4b87;}\n.meta .head { display: inline-block; overflow: hidden}\n.head .h-thumb { width: 30px; height: 30px; margin: 0; padding: 0; border-radius: 50%; float: left;}\n.head .h-content { margin: 0; padding: 0 0 0 9px; float: left;}\n.head .h-name {font-size: 13px; color: #eee; margin: 0;}\n.head .h-time {font-size: 11px; color: #7E829C; margin: 0;line-height: 11px;}\n.small {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.9); -webkit-transform: scale(0.9); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.smaller {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.8); -webkit-transform: scale(0.8); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.bt-text {font-size: 12px;margin: 1.5em 0 0 0}\n.bt-text p {margin: 0}\n</style>\n</head>\n<body>\n<div class=\"wrapper\">\n<header>\n<h2 class=\"title\">\nTesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors\n</h2>\n\n<h4 class=\"meta\">\n\n\n2021-06-03 22:55 GMT+8&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<a href=https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors>seekingalpha</a>\n\n\n</h4>\n\n</header>\n<article>\n<div>\nSummary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.\nShareholders assuming Tesla's ...\n\n<a href=\"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors\">Web Link</a>\n\n</div>\n\n\n</article>\n</div>\n</body>\n</html>\n","type":0,"thumbnail":"","relate_stocks":{"TSLA":"特斯拉"},"source_url":"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors","is_english":true,"share_image_url":"https://static.laohu8.com/e9f99090a1c2ed51c021029395664489","article_id":"1152573638","content_text":"Summary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.\nShareholders assuming Tesla's Price/Book multiple deflates from around 25 to 5 over the next 10 years need book value per share to grow 5x just to break even.\nSo far, Tesla's growth in book value is mostly from \"Additional Paid-In Capital\" (issuing new shares at high prices), rather than retained earnings.\nLong-term earnings estimates imply book value per share sums up to 150-250 by the end of 2030, meaning a breakeven Price/Book of 2.5-4x, which is well above most mature autos.\nI present a 1x2 put spread as an attractive trade both for long investors concerned about overvaluation, as well as those seeking to bet on a Price/Book multiple contraction.\n\nPhoto by Jag_cz/iStock Editorial via Getty Images\nBook value per share is likely not the first metric that comes to mind when you think of a \"growth company of the future\" like Tesla (TSLA), but in this article, I will explain why book value per share is the most important bottom line number long-term investors in this company should watch. As long as zero dividends are expected, a TSLA shareholder's total return will, by definition, be defined by the growth of Tesla's book value per share crossed against the change in the Price/Book (P/B) multiple of those shares. After looking at some numbers underlying TSLA's book value per share, and how much it will have to grow for current TSLA shareholders to make money, I conclude with three actionable option strategies based on expectations for how these numbers may change in the medium term. This article also can be seen as a follow up to the 2041 breakeven projection of Tesla I published last year.\nTesla Share Price Rise Follows Book Value\nThe first chart here shows how the rise in Tesla's share price has moved remarkably in line with TSLA's growth in book value per share. TSLA has so far never paid a dividend.\nData by YCharts\nMultiple Expansion and Contraction\nThe above chart, which is on a log scale, is far smoother than that of the (P/B) ratio between these two numbers. The multiple seemed to have stabilized between 2017 and late 2019, but its rise from below 7 in mid-2019 to over 40 in late 2020 and back to around 26 today explains much of TSLA's recent surge and volatility. Another way of thinking about it: TSLA's book value per share is up roughly 4-fold in the past two years, and its P/B is up about 4-fold over the past two years, which together explain why TSLA's shares are up about 16-fold over the past two years. The big question for investors at these levels is: What future combination of book value growth and P/B expansion or contraction can be expected to produce a satisfactory rate of return?\nData by YCharts\nUnderstanding Tesla's Book Value Growth\nAlthough the title of my Marketplace serviceLong Run Incomeimplies a preference for dividends, we believe high-quality book value growth is the best kind of \"dividend alternative\" for companies who can reinvest cash profits internally at far higher rates of return than I can externally. I would challenge any investor to explain why else to buy a low-dividend or no-dividend stock except for the expectation of higher returns from book value growth. For that reason, I have come to focus my analysis of growth companies on how well they seem able to grow book value per share.\nI break down Tesla's book value trajectory into two main parts: Retained Earnings, and Additional Paid In Capital. Although Tesla seems to have \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability, having reported 7 consecutive quarters of positive earnings since September 2019, accumulated profits still fall short of accumulated losses by over $4 billion.\nData by YCharts\nThe other \"half\" (actually over 100%) of Tesla's book value comes from the money paid in by investors. TSLA has continuously raised capital over the past several years by issuing new shares, and the higher the valuation multiple at which TSLA can issue new shares, the more it can accumulate in Additional Paid In Capital. These share issuances also raise the number of shares outstanding, which has the dual effect of raising Tesla's overall market value (since the price per share is now multiplied by more shares), and diluting each share's per-share book value. This increase in book value per share and decline in Price/Book in every recent new share issuance effectively reflects a \"profit\" earlier shareholders enjoy for having later investors pay a higher valuation to get into the company.\nData by YCharts\nPutting these above two charts together, we see that so far Tesla has \"made\" over $27 billion selling shares of its stock to investors, vs. losing over $4 billion in trying to sell cars and batteries to customers, and of course the latter eventually needs to overtake the former for investors to start making their money back.\nHow Tesla's Earnings Projections Add Up\nIf we assume that Tesla stops issuing new shares (a big assumption, but necessary to keep the math simple), then we can add up projected earnings per share to the book value per share to accumulate a projection of future book value per share. Projections of Tesla's future earnings deserve their own article or research report, so for the purposes of this update, I'll use the low vs high analyst forecasts on Tesla'sSeeking Alphaearnings page:\nSource:SeekingAlpha Earnings Page For TSLA\nNote that between 2025 and 2025, the low and median EPS estimates jump as the number of analysts covering the stock that far out falls from 11 to two, implying that the two analysts projecting TSLA's earnings out to 2030 are on the more optimistic end of the street. If we add up the low and high EPS estimates to today's starting book value per share of $23.90, we get a forecast of TSLA's book value of between $160 and $235 per share for the end of 2030. From today's price of around $623.90 per share, that means if TSLA's book value grows to around $200 (the middle of that optimistic range), then a contraction in TSLA's P/B from today's level of 26 to a still \"high for hardware\" multiple of 3 would mean shareholders would earn a 0% return between now and 2030. In other words, someone buying TSLA today would have to believe that either:\n\nTesla will grow its earnings and book value even faster than the most optimistic analyst estimates, or\nThat investors will continue paying P/B multiples well above 3 for the stock.\n\nOn forecasting what TSLA's P/B might be by 2030, there are three ways I can see expecting a multiple of 3 or higher:\n\nAnother valuation bubble: The P/B of Toyota Motor Corp. (TM), charted below, reached highs around 3 in Japan's late 1980s bubble, and again in the late 1990s \"echo bubble,\" and that was its high. If TSLA becomes like TM by 2030, this sort of broader stock valuation bubble may be needed to provide an attractive return on the exit price.\nBusiness transformation: The biggest TSLA bulls I speak to are those who believe TSLA may either remain a premium hardware maker with services on top like Apple Inc. (AAPL), or as a more asset-light, high return software platform like Microsoft (MSFT), whose P/B ratios are charted below Toyota's.\nFinancial engineering: One other driver of Apple's P/B expansion is buybacks, as I explained in this example with McDonald's. Buybacks at high P/B multiples reduce book value per share and raise the P/B multiple, all else equal, in ways exactly opposite to how Tesla has been only issuing (not buying back) shares so far.\n\nData by YCharts\nData by YCharts\nAnother way of comparing Tesla's $36 billion in annual sales vs. Toyota's $257 billion is on a revenue per capital basis. In other words, Tesla currently grosses around $5/year per person on the planet, vs. Toyota's roughly $37/year per human on earth. The growth question for 2030 is whether Tesla can still reach Toyota's number, especially given that:\n\nDemand for transportation, in terms of global population times the percentage of the global population that can afford a car, is likely to grow at a slower pace than historically, especially after 2030, and\nSelf-driving cars that aren't owned by one person, and so don't need to be parked idle most of the time, might actually decrease demand for new cars.\n\nWithout continued high growth past 2030, even 3x book might be on the high end for a car or battery company.\nData byYCharts\nTrading a TSLA P/B Contraction\nMy favorite actionable strategies on a stock like TSLA, which I don't expect to fundamentally collapse, but do expect to experience a significant multiple contraction, generally involve some form of option put spread. The option strategy described below works both for bears wanting to profit from an outright 20%-30% decline, or long-term bulls wanting to protect their shares' value against such a decline.\nOne challenge with simply buying put spreads on TSLA is that its option prices imply a significant \"positive skew,\" which makes put spreads relatively expensive to call spreads. In other words, the market is implying an expectation that TSLA shares are more likely than not to fall a little, offset by a smaller chance of a much larger upside move. Most of the near-the-money put spreads on TSLA cost more than 50% of the maximum payoff, even with longer-dated options or lower strike prices.\nFor the time horizon, I'm choosing the June 17, 2022, expiry date, which as of this writing is a little more than one year out. The main reasons I find first the expiry after one year to be a \"sweet spot\" for this type of strategy include:\n\nAs opposed to outright short selling, buying a put spread to profit from a decline in a share price may qualify for long-term capital gains tax treatment, as we would be holding a long position in a put spread longer than one year.\nAs opposed to even longer-dated options (say the two-year options expiring June 2023), rolling one-year options forces us to reevaluate our valuation and strike prices and decide if and in what form to roll the strategy after four more quarterly book value updates.\n\nIn this strategy, we buy 1x 650 strike put around 150 and then sell 2x 500 puts around 75 each, for roughly zero net up-front premium. Payoff scenarios based on TSLA's closing price at expiry include:\nSource: My Own Excel Calculation and Chart\nThe maximum payout ($150/share) divided by the maximum loss ($350/share) presents a \"maximum rate of return\" on this strategy is +42.8%, though getting that exact maximum payout is nearly impossible (as it requires TSLA to close at exactly $500/share on the expiry date). More likely, this option strategy would deliver a rate of return of more than 14.2% on the maximum loss if TSLA closes between 400-600 at expiry. If we follow the earlier earnings estimates and project TSLA's book value per share to be around $30/share by then, that means we expect a contract in P/B to between 13-20 by next summer.\nConclusion\nFor high-growth, non-dividend paying stocks like Tesla, return expectations break down into expectations of book value growth times expectation of P/B multiple expansion or contraction. Now that it's \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability and reached a respectable level of sales, I believe Tesla is less likely to be the next DeLorean Motor Company, and at best like Microsoft in 2000. To summarize an example I often reference inLong Run Income, from 2000 to 2010, Microsoft's business continued to grow, but investors who bought at the beginning of 2000 were still down over 36% 10 years later because Microsoft's P/B multiple declined by that much more than the business grew. Here is one chart showing that \"lost decade\" for MSFT shareholders.\nData by YCharts\nFor investors who want to hedge a decline in TSLA shares from here to $500, or those who believe TSLA may be a good company that is just wildly overvalued at these levels and may be worth buying below $500, the 1x2 put spread strategy described above may be worth considering.","news_type":1},"isVote":1,"likeStatus":false,"favoriteStatus":false,"reportStatus":false,"tweetType":1,"comments":[{"id":4569985,"gmtCreate":1622764043843,"gmtModify":1663227911445,"authorId":3582015516749888,"author":{"id":3582015516749888,"authorId":3582015516749888,"name":"HH浩","avatar":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/2639351c97027c6f71c4d9729ef216d8","vip":1,"crmLevel":3,"crmLevelSwitch":0,"individualDisplayBadges":[]},"repliedAuthorId":0,"objectId":118744179,"type":1,"supId":0,"prevId":0,"content":"Reciprocate","text":"Reciprocate","html":"Reciprocate"}],"langContent":"EN"},{"id":118754656,"gmtCreate":1622763524875,"gmtModify":1704190580969,"author":{"id":"3553254172092293","authorId":"3553254172092293","authorIdStr":"3553254172092293","name":"DingDang","avatar":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/d2a0c38ce6f3c2661fa15b7d1f52eeaf","vip":1,"crmLevel":2,"crmLevelSwitch":0,"idStr":"3553254172092293"},"htmlText":"Buy and hold!! Please like and comment!","listText":"Buy and hold!! Please like and comment!","text":"Buy and hold!! Please like and comment!","images":[],"top":1,"highlighted":1,"essential":1,"paper":1,"likeSize":0,"commentSize":2,"repostSize":0,"link":"https://ttm.financial/post/118754656","repostId":1152573638,"repostType":4,"repost":{"id":"1152573638","pubTimestamp":1622732138,"share":"https://ttm.financial/m/news/1152573638?lang=&edition=fundamental","pubTime":"2021-06-03 22:55","market":"us","language":"en","title":"Tesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors","url":"https://stock-news.laohu8.com/highlight/detail?id=1152573638","media":"seekingalpha","summary":"Summary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very hi","content":"Summary\n<ul>\n <li>As long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.</li>\n <li>Shareholders assuming Tesla's Price/Book multiple deflates from around 25 to 5 over the next 10 years need book value per share to grow 5x just to break even.</li>\n <li>So far, Tesla's growth in book value is mostly from \"Additional Paid-In Capital\" (issuing new shares at high prices), rather than retained earnings.</li>\n <li>Long-term earnings estimates imply book value per share sums up to 150-250 by the end of 2030, meaning a breakeven Price/Book of 2.5-4x, which is well above most mature autos.</li>\n <li>I present a 1x2 put spread as an attractive trade both for long investors concerned about overvaluation, as well as those seeking to bet on a Price/Book multiple contraction.</li>\n</ul>\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/c329e23b2762c47b11d11d95ec584959\" tg-width=\"768\" tg-height=\"512\">Photo by Jag_cz/iStock Editorial via Getty Images\nBook value per share is likely not the first metric that comes to mind when you think of a \"growth company of the future\" like Tesla (TSLA), but in this article, I will explain why book value per share is the most important bottom line number long-term investors in this company should watch. As long as zero dividends are expected, a TSLA shareholder's total return will, by definition, be defined by the growth of Tesla's book value per share crossed against the change in the Price/Book (P/B) multiple of those shares. After looking at some numbers underlying TSLA's book value per share, and how much it will have to grow for current TSLA shareholders to make money, I conclude with three actionable option strategies based on expectations for how these numbers may change in the medium term. This article also can be seen as a follow up to the&nbsp;2041 breakeven projection of Tesla I published last year.\nTesla Share Price Rise Follows Book Value\nThe first chart here shows how the rise in Tesla's share price has moved remarkably in line with TSLA's growth in book value per share. TSLA has so far never paid a dividend.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/c1f994d62f1ec67c3b95ae15c3791fa8\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"458\">Data by YCharts\nMultiple Expansion and Contraction\nThe above chart, which is on a log scale, is far smoother than that of the (P/B) ratio between these two numbers. The multiple seemed to have stabilized between 2017 and late 2019, but its rise from below 7 in mid-2019 to over 40 in late 2020 and back to around 26 today explains much of TSLA's recent surge and volatility. Another way of thinking about it: TSLA's book value per share is up roughly 4-fold in the past two years, and its P/B is up about 4-fold over the past two years, which together explain why TSLA's shares are up about 16-fold over the past two years. The big question for investors at these levels is: What future combination of book value growth and P/B expansion or contraction can be expected to produce a satisfactory rate of return?\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/b8eb71b806f59aaabd5d09a6eb4b1606\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\nUnderstanding Tesla's Book Value Growth\nAlthough the title of my Marketplace serviceLong Run Incomeimplies a preference for dividends, we believe high-quality book value growth is the best kind of \"dividend alternative\" for companies who can reinvest cash profits internally at far higher rates of return than I can externally. I would challenge any investor to explain why else to buy a low-dividend or no-dividend stock except for the expectation of higher returns from book value growth. For that reason, I have come to focus my analysis of growth companies on how well they seem able to grow book value per share.\nI break down Tesla's book value trajectory into two main parts: Retained Earnings, and Additional Paid In Capital. Although Tesla seems to have \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability, having reported&nbsp;7 consecutive quarters of positive earnings since September 2019, accumulated profits still fall short of accumulated losses by over $4 billion.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/08701c599a8c6fa7a66efde3c0a12cac\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\nThe other \"half\" (actually over 100%) of Tesla's book value comes from the money paid in by investors. TSLA has continuously raised capital over the past several years by issuing new shares, and the higher the valuation multiple at which TSLA can issue new shares, the more it can accumulate in Additional Paid In Capital. These share issuances also raise the number of shares outstanding, which has the dual effect of raising Tesla's overall market value (since the price per share is now multiplied by more shares), and diluting each share's per-share book value. This increase in book value per share and decline in Price/Book in every recent new share issuance effectively reflects a \"profit\" earlier shareholders enjoy for having later investors pay a higher valuation to get into the company.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/971bf86f3d08fe938af2845121be8d4c\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"441\">Data by YCharts\nPutting these above two charts together, we see that so far Tesla has \"made\" over $27 billion selling shares of its stock to investors, vs. losing over $4 billion in trying to sell cars and batteries to customers, and of course the latter eventually needs to overtake the former for investors to start making their money back.\nHow Tesla's Earnings Projections Add Up\nIf we assume that Tesla stops issuing new shares (a big assumption, but necessary to keep the math simple), then we can add up projected earnings per share to the book value per share to accumulate a projection of future book value per share. Projections of Tesla's future earnings deserve their own article or research report, so for the purposes of this update, I'll use the low vs high analyst forecasts on Tesla'sSeeking Alphaearnings page:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/f36166f6653fb8e11941e3c58b313ccb\" tg-width=\"640\" tg-height=\"312\">Source:SeekingAlpha Earnings Page For TSLA\nNote that between 2025 and 2025, the low and median EPS estimates jump as the number of analysts covering the stock that far out falls from 11 to two, implying that the two analysts projecting TSLA's earnings out to 2030 are on the more optimistic end of the street. If we add up the low and high EPS estimates to today's starting book value per share of $23.90, we get a forecast of TSLA's book value of between $160 and $235 per share for the end of 2030. From today's price of around $623.90 per share, that means if TSLA's book value grows to around $200 (the middle of that optimistic range), then a contraction in TSLA's P/B from today's level of 26 to a still \"high for hardware\" multiple of 3 would mean shareholders would earn a 0% return between now and 2030. In other words, someone buying TSLA today would have to believe that either:\n<ol>\n <li>Tesla will grow its earnings and book value even faster than the most optimistic analyst estimates, or</li>\n <li>That investors will continue paying P/B multiples well above 3 for the stock.</li>\n</ol>\nOn forecasting what TSLA's P/B might be by 2030, there are three ways I can see expecting a multiple of 3 or higher:\n<ol>\n <li>Another valuation bubble: The P/B of Toyota Motor Corp. (TM), charted below, reached highs around 3 in Japan's late 1980s bubble, and again in the late 1990s \"echo bubble,\" and that was its high. If TSLA becomes like TM by 2030, this sort of broader stock valuation bubble may be needed to provide an attractive return on the exit price.</li>\n <li>Business transformation: The biggest TSLA bulls I speak to are those who believe TSLA may either remain a premium hardware maker with services on top like Apple Inc. (AAPL), or as a more asset-light, high return software platform like Microsoft (MSFT), whose P/B ratios are charted below Toyota's.</li>\n <li>Financial engineering: One other driver of Apple's&nbsp;P/B expansion is buybacks, as I explained in this example with McDonald's. Buybacks at high P/B multiples reduce book value per share and raise the P/B multiple, all else equal, in ways exactly opposite to how Tesla has been only issuing (not buying back) shares so far.</li>\n</ol>\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/59e353b1112fb465bf275bfd2e2f5c38\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/7432d2c24afe124c70d139e0320f2d0c\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"441\">Data by YCharts\nAnother way of comparing Tesla's $36 billion in annual sales vs. Toyota's $257 billion is on a revenue per capital basis. In other words, Tesla currently grosses around $5/year per person on the planet, vs. Toyota's roughly $37/year per human on earth. The growth question for 2030 is whether Tesla can still reach Toyota's number, especially given that:\n<ol>\n <li>Demand for transportation, in terms of global population times the percentage of the global population that can afford a car, is likely to grow at a slower pace than historically, especially after 2030, and</li>\n <li>Self-driving cars that aren't owned by one person, and so don't need to be parked idle most of the time, might actually decrease demand for new cars.</li>\n</ol>\nWithout continued high growth past 2030, even 3x book might be on the high end for a car or battery company.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/ed6900c059b599cc5885a2184ad6db05\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"537\">Data byYCharts\nTrading a TSLA P/B Contraction\nMy favorite actionable strategies on a stock like TSLA, which I don't expect to fundamentally collapse, but do expect to experience a significant multiple contraction, generally involve some form of option put spread. The option strategy described below works both for bears wanting to profit from an outright 20%-30% decline, or long-term bulls wanting to protect their shares' value against such a decline.\nOne challenge with simply buying put spreads on TSLA is that its option prices imply a significant \"positive skew,\" which makes put spreads relatively expensive to call spreads. In other words, the market is implying an expectation that TSLA shares are more likely than not to fall a little, offset by a smaller chance of a much larger upside move. Most of the near-the-money put spreads on TSLA cost more than 50% of the maximum payoff, even with longer-dated options or lower strike prices.\nFor the time horizon, I'm choosing the June 17, 2022, expiry date, which as of this writing is a little more than one year out. The main reasons I find first the expiry after one year to be a \"sweet spot\" for this type of strategy include:\n<ol>\n <li>As opposed to outright short selling, buying a put spread to profit from a decline in a share price may qualify for long-term capital gains tax treatment, as we would be holding a long position in a put spread longer than one year.</li>\n <li>As opposed to even longer-dated options (say the two-year options expiring June 2023), rolling one-year options forces us to reevaluate our valuation and strike prices and decide if and in what form to roll the strategy after four more quarterly book value updates.</li>\n</ol>\nIn this strategy, we buy 1x 650 strike put around 150 and then sell 2x 500 puts around 75 each, for roughly zero net up-front premium. Payoff scenarios based on TSLA's closing price at expiry include:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/d8d415689c4d898bc75eba42b9f79152\" tg-width=\"640\" tg-height=\"452\">Source: My Own Excel Calculation and Chart\nThe maximum payout ($150/share) divided by the maximum loss ($350/share) presents a \"maximum rate of return\" on this strategy is +42.8%, though getting that exact maximum payout is nearly impossible (as it requires TSLA to close at exactly $500/share on the expiry date). More likely, this option strategy would deliver a rate of return of more than 14.2% on the maximum loss if TSLA closes between 400-600 at expiry. If we follow the earlier earnings estimates and project TSLA's book value per share to be around $30/share by then, that means we expect a contract in P/B to between 13-20 by next summer.\nConclusion\nFor high-growth, non-dividend paying stocks like Tesla, return expectations break down into expectations of book value growth times expectation of P/B multiple expansion or contraction. Now that it's \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability and reached a respectable level of sales, I believe Tesla is less likely to be the next&nbsp;DeLorean Motor Company, and at best like Microsoft in 2000. To summarize an example I often reference inLong Run Income, from 2000 to 2010, Microsoft's business continued to grow, but investors who bought at the beginning of 2000 were still down over 36% 10 years later because Microsoft's P/B multiple declined by that much more than the business grew. Here is one chart showing that \"lost decade\" for MSFT shareholders.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/faaf554d7a7744d36d27ea7f92e9a9e2\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"475\">Data by YCharts\nFor investors who want to hedge a decline in TSLA shares from here to $500, or those who believe TSLA may be a good company that is just wildly overvalued at these levels and may be worth buying below $500, the 1x2 put spread strategy described above may be worth considering.","collect":0,"html":"<!DOCTYPE html>\n<html>\n<head>\n<meta http-equiv=\"Content-Type\" content=\"text/html; charset=utf-8\" />\n<meta name=\"viewport\" content=\"width=device-width,initial-scale=1.0,minimum-scale=1.0,maximum-scale=1.0,user-scalable=no\"/>\n<meta name=\"format-detection\" content=\"telephone=no,email=no,address=no\" />\n<title>Tesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors</title>\n<style type=\"text/css\">\na,abbr,acronym,address,applet,article,aside,audio,b,big,blockquote,body,canvas,caption,center,cite,code,dd,del,details,dfn,div,dl,dt,\nem,embed,fieldset,figcaption,figure,footer,form,h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6,header,hgroup,html,i,iframe,img,ins,kbd,label,legend,li,mark,menu,nav,\nobject,ol,output,p,pre,q,ruby,s,samp,section,small,span,strike,strong,sub,summary,sup,table,tbody,td,tfoot,th,thead,time,tr,tt,u,ul,var,video{ font:inherit;margin:0;padding:0;vertical-align:baseline;border:0 }\nbody{ font-size:16px; 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}\n.meta {color:#5e5c6d;font-size:13px;margin:0 0 .5em; }\na{text-decoration:none; color:#2a4b87;}\n.meta .head { display: inline-block; overflow: hidden}\n.head .h-thumb { width: 30px; height: 30px; margin: 0; padding: 0; border-radius: 50%; float: left;}\n.head .h-content { margin: 0; padding: 0 0 0 9px; float: left;}\n.head .h-name {font-size: 13px; color: #eee; margin: 0;}\n.head .h-time {font-size: 11px; color: #7E829C; margin: 0;line-height: 11px;}\n.small {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.9); -webkit-transform: scale(0.9); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.smaller {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.8); -webkit-transform: scale(0.8); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.bt-text {font-size: 12px;margin: 1.5em 0 0 0}\n.bt-text p {margin: 0}\n</style>\n</head>\n<body>\n<div class=\"wrapper\">\n<header>\n<h2 class=\"title\">\nTesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors\n</h2>\n\n<h4 class=\"meta\">\n\n\n2021-06-03 22:55 GMT+8&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<a href=https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors>seekingalpha</a>\n\n\n</h4>\n\n</header>\n<article>\n<div>\nSummary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.\nShareholders assuming Tesla's ...\n\n<a href=\"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors\">Web Link</a>\n\n</div>\n\n\n</article>\n</div>\n</body>\n</html>\n","type":0,"thumbnail":"","relate_stocks":{"TSLA":"特斯拉"},"source_url":"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors","is_english":true,"share_image_url":"https://static.laohu8.com/e9f99090a1c2ed51c021029395664489","article_id":"1152573638","content_text":"Summary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.\nShareholders assuming Tesla's Price/Book multiple deflates from around 25 to 5 over the next 10 years need book value per share to grow 5x just to break even.\nSo far, Tesla's growth in book value is mostly from \"Additional Paid-In Capital\" (issuing new shares at high prices), rather than retained earnings.\nLong-term earnings estimates imply book value per share sums up to 150-250 by the end of 2030, meaning a breakeven Price/Book of 2.5-4x, which is well above most mature autos.\nI present a 1x2 put spread as an attractive trade both for long investors concerned about overvaluation, as well as those seeking to bet on a Price/Book multiple contraction.\n\nPhoto by Jag_cz/iStock Editorial via Getty Images\nBook value per share is likely not the first metric that comes to mind when you think of a \"growth company of the future\" like Tesla (TSLA), but in this article, I will explain why book value per share is the most important bottom line number long-term investors in this company should watch. As long as zero dividends are expected, a TSLA shareholder's total return will, by definition, be defined by the growth of Tesla's book value per share crossed against the change in the Price/Book (P/B) multiple of those shares. After looking at some numbers underlying TSLA's book value per share, and how much it will have to grow for current TSLA shareholders to make money, I conclude with three actionable option strategies based on expectations for how these numbers may change in the medium term. This article also can be seen as a follow up to the 2041 breakeven projection of Tesla I published last year.\nTesla Share Price Rise Follows Book Value\nThe first chart here shows how the rise in Tesla's share price has moved remarkably in line with TSLA's growth in book value per share. TSLA has so far never paid a dividend.\nData by YCharts\nMultiple Expansion and Contraction\nThe above chart, which is on a log scale, is far smoother than that of the (P/B) ratio between these two numbers. The multiple seemed to have stabilized between 2017 and late 2019, but its rise from below 7 in mid-2019 to over 40 in late 2020 and back to around 26 today explains much of TSLA's recent surge and volatility. Another way of thinking about it: TSLA's book value per share is up roughly 4-fold in the past two years, and its P/B is up about 4-fold over the past two years, which together explain why TSLA's shares are up about 16-fold over the past two years. The big question for investors at these levels is: What future combination of book value growth and P/B expansion or contraction can be expected to produce a satisfactory rate of return?\nData by YCharts\nUnderstanding Tesla's Book Value Growth\nAlthough the title of my Marketplace serviceLong Run Incomeimplies a preference for dividends, we believe high-quality book value growth is the best kind of \"dividend alternative\" for companies who can reinvest cash profits internally at far higher rates of return than I can externally. I would challenge any investor to explain why else to buy a low-dividend or no-dividend stock except for the expectation of higher returns from book value growth. For that reason, I have come to focus my analysis of growth companies on how well they seem able to grow book value per share.\nI break down Tesla's book value trajectory into two main parts: Retained Earnings, and Additional Paid In Capital. Although Tesla seems to have \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability, having reported 7 consecutive quarters of positive earnings since September 2019, accumulated profits still fall short of accumulated losses by over $4 billion.\nData by YCharts\nThe other \"half\" (actually over 100%) of Tesla's book value comes from the money paid in by investors. TSLA has continuously raised capital over the past several years by issuing new shares, and the higher the valuation multiple at which TSLA can issue new shares, the more it can accumulate in Additional Paid In Capital. These share issuances also raise the number of shares outstanding, which has the dual effect of raising Tesla's overall market value (since the price per share is now multiplied by more shares), and diluting each share's per-share book value. This increase in book value per share and decline in Price/Book in every recent new share issuance effectively reflects a \"profit\" earlier shareholders enjoy for having later investors pay a higher valuation to get into the company.\nData by YCharts\nPutting these above two charts together, we see that so far Tesla has \"made\" over $27 billion selling shares of its stock to investors, vs. losing over $4 billion in trying to sell cars and batteries to customers, and of course the latter eventually needs to overtake the former for investors to start making their money back.\nHow Tesla's Earnings Projections Add Up\nIf we assume that Tesla stops issuing new shares (a big assumption, but necessary to keep the math simple), then we can add up projected earnings per share to the book value per share to accumulate a projection of future book value per share. Projections of Tesla's future earnings deserve their own article or research report, so for the purposes of this update, I'll use the low vs high analyst forecasts on Tesla'sSeeking Alphaearnings page:\nSource:SeekingAlpha Earnings Page For TSLA\nNote that between 2025 and 2025, the low and median EPS estimates jump as the number of analysts covering the stock that far out falls from 11 to two, implying that the two analysts projecting TSLA's earnings out to 2030 are on the more optimistic end of the street. If we add up the low and high EPS estimates to today's starting book value per share of $23.90, we get a forecast of TSLA's book value of between $160 and $235 per share for the end of 2030. From today's price of around $623.90 per share, that means if TSLA's book value grows to around $200 (the middle of that optimistic range), then a contraction in TSLA's P/B from today's level of 26 to a still \"high for hardware\" multiple of 3 would mean shareholders would earn a 0% return between now and 2030. In other words, someone buying TSLA today would have to believe that either:\n\nTesla will grow its earnings and book value even faster than the most optimistic analyst estimates, or\nThat investors will continue paying P/B multiples well above 3 for the stock.\n\nOn forecasting what TSLA's P/B might be by 2030, there are three ways I can see expecting a multiple of 3 or higher:\n\nAnother valuation bubble: The P/B of Toyota Motor Corp. (TM), charted below, reached highs around 3 in Japan's late 1980s bubble, and again in the late 1990s \"echo bubble,\" and that was its high. If TSLA becomes like TM by 2030, this sort of broader stock valuation bubble may be needed to provide an attractive return on the exit price.\nBusiness transformation: The biggest TSLA bulls I speak to are those who believe TSLA may either remain a premium hardware maker with services on top like Apple Inc. (AAPL), or as a more asset-light, high return software platform like Microsoft (MSFT), whose P/B ratios are charted below Toyota's.\nFinancial engineering: One other driver of Apple's P/B expansion is buybacks, as I explained in this example with McDonald's. Buybacks at high P/B multiples reduce book value per share and raise the P/B multiple, all else equal, in ways exactly opposite to how Tesla has been only issuing (not buying back) shares so far.\n\nData by YCharts\nData by YCharts\nAnother way of comparing Tesla's $36 billion in annual sales vs. Toyota's $257 billion is on a revenue per capital basis. In other words, Tesla currently grosses around $5/year per person on the planet, vs. Toyota's roughly $37/year per human on earth. The growth question for 2030 is whether Tesla can still reach Toyota's number, especially given that:\n\nDemand for transportation, in terms of global population times the percentage of the global population that can afford a car, is likely to grow at a slower pace than historically, especially after 2030, and\nSelf-driving cars that aren't owned by one person, and so don't need to be parked idle most of the time, might actually decrease demand for new cars.\n\nWithout continued high growth past 2030, even 3x book might be on the high end for a car or battery company.\nData byYCharts\nTrading a TSLA P/B Contraction\nMy favorite actionable strategies on a stock like TSLA, which I don't expect to fundamentally collapse, but do expect to experience a significant multiple contraction, generally involve some form of option put spread. The option strategy described below works both for bears wanting to profit from an outright 20%-30% decline, or long-term bulls wanting to protect their shares' value against such a decline.\nOne challenge with simply buying put spreads on TSLA is that its option prices imply a significant \"positive skew,\" which makes put spreads relatively expensive to call spreads. In other words, the market is implying an expectation that TSLA shares are more likely than not to fall a little, offset by a smaller chance of a much larger upside move. Most of the near-the-money put spreads on TSLA cost more than 50% of the maximum payoff, even with longer-dated options or lower strike prices.\nFor the time horizon, I'm choosing the June 17, 2022, expiry date, which as of this writing is a little more than one year out. The main reasons I find first the expiry after one year to be a \"sweet spot\" for this type of strategy include:\n\nAs opposed to outright short selling, buying a put spread to profit from a decline in a share price may qualify for long-term capital gains tax treatment, as we would be holding a long position in a put spread longer than one year.\nAs opposed to even longer-dated options (say the two-year options expiring June 2023), rolling one-year options forces us to reevaluate our valuation and strike prices and decide if and in what form to roll the strategy after four more quarterly book value updates.\n\nIn this strategy, we buy 1x 650 strike put around 150 and then sell 2x 500 puts around 75 each, for roughly zero net up-front premium. Payoff scenarios based on TSLA's closing price at expiry include:\nSource: My Own Excel Calculation and Chart\nThe maximum payout ($150/share) divided by the maximum loss ($350/share) presents a \"maximum rate of return\" on this strategy is +42.8%, though getting that exact maximum payout is nearly impossible (as it requires TSLA to close at exactly $500/share on the expiry date). More likely, this option strategy would deliver a rate of return of more than 14.2% on the maximum loss if TSLA closes between 400-600 at expiry. If we follow the earlier earnings estimates and project TSLA's book value per share to be around $30/share by then, that means we expect a contract in P/B to between 13-20 by next summer.\nConclusion\nFor high-growth, non-dividend paying stocks like Tesla, return expectations break down into expectations of book value growth times expectation of P/B multiple expansion or contraction. Now that it's \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability and reached a respectable level of sales, I believe Tesla is less likely to be the next DeLorean Motor Company, and at best like Microsoft in 2000. To summarize an example I often reference inLong Run Income, from 2000 to 2010, Microsoft's business continued to grow, but investors who bought at the beginning of 2000 were still down over 36% 10 years later because Microsoft's P/B multiple declined by that much more than the business grew. Here is one chart showing that \"lost decade\" for MSFT shareholders.\nData by YCharts\nFor investors who want to hedge a decline in TSLA shares from here to $500, or those who believe TSLA may be a good company that is just wildly overvalued at these levels and may be worth buying below $500, the 1x2 put spread strategy described above may be worth considering.","news_type":1},"isVote":1,"likeStatus":false,"favoriteStatus":false,"reportStatus":false,"tweetType":1,"comments":[{"id":4582819,"gmtCreate":1622823049882,"gmtModify":1663227971740,"authorId":3573731511713779,"author":{"id":3573731511713779,"authorId":3573731511713779,"name":"Peiqi","avatar":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/6ad2ab300acbe427a7b14e371265cfd0","vip":1,"crmLevel":2,"crmLevelSwitch":0,"individualDisplayBadges":[]},"repliedAuthorId":0,"objectId":118754656,"type":1,"supId":0,"prevId":0,"content":"[爱你]","text":"[爱你]","html":"[爱你]"},{"id":4582833,"gmtCreate":1622823137151,"gmtModify":1663227971143,"authorId":3553254172092293,"author":{"id":3553254172092293,"authorId":3553254172092293,"name":"DingDang","avatar":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/d2a0c38ce6f3c2661fa15b7d1f52eeaf","vip":1,"crmLevel":2,"crmLevelSwitch":0,"individualDisplayBadges":[]},"repliedAuthorId":0,"objectId":118754656,"type":1,"supId":4582819,"prevId":0,"content":"Yes!!","text":"Yes!!","html":"Yes!!"}],"langContent":"EN"},{"id":118763806,"gmtCreate":1622762644105,"gmtModify":1704190546545,"author":{"id":"3585048303831970","authorId":"3585048303831970","authorIdStr":"3585048303831970","name":"THOMAX","avatar":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/7d3eb5c895e7d95e8defa6b9b43ef97f","vip":1,"crmLevel":2,"crmLevelSwitch":0,"idStr":"3585048303831970"},"htmlText":"?","listText":"?","text":"?","images":[],"top":1,"highlighted":1,"essential":1,"paper":1,"likeSize":0,"commentSize":0,"repostSize":0,"link":"https://ttm.financial/post/118763806","repostId":1152573638,"repostType":4,"repost":{"id":"1152573638","pubTimestamp":1622732138,"share":"https://ttm.financial/m/news/1152573638?lang=&edition=fundamental","pubTime":"2021-06-03 22:55","market":"us","language":"en","title":"Tesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors","url":"https://stock-news.laohu8.com/highlight/detail?id=1152573638","media":"seekingalpha","summary":"Summary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very hi","content":"Summary\n<ul>\n <li>As long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.</li>\n <li>Shareholders assuming Tesla's Price/Book multiple deflates from around 25 to 5 over the next 10 years need book value per share to grow 5x just to break even.</li>\n <li>So far, Tesla's growth in book value is mostly from \"Additional Paid-In Capital\" (issuing new shares at high prices), rather than retained earnings.</li>\n <li>Long-term earnings estimates imply book value per share sums up to 150-250 by the end of 2030, meaning a breakeven Price/Book of 2.5-4x, which is well above most mature autos.</li>\n <li>I present a 1x2 put spread as an attractive trade both for long investors concerned about overvaluation, as well as those seeking to bet on a Price/Book multiple contraction.</li>\n</ul>\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/c329e23b2762c47b11d11d95ec584959\" tg-width=\"768\" tg-height=\"512\">Photo by Jag_cz/iStock Editorial via Getty Images\nBook value per share is likely not the first metric that comes to mind when you think of a \"growth company of the future\" like Tesla (TSLA), but in this article, I will explain why book value per share is the most important bottom line number long-term investors in this company should watch. As long as zero dividends are expected, a TSLA shareholder's total return will, by definition, be defined by the growth of Tesla's book value per share crossed against the change in the Price/Book (P/B) multiple of those shares. After looking at some numbers underlying TSLA's book value per share, and how much it will have to grow for current TSLA shareholders to make money, I conclude with three actionable option strategies based on expectations for how these numbers may change in the medium term. This article also can be seen as a follow up to the&nbsp;2041 breakeven projection of Tesla I published last year.\nTesla Share Price Rise Follows Book Value\nThe first chart here shows how the rise in Tesla's share price has moved remarkably in line with TSLA's growth in book value per share. TSLA has so far never paid a dividend.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/c1f994d62f1ec67c3b95ae15c3791fa8\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"458\">Data by YCharts\nMultiple Expansion and Contraction\nThe above chart, which is on a log scale, is far smoother than that of the (P/B) ratio between these two numbers. The multiple seemed to have stabilized between 2017 and late 2019, but its rise from below 7 in mid-2019 to over 40 in late 2020 and back to around 26 today explains much of TSLA's recent surge and volatility. Another way of thinking about it: TSLA's book value per share is up roughly 4-fold in the past two years, and its P/B is up about 4-fold over the past two years, which together explain why TSLA's shares are up about 16-fold over the past two years. The big question for investors at these levels is: What future combination of book value growth and P/B expansion or contraction can be expected to produce a satisfactory rate of return?\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/b8eb71b806f59aaabd5d09a6eb4b1606\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\nUnderstanding Tesla's Book Value Growth\nAlthough the title of my Marketplace serviceLong Run Incomeimplies a preference for dividends, we believe high-quality book value growth is the best kind of \"dividend alternative\" for companies who can reinvest cash profits internally at far higher rates of return than I can externally. I would challenge any investor to explain why else to buy a low-dividend or no-dividend stock except for the expectation of higher returns from book value growth. For that reason, I have come to focus my analysis of growth companies on how well they seem able to grow book value per share.\nI break down Tesla's book value trajectory into two main parts: Retained Earnings, and Additional Paid In Capital. Although Tesla seems to have \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability, having reported&nbsp;7 consecutive quarters of positive earnings since September 2019, accumulated profits still fall short of accumulated losses by over $4 billion.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/08701c599a8c6fa7a66efde3c0a12cac\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\nThe other \"half\" (actually over 100%) of Tesla's book value comes from the money paid in by investors. TSLA has continuously raised capital over the past several years by issuing new shares, and the higher the valuation multiple at which TSLA can issue new shares, the more it can accumulate in Additional Paid In Capital. These share issuances also raise the number of shares outstanding, which has the dual effect of raising Tesla's overall market value (since the price per share is now multiplied by more shares), and diluting each share's per-share book value. This increase in book value per share and decline in Price/Book in every recent new share issuance effectively reflects a \"profit\" earlier shareholders enjoy for having later investors pay a higher valuation to get into the company.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/971bf86f3d08fe938af2845121be8d4c\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"441\">Data by YCharts\nPutting these above two charts together, we see that so far Tesla has \"made\" over $27 billion selling shares of its stock to investors, vs. losing over $4 billion in trying to sell cars and batteries to customers, and of course the latter eventually needs to overtake the former for investors to start making their money back.\nHow Tesla's Earnings Projections Add Up\nIf we assume that Tesla stops issuing new shares (a big assumption, but necessary to keep the math simple), then we can add up projected earnings per share to the book value per share to accumulate a projection of future book value per share. Projections of Tesla's future earnings deserve their own article or research report, so for the purposes of this update, I'll use the low vs high analyst forecasts on Tesla'sSeeking Alphaearnings page:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/f36166f6653fb8e11941e3c58b313ccb\" tg-width=\"640\" tg-height=\"312\">Source:SeekingAlpha Earnings Page For TSLA\nNote that between 2025 and 2025, the low and median EPS estimates jump as the number of analysts covering the stock that far out falls from 11 to two, implying that the two analysts projecting TSLA's earnings out to 2030 are on the more optimistic end of the street. If we add up the low and high EPS estimates to today's starting book value per share of $23.90, we get a forecast of TSLA's book value of between $160 and $235 per share for the end of 2030. From today's price of around $623.90 per share, that means if TSLA's book value grows to around $200 (the middle of that optimistic range), then a contraction in TSLA's P/B from today's level of 26 to a still \"high for hardware\" multiple of 3 would mean shareholders would earn a 0% return between now and 2030. In other words, someone buying TSLA today would have to believe that either:\n<ol>\n <li>Tesla will grow its earnings and book value even faster than the most optimistic analyst estimates, or</li>\n <li>That investors will continue paying P/B multiples well above 3 for the stock.</li>\n</ol>\nOn forecasting what TSLA's P/B might be by 2030, there are three ways I can see expecting a multiple of 3 or higher:\n<ol>\n <li>Another valuation bubble: The P/B of Toyota Motor Corp. (TM), charted below, reached highs around 3 in Japan's late 1980s bubble, and again in the late 1990s \"echo bubble,\" and that was its high. If TSLA becomes like TM by 2030, this sort of broader stock valuation bubble may be needed to provide an attractive return on the exit price.</li>\n <li>Business transformation: The biggest TSLA bulls I speak to are those who believe TSLA may either remain a premium hardware maker with services on top like Apple Inc. (AAPL), or as a more asset-light, high return software platform like Microsoft (MSFT), whose P/B ratios are charted below Toyota's.</li>\n <li>Financial engineering: One other driver of Apple's&nbsp;P/B expansion is buybacks, as I explained in this example with McDonald's. Buybacks at high P/B multiples reduce book value per share and raise the P/B multiple, all else equal, in ways exactly opposite to how Tesla has been only issuing (not buying back) shares so far.</li>\n</ol>\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/59e353b1112fb465bf275bfd2e2f5c38\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/7432d2c24afe124c70d139e0320f2d0c\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"441\">Data by YCharts\nAnother way of comparing Tesla's $36 billion in annual sales vs. Toyota's $257 billion is on a revenue per capital basis. In other words, Tesla currently grosses around $5/year per person on the planet, vs. Toyota's roughly $37/year per human on earth. The growth question for 2030 is whether Tesla can still reach Toyota's number, especially given that:\n<ol>\n <li>Demand for transportation, in terms of global population times the percentage of the global population that can afford a car, is likely to grow at a slower pace than historically, especially after 2030, and</li>\n <li>Self-driving cars that aren't owned by one person, and so don't need to be parked idle most of the time, might actually decrease demand for new cars.</li>\n</ol>\nWithout continued high growth past 2030, even 3x book might be on the high end for a car or battery company.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/ed6900c059b599cc5885a2184ad6db05\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"537\">Data byYCharts\nTrading a TSLA P/B Contraction\nMy favorite actionable strategies on a stock like TSLA, which I don't expect to fundamentally collapse, but do expect to experience a significant multiple contraction, generally involve some form of option put spread. The option strategy described below works both for bears wanting to profit from an outright 20%-30% decline, or long-term bulls wanting to protect their shares' value against such a decline.\nOne challenge with simply buying put spreads on TSLA is that its option prices imply a significant \"positive skew,\" which makes put spreads relatively expensive to call spreads. In other words, the market is implying an expectation that TSLA shares are more likely than not to fall a little, offset by a smaller chance of a much larger upside move. Most of the near-the-money put spreads on TSLA cost more than 50% of the maximum payoff, even with longer-dated options or lower strike prices.\nFor the time horizon, I'm choosing the June 17, 2022, expiry date, which as of this writing is a little more than one year out. The main reasons I find first the expiry after one year to be a \"sweet spot\" for this type of strategy include:\n<ol>\n <li>As opposed to outright short selling, buying a put spread to profit from a decline in a share price may qualify for long-term capital gains tax treatment, as we would be holding a long position in a put spread longer than one year.</li>\n <li>As opposed to even longer-dated options (say the two-year options expiring June 2023), rolling one-year options forces us to reevaluate our valuation and strike prices and decide if and in what form to roll the strategy after four more quarterly book value updates.</li>\n</ol>\nIn this strategy, we buy 1x 650 strike put around 150 and then sell 2x 500 puts around 75 each, for roughly zero net up-front premium. Payoff scenarios based on TSLA's closing price at expiry include:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/d8d415689c4d898bc75eba42b9f79152\" tg-width=\"640\" tg-height=\"452\">Source: My Own Excel Calculation and Chart\nThe maximum payout ($150/share) divided by the maximum loss ($350/share) presents a \"maximum rate of return\" on this strategy is +42.8%, though getting that exact maximum payout is nearly impossible (as it requires TSLA to close at exactly $500/share on the expiry date). More likely, this option strategy would deliver a rate of return of more than 14.2% on the maximum loss if TSLA closes between 400-600 at expiry. If we follow the earlier earnings estimates and project TSLA's book value per share to be around $30/share by then, that means we expect a contract in P/B to between 13-20 by next summer.\nConclusion\nFor high-growth, non-dividend paying stocks like Tesla, return expectations break down into expectations of book value growth times expectation of P/B multiple expansion or contraction. Now that it's \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability and reached a respectable level of sales, I believe Tesla is less likely to be the next&nbsp;DeLorean Motor Company, and at best like Microsoft in 2000. To summarize an example I often reference inLong Run Income, from 2000 to 2010, Microsoft's business continued to grow, but investors who bought at the beginning of 2000 were still down over 36% 10 years later because Microsoft's P/B multiple declined by that much more than the business grew. Here is one chart showing that \"lost decade\" for MSFT shareholders.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/faaf554d7a7744d36d27ea7f92e9a9e2\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"475\">Data by YCharts\nFor investors who want to hedge a decline in TSLA shares from here to $500, or those who believe TSLA may be a good company that is just wildly overvalued at these levels and may be worth buying below $500, the 1x2 put spread strategy described above may be worth considering.","collect":0,"html":"<!DOCTYPE html>\n<html>\n<head>\n<meta http-equiv=\"Content-Type\" content=\"text/html; charset=utf-8\" />\n<meta name=\"viewport\" content=\"width=device-width,initial-scale=1.0,minimum-scale=1.0,maximum-scale=1.0,user-scalable=no\"/>\n<meta name=\"format-detection\" content=\"telephone=no,email=no,address=no\" />\n<title>Tesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors</title>\n<style type=\"text/css\">\na,abbr,acronym,address,applet,article,aside,audio,b,big,blockquote,body,canvas,caption,center,cite,code,dd,del,details,dfn,div,dl,dt,\nem,embed,fieldset,figcaption,figure,footer,form,h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6,header,hgroup,html,i,iframe,img,ins,kbd,label,legend,li,mark,menu,nav,\nobject,ol,output,p,pre,q,ruby,s,samp,section,small,span,strike,strong,sub,summary,sup,table,tbody,td,tfoot,th,thead,time,tr,tt,u,ul,var,video{ font:inherit;margin:0;padding:0;vertical-align:baseline;border:0 }\nbody{ font-size:16px; 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}\n.meta {color:#5e5c6d;font-size:13px;margin:0 0 .5em; }\na{text-decoration:none; color:#2a4b87;}\n.meta .head { display: inline-block; overflow: hidden}\n.head .h-thumb { width: 30px; height: 30px; margin: 0; padding: 0; border-radius: 50%; float: left;}\n.head .h-content { margin: 0; padding: 0 0 0 9px; float: left;}\n.head .h-name {font-size: 13px; color: #eee; margin: 0;}\n.head .h-time {font-size: 11px; color: #7E829C; margin: 0;line-height: 11px;}\n.small {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.9); -webkit-transform: scale(0.9); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.smaller {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.8); -webkit-transform: scale(0.8); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.bt-text {font-size: 12px;margin: 1.5em 0 0 0}\n.bt-text p {margin: 0}\n</style>\n</head>\n<body>\n<div class=\"wrapper\">\n<header>\n<h2 class=\"title\">\nTesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors\n</h2>\n\n<h4 class=\"meta\">\n\n\n2021-06-03 22:55 GMT+8&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<a href=https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors>seekingalpha</a>\n\n\n</h4>\n\n</header>\n<article>\n<div>\nSummary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.\nShareholders assuming Tesla's ...\n\n<a href=\"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors\">Web Link</a>\n\n</div>\n\n\n</article>\n</div>\n</body>\n</html>\n","type":0,"thumbnail":"","relate_stocks":{"TSLA":"特斯拉"},"source_url":"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors","is_english":true,"share_image_url":"https://static.laohu8.com/e9f99090a1c2ed51c021029395664489","article_id":"1152573638","content_text":"Summary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.\nShareholders assuming Tesla's Price/Book multiple deflates from around 25 to 5 over the next 10 years need book value per share to grow 5x just to break even.\nSo far, Tesla's growth in book value is mostly from \"Additional Paid-In Capital\" (issuing new shares at high prices), rather than retained earnings.\nLong-term earnings estimates imply book value per share sums up to 150-250 by the end of 2030, meaning a breakeven Price/Book of 2.5-4x, which is well above most mature autos.\nI present a 1x2 put spread as an attractive trade both for long investors concerned about overvaluation, as well as those seeking to bet on a Price/Book multiple contraction.\n\nPhoto by Jag_cz/iStock Editorial via Getty Images\nBook value per share is likely not the first metric that comes to mind when you think of a \"growth company of the future\" like Tesla (TSLA), but in this article, I will explain why book value per share is the most important bottom line number long-term investors in this company should watch. As long as zero dividends are expected, a TSLA shareholder's total return will, by definition, be defined by the growth of Tesla's book value per share crossed against the change in the Price/Book (P/B) multiple of those shares. After looking at some numbers underlying TSLA's book value per share, and how much it will have to grow for current TSLA shareholders to make money, I conclude with three actionable option strategies based on expectations for how these numbers may change in the medium term. This article also can be seen as a follow up to the 2041 breakeven projection of Tesla I published last year.\nTesla Share Price Rise Follows Book Value\nThe first chart here shows how the rise in Tesla's share price has moved remarkably in line with TSLA's growth in book value per share. TSLA has so far never paid a dividend.\nData by YCharts\nMultiple Expansion and Contraction\nThe above chart, which is on a log scale, is far smoother than that of the (P/B) ratio between these two numbers. The multiple seemed to have stabilized between 2017 and late 2019, but its rise from below 7 in mid-2019 to over 40 in late 2020 and back to around 26 today explains much of TSLA's recent surge and volatility. Another way of thinking about it: TSLA's book value per share is up roughly 4-fold in the past two years, and its P/B is up about 4-fold over the past two years, which together explain why TSLA's shares are up about 16-fold over the past two years. The big question for investors at these levels is: What future combination of book value growth and P/B expansion or contraction can be expected to produce a satisfactory rate of return?\nData by YCharts\nUnderstanding Tesla's Book Value Growth\nAlthough the title of my Marketplace serviceLong Run Incomeimplies a preference for dividends, we believe high-quality book value growth is the best kind of \"dividend alternative\" for companies who can reinvest cash profits internally at far higher rates of return than I can externally. I would challenge any investor to explain why else to buy a low-dividend or no-dividend stock except for the expectation of higher returns from book value growth. For that reason, I have come to focus my analysis of growth companies on how well they seem able to grow book value per share.\nI break down Tesla's book value trajectory into two main parts: Retained Earnings, and Additional Paid In Capital. Although Tesla seems to have \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability, having reported 7 consecutive quarters of positive earnings since September 2019, accumulated profits still fall short of accumulated losses by over $4 billion.\nData by YCharts\nThe other \"half\" (actually over 100%) of Tesla's book value comes from the money paid in by investors. TSLA has continuously raised capital over the past several years by issuing new shares, and the higher the valuation multiple at which TSLA can issue new shares, the more it can accumulate in Additional Paid In Capital. These share issuances also raise the number of shares outstanding, which has the dual effect of raising Tesla's overall market value (since the price per share is now multiplied by more shares), and diluting each share's per-share book value. This increase in book value per share and decline in Price/Book in every recent new share issuance effectively reflects a \"profit\" earlier shareholders enjoy for having later investors pay a higher valuation to get into the company.\nData by YCharts\nPutting these above two charts together, we see that so far Tesla has \"made\" over $27 billion selling shares of its stock to investors, vs. losing over $4 billion in trying to sell cars and batteries to customers, and of course the latter eventually needs to overtake the former for investors to start making their money back.\nHow Tesla's Earnings Projections Add Up\nIf we assume that Tesla stops issuing new shares (a big assumption, but necessary to keep the math simple), then we can add up projected earnings per share to the book value per share to accumulate a projection of future book value per share. Projections of Tesla's future earnings deserve their own article or research report, so for the purposes of this update, I'll use the low vs high analyst forecasts on Tesla'sSeeking Alphaearnings page:\nSource:SeekingAlpha Earnings Page For TSLA\nNote that between 2025 and 2025, the low and median EPS estimates jump as the number of analysts covering the stock that far out falls from 11 to two, implying that the two analysts projecting TSLA's earnings out to 2030 are on the more optimistic end of the street. If we add up the low and high EPS estimates to today's starting book value per share of $23.90, we get a forecast of TSLA's book value of between $160 and $235 per share for the end of 2030. From today's price of around $623.90 per share, that means if TSLA's book value grows to around $200 (the middle of that optimistic range), then a contraction in TSLA's P/B from today's level of 26 to a still \"high for hardware\" multiple of 3 would mean shareholders would earn a 0% return between now and 2030. In other words, someone buying TSLA today would have to believe that either:\n\nTesla will grow its earnings and book value even faster than the most optimistic analyst estimates, or\nThat investors will continue paying P/B multiples well above 3 for the stock.\n\nOn forecasting what TSLA's P/B might be by 2030, there are three ways I can see expecting a multiple of 3 or higher:\n\nAnother valuation bubble: The P/B of Toyota Motor Corp. (TM), charted below, reached highs around 3 in Japan's late 1980s bubble, and again in the late 1990s \"echo bubble,\" and that was its high. If TSLA becomes like TM by 2030, this sort of broader stock valuation bubble may be needed to provide an attractive return on the exit price.\nBusiness transformation: The biggest TSLA bulls I speak to are those who believe TSLA may either remain a premium hardware maker with services on top like Apple Inc. (AAPL), or as a more asset-light, high return software platform like Microsoft (MSFT), whose P/B ratios are charted below Toyota's.\nFinancial engineering: One other driver of Apple's P/B expansion is buybacks, as I explained in this example with McDonald's. Buybacks at high P/B multiples reduce book value per share and raise the P/B multiple, all else equal, in ways exactly opposite to how Tesla has been only issuing (not buying back) shares so far.\n\nData by YCharts\nData by YCharts\nAnother way of comparing Tesla's $36 billion in annual sales vs. Toyota's $257 billion is on a revenue per capital basis. In other words, Tesla currently grosses around $5/year per person on the planet, vs. Toyota's roughly $37/year per human on earth. The growth question for 2030 is whether Tesla can still reach Toyota's number, especially given that:\n\nDemand for transportation, in terms of global population times the percentage of the global population that can afford a car, is likely to grow at a slower pace than historically, especially after 2030, and\nSelf-driving cars that aren't owned by one person, and so don't need to be parked idle most of the time, might actually decrease demand for new cars.\n\nWithout continued high growth past 2030, even 3x book might be on the high end for a car or battery company.\nData byYCharts\nTrading a TSLA P/B Contraction\nMy favorite actionable strategies on a stock like TSLA, which I don't expect to fundamentally collapse, but do expect to experience a significant multiple contraction, generally involve some form of option put spread. The option strategy described below works both for bears wanting to profit from an outright 20%-30% decline, or long-term bulls wanting to protect their shares' value against such a decline.\nOne challenge with simply buying put spreads on TSLA is that its option prices imply a significant \"positive skew,\" which makes put spreads relatively expensive to call spreads. In other words, the market is implying an expectation that TSLA shares are more likely than not to fall a little, offset by a smaller chance of a much larger upside move. Most of the near-the-money put spreads on TSLA cost more than 50% of the maximum payoff, even with longer-dated options or lower strike prices.\nFor the time horizon, I'm choosing the June 17, 2022, expiry date, which as of this writing is a little more than one year out. The main reasons I find first the expiry after one year to be a \"sweet spot\" for this type of strategy include:\n\nAs opposed to outright short selling, buying a put spread to profit from a decline in a share price may qualify for long-term capital gains tax treatment, as we would be holding a long position in a put spread longer than one year.\nAs opposed to even longer-dated options (say the two-year options expiring June 2023), rolling one-year options forces us to reevaluate our valuation and strike prices and decide if and in what form to roll the strategy after four more quarterly book value updates.\n\nIn this strategy, we buy 1x 650 strike put around 150 and then sell 2x 500 puts around 75 each, for roughly zero net up-front premium. Payoff scenarios based on TSLA's closing price at expiry include:\nSource: My Own Excel Calculation and Chart\nThe maximum payout ($150/share) divided by the maximum loss ($350/share) presents a \"maximum rate of return\" on this strategy is +42.8%, though getting that exact maximum payout is nearly impossible (as it requires TSLA to close at exactly $500/share on the expiry date). More likely, this option strategy would deliver a rate of return of more than 14.2% on the maximum loss if TSLA closes between 400-600 at expiry. If we follow the earlier earnings estimates and project TSLA's book value per share to be around $30/share by then, that means we expect a contract in P/B to between 13-20 by next summer.\nConclusion\nFor high-growth, non-dividend paying stocks like Tesla, return expectations break down into expectations of book value growth times expectation of P/B multiple expansion or contraction. Now that it's \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability and reached a respectable level of sales, I believe Tesla is less likely to be the next DeLorean Motor Company, and at best like Microsoft in 2000. To summarize an example I often reference inLong Run Income, from 2000 to 2010, Microsoft's business continued to grow, but investors who bought at the beginning of 2000 were still down over 36% 10 years later because Microsoft's P/B multiple declined by that much more than the business grew. Here is one chart showing that \"lost decade\" for MSFT shareholders.\nData by YCharts\nFor investors who want to hedge a decline in TSLA shares from here to $500, or those who believe TSLA may be a good company that is just wildly overvalued at these levels and may be worth buying below $500, the 1x2 put spread strategy described above may be worth considering.","news_type":1},"isVote":1,"likeStatus":false,"favoriteStatus":false,"reportStatus":false,"tweetType":1,"langContent":"EN"},{"id":118787605,"gmtCreate":1622762547907,"gmtModify":1704190540726,"author":{"id":"3579931573579109","authorId":"3579931573579109","authorIdStr":"3579931573579109","name":"Kiranaar","avatar":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/fc9541e5ba792fc73edc7524c494929f","vip":1,"hat":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/646756f1284a5a6480ed02cc4fa7d1d2","crmLevel":7,"crmLevelSwitch":1,"idStr":"3579931573579109"},"htmlText":"Is it a buy now?","listText":"Is it a buy now?","text":"Is it a buy now?","images":[],"top":1,"highlighted":1,"essential":1,"paper":1,"likeSize":0,"commentSize":2,"repostSize":0,"link":"https://ttm.financial/post/118787605","repostId":1152573638,"repostType":4,"repost":{"id":"1152573638","pubTimestamp":1622732138,"share":"https://ttm.financial/m/news/1152573638?lang=&edition=fundamental","pubTime":"2021-06-03 22:55","market":"us","language":"en","title":"Tesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors","url":"https://stock-news.laohu8.com/highlight/detail?id=1152573638","media":"seekingalpha","summary":"Summary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very hi","content":"Summary\n<ul>\n <li>As long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.</li>\n <li>Shareholders assuming Tesla's Price/Book multiple deflates from around 25 to 5 over the next 10 years need book value per share to grow 5x just to break even.</li>\n <li>So far, Tesla's growth in book value is mostly from \"Additional Paid-In Capital\" (issuing new shares at high prices), rather than retained earnings.</li>\n <li>Long-term earnings estimates imply book value per share sums up to 150-250 by the end of 2030, meaning a breakeven Price/Book of 2.5-4x, which is well above most mature autos.</li>\n <li>I present a 1x2 put spread as an attractive trade both for long investors concerned about overvaluation, as well as those seeking to bet on a Price/Book multiple contraction.</li>\n</ul>\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/c329e23b2762c47b11d11d95ec584959\" tg-width=\"768\" tg-height=\"512\">Photo by Jag_cz/iStock Editorial via Getty Images\nBook value per share is likely not the first metric that comes to mind when you think of a \"growth company of the future\" like Tesla (TSLA), but in this article, I will explain why book value per share is the most important bottom line number long-term investors in this company should watch. As long as zero dividends are expected, a TSLA shareholder's total return will, by definition, be defined by the growth of Tesla's book value per share crossed against the change in the Price/Book (P/B) multiple of those shares. After looking at some numbers underlying TSLA's book value per share, and how much it will have to grow for current TSLA shareholders to make money, I conclude with three actionable option strategies based on expectations for how these numbers may change in the medium term. This article also can be seen as a follow up to the&nbsp;2041 breakeven projection of Tesla I published last year.\nTesla Share Price Rise Follows Book Value\nThe first chart here shows how the rise in Tesla's share price has moved remarkably in line with TSLA's growth in book value per share. TSLA has so far never paid a dividend.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/c1f994d62f1ec67c3b95ae15c3791fa8\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"458\">Data by YCharts\nMultiple Expansion and Contraction\nThe above chart, which is on a log scale, is far smoother than that of the (P/B) ratio between these two numbers. The multiple seemed to have stabilized between 2017 and late 2019, but its rise from below 7 in mid-2019 to over 40 in late 2020 and back to around 26 today explains much of TSLA's recent surge and volatility. Another way of thinking about it: TSLA's book value per share is up roughly 4-fold in the past two years, and its P/B is up about 4-fold over the past two years, which together explain why TSLA's shares are up about 16-fold over the past two years. The big question for investors at these levels is: What future combination of book value growth and P/B expansion or contraction can be expected to produce a satisfactory rate of return?\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/b8eb71b806f59aaabd5d09a6eb4b1606\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\nUnderstanding Tesla's Book Value Growth\nAlthough the title of my Marketplace serviceLong Run Incomeimplies a preference for dividends, we believe high-quality book value growth is the best kind of \"dividend alternative\" for companies who can reinvest cash profits internally at far higher rates of return than I can externally. I would challenge any investor to explain why else to buy a low-dividend or no-dividend stock except for the expectation of higher returns from book value growth. For that reason, I have come to focus my analysis of growth companies on how well they seem able to grow book value per share.\nI break down Tesla's book value trajectory into two main parts: Retained Earnings, and Additional Paid In Capital. Although Tesla seems to have \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability, having reported&nbsp;7 consecutive quarters of positive earnings since September 2019, accumulated profits still fall short of accumulated losses by over $4 billion.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/08701c599a8c6fa7a66efde3c0a12cac\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\nThe other \"half\" (actually over 100%) of Tesla's book value comes from the money paid in by investors. TSLA has continuously raised capital over the past several years by issuing new shares, and the higher the valuation multiple at which TSLA can issue new shares, the more it can accumulate in Additional Paid In Capital. These share issuances also raise the number of shares outstanding, which has the dual effect of raising Tesla's overall market value (since the price per share is now multiplied by more shares), and diluting each share's per-share book value. This increase in book value per share and decline in Price/Book in every recent new share issuance effectively reflects a \"profit\" earlier shareholders enjoy for having later investors pay a higher valuation to get into the company.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/971bf86f3d08fe938af2845121be8d4c\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"441\">Data by YCharts\nPutting these above two charts together, we see that so far Tesla has \"made\" over $27 billion selling shares of its stock to investors, vs. losing over $4 billion in trying to sell cars and batteries to customers, and of course the latter eventually needs to overtake the former for investors to start making their money back.\nHow Tesla's Earnings Projections Add Up\nIf we assume that Tesla stops issuing new shares (a big assumption, but necessary to keep the math simple), then we can add up projected earnings per share to the book value per share to accumulate a projection of future book value per share. Projections of Tesla's future earnings deserve their own article or research report, so for the purposes of this update, I'll use the low vs high analyst forecasts on Tesla'sSeeking Alphaearnings page:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/f36166f6653fb8e11941e3c58b313ccb\" tg-width=\"640\" tg-height=\"312\">Source:SeekingAlpha Earnings Page For TSLA\nNote that between 2025 and 2025, the low and median EPS estimates jump as the number of analysts covering the stock that far out falls from 11 to two, implying that the two analysts projecting TSLA's earnings out to 2030 are on the more optimistic end of the street. If we add up the low and high EPS estimates to today's starting book value per share of $23.90, we get a forecast of TSLA's book value of between $160 and $235 per share for the end of 2030. From today's price of around $623.90 per share, that means if TSLA's book value grows to around $200 (the middle of that optimistic range), then a contraction in TSLA's P/B from today's level of 26 to a still \"high for hardware\" multiple of 3 would mean shareholders would earn a 0% return between now and 2030. In other words, someone buying TSLA today would have to believe that either:\n<ol>\n <li>Tesla will grow its earnings and book value even faster than the most optimistic analyst estimates, or</li>\n <li>That investors will continue paying P/B multiples well above 3 for the stock.</li>\n</ol>\nOn forecasting what TSLA's P/B might be by 2030, there are three ways I can see expecting a multiple of 3 or higher:\n<ol>\n <li>Another valuation bubble: The P/B of Toyota Motor Corp. (TM), charted below, reached highs around 3 in Japan's late 1980s bubble, and again in the late 1990s \"echo bubble,\" and that was its high. If TSLA becomes like TM by 2030, this sort of broader stock valuation bubble may be needed to provide an attractive return on the exit price.</li>\n <li>Business transformation: The biggest TSLA bulls I speak to are those who believe TSLA may either remain a premium hardware maker with services on top like Apple Inc. (AAPL), or as a more asset-light, high return software platform like Microsoft (MSFT), whose P/B ratios are charted below Toyota's.</li>\n <li>Financial engineering: One other driver of Apple's&nbsp;P/B expansion is buybacks, as I explained in this example with McDonald's. Buybacks at high P/B multiples reduce book value per share and raise the P/B multiple, all else equal, in ways exactly opposite to how Tesla has been only issuing (not buying back) shares so far.</li>\n</ol>\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/59e353b1112fb465bf275bfd2e2f5c38\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/7432d2c24afe124c70d139e0320f2d0c\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"441\">Data by YCharts\nAnother way of comparing Tesla's $36 billion in annual sales vs. Toyota's $257 billion is on a revenue per capital basis. In other words, Tesla currently grosses around $5/year per person on the planet, vs. Toyota's roughly $37/year per human on earth. The growth question for 2030 is whether Tesla can still reach Toyota's number, especially given that:\n<ol>\n <li>Demand for transportation, in terms of global population times the percentage of the global population that can afford a car, is likely to grow at a slower pace than historically, especially after 2030, and</li>\n <li>Self-driving cars that aren't owned by one person, and so don't need to be parked idle most of the time, might actually decrease demand for new cars.</li>\n</ol>\nWithout continued high growth past 2030, even 3x book might be on the high end for a car or battery company.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/ed6900c059b599cc5885a2184ad6db05\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"537\">Data byYCharts\nTrading a TSLA P/B Contraction\nMy favorite actionable strategies on a stock like TSLA, which I don't expect to fundamentally collapse, but do expect to experience a significant multiple contraction, generally involve some form of option put spread. The option strategy described below works both for bears wanting to profit from an outright 20%-30% decline, or long-term bulls wanting to protect their shares' value against such a decline.\nOne challenge with simply buying put spreads on TSLA is that its option prices imply a significant \"positive skew,\" which makes put spreads relatively expensive to call spreads. In other words, the market is implying an expectation that TSLA shares are more likely than not to fall a little, offset by a smaller chance of a much larger upside move. Most of the near-the-money put spreads on TSLA cost more than 50% of the maximum payoff, even with longer-dated options or lower strike prices.\nFor the time horizon, I'm choosing the June 17, 2022, expiry date, which as of this writing is a little more than one year out. The main reasons I find first the expiry after one year to be a \"sweet spot\" for this type of strategy include:\n<ol>\n <li>As opposed to outright short selling, buying a put spread to profit from a decline in a share price may qualify for long-term capital gains tax treatment, as we would be holding a long position in a put spread longer than one year.</li>\n <li>As opposed to even longer-dated options (say the two-year options expiring June 2023), rolling one-year options forces us to reevaluate our valuation and strike prices and decide if and in what form to roll the strategy after four more quarterly book value updates.</li>\n</ol>\nIn this strategy, we buy 1x 650 strike put around 150 and then sell 2x 500 puts around 75 each, for roughly zero net up-front premium. Payoff scenarios based on TSLA's closing price at expiry include:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/d8d415689c4d898bc75eba42b9f79152\" tg-width=\"640\" tg-height=\"452\">Source: My Own Excel Calculation and Chart\nThe maximum payout ($150/share) divided by the maximum loss ($350/share) presents a \"maximum rate of return\" on this strategy is +42.8%, though getting that exact maximum payout is nearly impossible (as it requires TSLA to close at exactly $500/share on the expiry date). More likely, this option strategy would deliver a rate of return of more than 14.2% on the maximum loss if TSLA closes between 400-600 at expiry. If we follow the earlier earnings estimates and project TSLA's book value per share to be around $30/share by then, that means we expect a contract in P/B to between 13-20 by next summer.\nConclusion\nFor high-growth, non-dividend paying stocks like Tesla, return expectations break down into expectations of book value growth times expectation of P/B multiple expansion or contraction. Now that it's \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability and reached a respectable level of sales, I believe Tesla is less likely to be the next&nbsp;DeLorean Motor Company, and at best like Microsoft in 2000. To summarize an example I often reference inLong Run Income, from 2000 to 2010, Microsoft's business continued to grow, but investors who bought at the beginning of 2000 were still down over 36% 10 years later because Microsoft's P/B multiple declined by that much more than the business grew. Here is one chart showing that \"lost decade\" for MSFT shareholders.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/faaf554d7a7744d36d27ea7f92e9a9e2\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"475\">Data by YCharts\nFor investors who want to hedge a decline in TSLA shares from here to $500, or those who believe TSLA may be a good company that is just wildly overvalued at these levels and may be worth buying below $500, the 1x2 put spread strategy described above may be worth considering.","collect":0,"html":"<!DOCTYPE html>\n<html>\n<head>\n<meta http-equiv=\"Content-Type\" content=\"text/html; charset=utf-8\" />\n<meta name=\"viewport\" content=\"width=device-width,initial-scale=1.0,minimum-scale=1.0,maximum-scale=1.0,user-scalable=no\"/>\n<meta name=\"format-detection\" content=\"telephone=no,email=no,address=no\" />\n<title>Tesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors</title>\n<style type=\"text/css\">\na,abbr,acronym,address,applet,article,aside,audio,b,big,blockquote,body,canvas,caption,center,cite,code,dd,del,details,dfn,div,dl,dt,\nem,embed,fieldset,figcaption,figure,footer,form,h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6,header,hgroup,html,i,iframe,img,ins,kbd,label,legend,li,mark,menu,nav,\nobject,ol,output,p,pre,q,ruby,s,samp,section,small,span,strike,strong,sub,summary,sup,table,tbody,td,tfoot,th,thead,time,tr,tt,u,ul,var,video{ font:inherit;margin:0;padding:0;vertical-align:baseline;border:0 }\nbody{ font-size:16px; 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}\n.meta {color:#5e5c6d;font-size:13px;margin:0 0 .5em; }\na{text-decoration:none; color:#2a4b87;}\n.meta .head { display: inline-block; overflow: hidden}\n.head .h-thumb { width: 30px; height: 30px; margin: 0; padding: 0; border-radius: 50%; float: left;}\n.head .h-content { margin: 0; padding: 0 0 0 9px; float: left;}\n.head .h-name {font-size: 13px; color: #eee; margin: 0;}\n.head .h-time {font-size: 11px; color: #7E829C; margin: 0;line-height: 11px;}\n.small {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.9); -webkit-transform: scale(0.9); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.smaller {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.8); -webkit-transform: scale(0.8); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.bt-text {font-size: 12px;margin: 1.5em 0 0 0}\n.bt-text p {margin: 0}\n</style>\n</head>\n<body>\n<div class=\"wrapper\">\n<header>\n<h2 class=\"title\">\nTesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors\n</h2>\n\n<h4 class=\"meta\">\n\n\n2021-06-03 22:55 GMT+8&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<a href=https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors>seekingalpha</a>\n\n\n</h4>\n\n</header>\n<article>\n<div>\nSummary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.\nShareholders assuming Tesla's ...\n\n<a href=\"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors\">Web Link</a>\n\n</div>\n\n\n</article>\n</div>\n</body>\n</html>\n","type":0,"thumbnail":"","relate_stocks":{"TSLA":"特斯拉"},"source_url":"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors","is_english":true,"share_image_url":"https://static.laohu8.com/e9f99090a1c2ed51c021029395664489","article_id":"1152573638","content_text":"Summary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.\nShareholders assuming Tesla's Price/Book multiple deflates from around 25 to 5 over the next 10 years need book value per share to grow 5x just to break even.\nSo far, Tesla's growth in book value is mostly from \"Additional Paid-In Capital\" (issuing new shares at high prices), rather than retained earnings.\nLong-term earnings estimates imply book value per share sums up to 150-250 by the end of 2030, meaning a breakeven Price/Book of 2.5-4x, which is well above most mature autos.\nI present a 1x2 put spread as an attractive trade both for long investors concerned about overvaluation, as well as those seeking to bet on a Price/Book multiple contraction.\n\nPhoto by Jag_cz/iStock Editorial via Getty Images\nBook value per share is likely not the first metric that comes to mind when you think of a \"growth company of the future\" like Tesla (TSLA), but in this article, I will explain why book value per share is the most important bottom line number long-term investors in this company should watch. As long as zero dividends are expected, a TSLA shareholder's total return will, by definition, be defined by the growth of Tesla's book value per share crossed against the change in the Price/Book (P/B) multiple of those shares. After looking at some numbers underlying TSLA's book value per share, and how much it will have to grow for current TSLA shareholders to make money, I conclude with three actionable option strategies based on expectations for how these numbers may change in the medium term. This article also can be seen as a follow up to the 2041 breakeven projection of Tesla I published last year.\nTesla Share Price Rise Follows Book Value\nThe first chart here shows how the rise in Tesla's share price has moved remarkably in line with TSLA's growth in book value per share. TSLA has so far never paid a dividend.\nData by YCharts\nMultiple Expansion and Contraction\nThe above chart, which is on a log scale, is far smoother than that of the (P/B) ratio between these two numbers. The multiple seemed to have stabilized between 2017 and late 2019, but its rise from below 7 in mid-2019 to over 40 in late 2020 and back to around 26 today explains much of TSLA's recent surge and volatility. Another way of thinking about it: TSLA's book value per share is up roughly 4-fold in the past two years, and its P/B is up about 4-fold over the past two years, which together explain why TSLA's shares are up about 16-fold over the past two years. The big question for investors at these levels is: What future combination of book value growth and P/B expansion or contraction can be expected to produce a satisfactory rate of return?\nData by YCharts\nUnderstanding Tesla's Book Value Growth\nAlthough the title of my Marketplace serviceLong Run Incomeimplies a preference for dividends, we believe high-quality book value growth is the best kind of \"dividend alternative\" for companies who can reinvest cash profits internally at far higher rates of return than I can externally. I would challenge any investor to explain why else to buy a low-dividend or no-dividend stock except for the expectation of higher returns from book value growth. For that reason, I have come to focus my analysis of growth companies on how well they seem able to grow book value per share.\nI break down Tesla's book value trajectory into two main parts: Retained Earnings, and Additional Paid In Capital. Although Tesla seems to have \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability, having reported 7 consecutive quarters of positive earnings since September 2019, accumulated profits still fall short of accumulated losses by over $4 billion.\nData by YCharts\nThe other \"half\" (actually over 100%) of Tesla's book value comes from the money paid in by investors. TSLA has continuously raised capital over the past several years by issuing new shares, and the higher the valuation multiple at which TSLA can issue new shares, the more it can accumulate in Additional Paid In Capital. These share issuances also raise the number of shares outstanding, which has the dual effect of raising Tesla's overall market value (since the price per share is now multiplied by more shares), and diluting each share's per-share book value. This increase in book value per share and decline in Price/Book in every recent new share issuance effectively reflects a \"profit\" earlier shareholders enjoy for having later investors pay a higher valuation to get into the company.\nData by YCharts\nPutting these above two charts together, we see that so far Tesla has \"made\" over $27 billion selling shares of its stock to investors, vs. losing over $4 billion in trying to sell cars and batteries to customers, and of course the latter eventually needs to overtake the former for investors to start making their money back.\nHow Tesla's Earnings Projections Add Up\nIf we assume that Tesla stops issuing new shares (a big assumption, but necessary to keep the math simple), then we can add up projected earnings per share to the book value per share to accumulate a projection of future book value per share. Projections of Tesla's future earnings deserve their own article or research report, so for the purposes of this update, I'll use the low vs high analyst forecasts on Tesla'sSeeking Alphaearnings page:\nSource:SeekingAlpha Earnings Page For TSLA\nNote that between 2025 and 2025, the low and median EPS estimates jump as the number of analysts covering the stock that far out falls from 11 to two, implying that the two analysts projecting TSLA's earnings out to 2030 are on the more optimistic end of the street. If we add up the low and high EPS estimates to today's starting book value per share of $23.90, we get a forecast of TSLA's book value of between $160 and $235 per share for the end of 2030. From today's price of around $623.90 per share, that means if TSLA's book value grows to around $200 (the middle of that optimistic range), then a contraction in TSLA's P/B from today's level of 26 to a still \"high for hardware\" multiple of 3 would mean shareholders would earn a 0% return between now and 2030. In other words, someone buying TSLA today would have to believe that either:\n\nTesla will grow its earnings and book value even faster than the most optimistic analyst estimates, or\nThat investors will continue paying P/B multiples well above 3 for the stock.\n\nOn forecasting what TSLA's P/B might be by 2030, there are three ways I can see expecting a multiple of 3 or higher:\n\nAnother valuation bubble: The P/B of Toyota Motor Corp. (TM), charted below, reached highs around 3 in Japan's late 1980s bubble, and again in the late 1990s \"echo bubble,\" and that was its high. If TSLA becomes like TM by 2030, this sort of broader stock valuation bubble may be needed to provide an attractive return on the exit price.\nBusiness transformation: The biggest TSLA bulls I speak to are those who believe TSLA may either remain a premium hardware maker with services on top like Apple Inc. (AAPL), or as a more asset-light, high return software platform like Microsoft (MSFT), whose P/B ratios are charted below Toyota's.\nFinancial engineering: One other driver of Apple's P/B expansion is buybacks, as I explained in this example with McDonald's. Buybacks at high P/B multiples reduce book value per share and raise the P/B multiple, all else equal, in ways exactly opposite to how Tesla has been only issuing (not buying back) shares so far.\n\nData by YCharts\nData by YCharts\nAnother way of comparing Tesla's $36 billion in annual sales vs. Toyota's $257 billion is on a revenue per capital basis. In other words, Tesla currently grosses around $5/year per person on the planet, vs. Toyota's roughly $37/year per human on earth. The growth question for 2030 is whether Tesla can still reach Toyota's number, especially given that:\n\nDemand for transportation, in terms of global population times the percentage of the global population that can afford a car, is likely to grow at a slower pace than historically, especially after 2030, and\nSelf-driving cars that aren't owned by one person, and so don't need to be parked idle most of the time, might actually decrease demand for new cars.\n\nWithout continued high growth past 2030, even 3x book might be on the high end for a car or battery company.\nData byYCharts\nTrading a TSLA P/B Contraction\nMy favorite actionable strategies on a stock like TSLA, which I don't expect to fundamentally collapse, but do expect to experience a significant multiple contraction, generally involve some form of option put spread. The option strategy described below works both for bears wanting to profit from an outright 20%-30% decline, or long-term bulls wanting to protect their shares' value against such a decline.\nOne challenge with simply buying put spreads on TSLA is that its option prices imply a significant \"positive skew,\" which makes put spreads relatively expensive to call spreads. In other words, the market is implying an expectation that TSLA shares are more likely than not to fall a little, offset by a smaller chance of a much larger upside move. Most of the near-the-money put spreads on TSLA cost more than 50% of the maximum payoff, even with longer-dated options or lower strike prices.\nFor the time horizon, I'm choosing the June 17, 2022, expiry date, which as of this writing is a little more than one year out. The main reasons I find first the expiry after one year to be a \"sweet spot\" for this type of strategy include:\n\nAs opposed to outright short selling, buying a put spread to profit from a decline in a share price may qualify for long-term capital gains tax treatment, as we would be holding a long position in a put spread longer than one year.\nAs opposed to even longer-dated options (say the two-year options expiring June 2023), rolling one-year options forces us to reevaluate our valuation and strike prices and decide if and in what form to roll the strategy after four more quarterly book value updates.\n\nIn this strategy, we buy 1x 650 strike put around 150 and then sell 2x 500 puts around 75 each, for roughly zero net up-front premium. Payoff scenarios based on TSLA's closing price at expiry include:\nSource: My Own Excel Calculation and Chart\nThe maximum payout ($150/share) divided by the maximum loss ($350/share) presents a \"maximum rate of return\" on this strategy is +42.8%, though getting that exact maximum payout is nearly impossible (as it requires TSLA to close at exactly $500/share on the expiry date). More likely, this option strategy would deliver a rate of return of more than 14.2% on the maximum loss if TSLA closes between 400-600 at expiry. If we follow the earlier earnings estimates and project TSLA's book value per share to be around $30/share by then, that means we expect a contract in P/B to between 13-20 by next summer.\nConclusion\nFor high-growth, non-dividend paying stocks like Tesla, return expectations break down into expectations of book value growth times expectation of P/B multiple expansion or contraction. Now that it's \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability and reached a respectable level of sales, I believe Tesla is less likely to be the next DeLorean Motor Company, and at best like Microsoft in 2000. To summarize an example I often reference inLong Run Income, from 2000 to 2010, Microsoft's business continued to grow, but investors who bought at the beginning of 2000 were still down over 36% 10 years later because Microsoft's P/B multiple declined by that much more than the business grew. Here is one chart showing that \"lost decade\" for MSFT shareholders.\nData by YCharts\nFor investors who want to hedge a decline in TSLA shares from here to $500, or those who believe TSLA may be a good company that is just wildly overvalued at these levels and may be worth buying below $500, the 1x2 put spread strategy described above may be worth considering.","news_type":1},"isVote":1,"likeStatus":false,"favoriteStatus":false,"reportStatus":false,"tweetType":1,"comments":[{"id":4570302,"gmtCreate":1622764769762,"gmtModify":1663227912835,"authorId":3566963423285739,"author":{"id":3566963423285739,"authorId":3566963423285739,"name":"AliceQuah","avatar":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/ab75773a0b4e08c10b11baaf6a467648","vip":1,"crmLevel":2,"crmLevelSwitch":0,"individualDisplayBadges":[]},"repliedAuthorId":0,"objectId":118787605,"type":1,"supId":0,"prevId":0,"content":"I'm not interested","text":"I'm not interested","html":"I'm not interested"},{"id":4569796,"gmtCreate":1622763603285,"gmtModify":1663227910828,"authorId":3553254172092293,"author":{"id":3553254172092293,"authorId":3553254172092293,"name":"DingDang","avatar":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/d2a0c38ce6f3c2661fa15b7d1f52eeaf","vip":1,"crmLevel":2,"crmLevelSwitch":0,"individualDisplayBadges":[]},"repliedAuthorId":0,"objectId":118787605,"type":1,"supId":0,"prevId":0,"content":"MTL!!! Please lIke and comment!","text":"MTL!!! Please lIke and comment!","html":"MTL!!! Please lIke and comment!"}],"langContent":"EN"},{"id":118732396,"gmtCreate":1622761616515,"gmtModify":1704190509949,"author":{"id":"3574411684600657","authorId":"3574411684600657","authorIdStr":"3574411684600657","name":"AJ1977","avatar":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/aa526fc2ee7ebbfedc30edc637c7981f","vip":1,"crmLevel":2,"crmLevelSwitch":0,"idStr":"3574411684600657"},"htmlText":"Gggggggg","listText":"Gggggggg","text":"Gggggggg","images":[],"top":1,"highlighted":1,"essential":1,"paper":1,"likeSize":3,"commentSize":2,"repostSize":0,"link":"https://ttm.financial/post/118732396","repostId":1152573638,"repostType":4,"repost":{"id":"1152573638","pubTimestamp":1622732138,"share":"https://ttm.financial/m/news/1152573638?lang=&edition=fundamental","pubTime":"2021-06-03 22:55","market":"us","language":"en","title":"Tesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors","url":"https://stock-news.laohu8.com/highlight/detail?id=1152573638","media":"seekingalpha","summary":"Summary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very hi","content":"Summary\n<ul>\n <li>As long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.</li>\n <li>Shareholders assuming Tesla's Price/Book multiple deflates from around 25 to 5 over the next 10 years need book value per share to grow 5x just to break even.</li>\n <li>So far, Tesla's growth in book value is mostly from \"Additional Paid-In Capital\" (issuing new shares at high prices), rather than retained earnings.</li>\n <li>Long-term earnings estimates imply book value per share sums up to 150-250 by the end of 2030, meaning a breakeven Price/Book of 2.5-4x, which is well above most mature autos.</li>\n <li>I present a 1x2 put spread as an attractive trade both for long investors concerned about overvaluation, as well as those seeking to bet on a Price/Book multiple contraction.</li>\n</ul>\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/c329e23b2762c47b11d11d95ec584959\" tg-width=\"768\" tg-height=\"512\">Photo by Jag_cz/iStock Editorial via Getty Images\nBook value per share is likely not the first metric that comes to mind when you think of a \"growth company of the future\" like Tesla (TSLA), but in this article, I will explain why book value per share is the most important bottom line number long-term investors in this company should watch. As long as zero dividends are expected, a TSLA shareholder's total return will, by definition, be defined by the growth of Tesla's book value per share crossed against the change in the Price/Book (P/B) multiple of those shares. After looking at some numbers underlying TSLA's book value per share, and how much it will have to grow for current TSLA shareholders to make money, I conclude with three actionable option strategies based on expectations for how these numbers may change in the medium term. This article also can be seen as a follow up to the&nbsp;2041 breakeven projection of Tesla I published last year.\nTesla Share Price Rise Follows Book Value\nThe first chart here shows how the rise in Tesla's share price has moved remarkably in line with TSLA's growth in book value per share. TSLA has so far never paid a dividend.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/c1f994d62f1ec67c3b95ae15c3791fa8\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"458\">Data by YCharts\nMultiple Expansion and Contraction\nThe above chart, which is on a log scale, is far smoother than that of the (P/B) ratio between these two numbers. The multiple seemed to have stabilized between 2017 and late 2019, but its rise from below 7 in mid-2019 to over 40 in late 2020 and back to around 26 today explains much of TSLA's recent surge and volatility. Another way of thinking about it: TSLA's book value per share is up roughly 4-fold in the past two years, and its P/B is up about 4-fold over the past two years, which together explain why TSLA's shares are up about 16-fold over the past two years. The big question for investors at these levels is: What future combination of book value growth and P/B expansion or contraction can be expected to produce a satisfactory rate of return?\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/b8eb71b806f59aaabd5d09a6eb4b1606\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\nUnderstanding Tesla's Book Value Growth\nAlthough the title of my Marketplace serviceLong Run Incomeimplies a preference for dividends, we believe high-quality book value growth is the best kind of \"dividend alternative\" for companies who can reinvest cash profits internally at far higher rates of return than I can externally. I would challenge any investor to explain why else to buy a low-dividend or no-dividend stock except for the expectation of higher returns from book value growth. For that reason, I have come to focus my analysis of growth companies on how well they seem able to grow book value per share.\nI break down Tesla's book value trajectory into two main parts: Retained Earnings, and Additional Paid In Capital. Although Tesla seems to have \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability, having reported&nbsp;7 consecutive quarters of positive earnings since September 2019, accumulated profits still fall short of accumulated losses by over $4 billion.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/08701c599a8c6fa7a66efde3c0a12cac\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\nThe other \"half\" (actually over 100%) of Tesla's book value comes from the money paid in by investors. TSLA has continuously raised capital over the past several years by issuing new shares, and the higher the valuation multiple at which TSLA can issue new shares, the more it can accumulate in Additional Paid In Capital. These share issuances also raise the number of shares outstanding, which has the dual effect of raising Tesla's overall market value (since the price per share is now multiplied by more shares), and diluting each share's per-share book value. This increase in book value per share and decline in Price/Book in every recent new share issuance effectively reflects a \"profit\" earlier shareholders enjoy for having later investors pay a higher valuation to get into the company.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/971bf86f3d08fe938af2845121be8d4c\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"441\">Data by YCharts\nPutting these above two charts together, we see that so far Tesla has \"made\" over $27 billion selling shares of its stock to investors, vs. losing over $4 billion in trying to sell cars and batteries to customers, and of course the latter eventually needs to overtake the former for investors to start making their money back.\nHow Tesla's Earnings Projections Add Up\nIf we assume that Tesla stops issuing new shares (a big assumption, but necessary to keep the math simple), then we can add up projected earnings per share to the book value per share to accumulate a projection of future book value per share. Projections of Tesla's future earnings deserve their own article or research report, so for the purposes of this update, I'll use the low vs high analyst forecasts on Tesla'sSeeking Alphaearnings page:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/f36166f6653fb8e11941e3c58b313ccb\" tg-width=\"640\" tg-height=\"312\">Source:SeekingAlpha Earnings Page For TSLA\nNote that between 2025 and 2025, the low and median EPS estimates jump as the number of analysts covering the stock that far out falls from 11 to two, implying that the two analysts projecting TSLA's earnings out to 2030 are on the more optimistic end of the street. If we add up the low and high EPS estimates to today's starting book value per share of $23.90, we get a forecast of TSLA's book value of between $160 and $235 per share for the end of 2030. From today's price of around $623.90 per share, that means if TSLA's book value grows to around $200 (the middle of that optimistic range), then a contraction in TSLA's P/B from today's level of 26 to a still \"high for hardware\" multiple of 3 would mean shareholders would earn a 0% return between now and 2030. In other words, someone buying TSLA today would have to believe that either:\n<ol>\n <li>Tesla will grow its earnings and book value even faster than the most optimistic analyst estimates, or</li>\n <li>That investors will continue paying P/B multiples well above 3 for the stock.</li>\n</ol>\nOn forecasting what TSLA's P/B might be by 2030, there are three ways I can see expecting a multiple of 3 or higher:\n<ol>\n <li>Another valuation bubble: The P/B of Toyota Motor Corp. (TM), charted below, reached highs around 3 in Japan's late 1980s bubble, and again in the late 1990s \"echo bubble,\" and that was its high. If TSLA becomes like TM by 2030, this sort of broader stock valuation bubble may be needed to provide an attractive return on the exit price.</li>\n <li>Business transformation: The biggest TSLA bulls I speak to are those who believe TSLA may either remain a premium hardware maker with services on top like Apple Inc. (AAPL), or as a more asset-light, high return software platform like Microsoft (MSFT), whose P/B ratios are charted below Toyota's.</li>\n <li>Financial engineering: One other driver of Apple's&nbsp;P/B expansion is buybacks, as I explained in this example with McDonald's. Buybacks at high P/B multiples reduce book value per share and raise the P/B multiple, all else equal, in ways exactly opposite to how Tesla has been only issuing (not buying back) shares so far.</li>\n</ol>\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/59e353b1112fb465bf275bfd2e2f5c38\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/7432d2c24afe124c70d139e0320f2d0c\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"441\">Data by YCharts\nAnother way of comparing Tesla's $36 billion in annual sales vs. Toyota's $257 billion is on a revenue per capital basis. In other words, Tesla currently grosses around $5/year per person on the planet, vs. Toyota's roughly $37/year per human on earth. The growth question for 2030 is whether Tesla can still reach Toyota's number, especially given that:\n<ol>\n <li>Demand for transportation, in terms of global population times the percentage of the global population that can afford a car, is likely to grow at a slower pace than historically, especially after 2030, and</li>\n <li>Self-driving cars that aren't owned by one person, and so don't need to be parked idle most of the time, might actually decrease demand for new cars.</li>\n</ol>\nWithout continued high growth past 2030, even 3x book might be on the high end for a car or battery company.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/ed6900c059b599cc5885a2184ad6db05\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"537\">Data byYCharts\nTrading a TSLA P/B Contraction\nMy favorite actionable strategies on a stock like TSLA, which I don't expect to fundamentally collapse, but do expect to experience a significant multiple contraction, generally involve some form of option put spread. The option strategy described below works both for bears wanting to profit from an outright 20%-30% decline, or long-term bulls wanting to protect their shares' value against such a decline.\nOne challenge with simply buying put spreads on TSLA is that its option prices imply a significant \"positive skew,\" which makes put spreads relatively expensive to call spreads. In other words, the market is implying an expectation that TSLA shares are more likely than not to fall a little, offset by a smaller chance of a much larger upside move. Most of the near-the-money put spreads on TSLA cost more than 50% of the maximum payoff, even with longer-dated options or lower strike prices.\nFor the time horizon, I'm choosing the June 17, 2022, expiry date, which as of this writing is a little more than one year out. The main reasons I find first the expiry after one year to be a \"sweet spot\" for this type of strategy include:\n<ol>\n <li>As opposed to outright short selling, buying a put spread to profit from a decline in a share price may qualify for long-term capital gains tax treatment, as we would be holding a long position in a put spread longer than one year.</li>\n <li>As opposed to even longer-dated options (say the two-year options expiring June 2023), rolling one-year options forces us to reevaluate our valuation and strike prices and decide if and in what form to roll the strategy after four more quarterly book value updates.</li>\n</ol>\nIn this strategy, we buy 1x 650 strike put around 150 and then sell 2x 500 puts around 75 each, for roughly zero net up-front premium. Payoff scenarios based on TSLA's closing price at expiry include:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/d8d415689c4d898bc75eba42b9f79152\" tg-width=\"640\" tg-height=\"452\">Source: My Own Excel Calculation and Chart\nThe maximum payout ($150/share) divided by the maximum loss ($350/share) presents a \"maximum rate of return\" on this strategy is +42.8%, though getting that exact maximum payout is nearly impossible (as it requires TSLA to close at exactly $500/share on the expiry date). More likely, this option strategy would deliver a rate of return of more than 14.2% on the maximum loss if TSLA closes between 400-600 at expiry. If we follow the earlier earnings estimates and project TSLA's book value per share to be around $30/share by then, that means we expect a contract in P/B to between 13-20 by next summer.\nConclusion\nFor high-growth, non-dividend paying stocks like Tesla, return expectations break down into expectations of book value growth times expectation of P/B multiple expansion or contraction. Now that it's \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability and reached a respectable level of sales, I believe Tesla is less likely to be the next&nbsp;DeLorean Motor Company, and at best like Microsoft in 2000. To summarize an example I often reference inLong Run Income, from 2000 to 2010, Microsoft's business continued to grow, but investors who bought at the beginning of 2000 were still down over 36% 10 years later because Microsoft's P/B multiple declined by that much more than the business grew. Here is one chart showing that \"lost decade\" for MSFT shareholders.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/faaf554d7a7744d36d27ea7f92e9a9e2\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"475\">Data by YCharts\nFor investors who want to hedge a decline in TSLA shares from here to $500, or those who believe TSLA may be a good company that is just wildly overvalued at these levels and may be worth buying below $500, the 1x2 put spread strategy described above may be worth considering.","collect":0,"html":"<!DOCTYPE html>\n<html>\n<head>\n<meta http-equiv=\"Content-Type\" content=\"text/html; charset=utf-8\" />\n<meta name=\"viewport\" content=\"width=device-width,initial-scale=1.0,minimum-scale=1.0,maximum-scale=1.0,user-scalable=no\"/>\n<meta name=\"format-detection\" content=\"telephone=no,email=no,address=no\" />\n<title>Tesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors</title>\n<style type=\"text/css\">\na,abbr,acronym,address,applet,article,aside,audio,b,big,blockquote,body,canvas,caption,center,cite,code,dd,del,details,dfn,div,dl,dt,\nem,embed,fieldset,figcaption,figure,footer,form,h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6,header,hgroup,html,i,iframe,img,ins,kbd,label,legend,li,mark,menu,nav,\nobject,ol,output,p,pre,q,ruby,s,samp,section,small,span,strike,strong,sub,summary,sup,table,tbody,td,tfoot,th,thead,time,tr,tt,u,ul,var,video{ font:inherit;margin:0;padding:0;vertical-align:baseline;border:0 }\nbody{ font-size:16px; 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}\n.meta {color:#5e5c6d;font-size:13px;margin:0 0 .5em; }\na{text-decoration:none; color:#2a4b87;}\n.meta .head { display: inline-block; overflow: hidden}\n.head .h-thumb { width: 30px; height: 30px; margin: 0; padding: 0; border-radius: 50%; float: left;}\n.head .h-content { margin: 0; padding: 0 0 0 9px; float: left;}\n.head .h-name {font-size: 13px; color: #eee; margin: 0;}\n.head .h-time {font-size: 11px; color: #7E829C; margin: 0;line-height: 11px;}\n.small {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.9); -webkit-transform: scale(0.9); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.smaller {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.8); -webkit-transform: scale(0.8); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.bt-text {font-size: 12px;margin: 1.5em 0 0 0}\n.bt-text p {margin: 0}\n</style>\n</head>\n<body>\n<div class=\"wrapper\">\n<header>\n<h2 class=\"title\">\nTesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors\n</h2>\n\n<h4 class=\"meta\">\n\n\n2021-06-03 22:55 GMT+8&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<a href=https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors>seekingalpha</a>\n\n\n</h4>\n\n</header>\n<article>\n<div>\nSummary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.\nShareholders assuming Tesla's ...\n\n<a href=\"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors\">Web Link</a>\n\n</div>\n\n\n</article>\n</div>\n</body>\n</html>\n","type":0,"thumbnail":"","relate_stocks":{"TSLA":"特斯拉"},"source_url":"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors","is_english":true,"share_image_url":"https://static.laohu8.com/e9f99090a1c2ed51c021029395664489","article_id":"1152573638","content_text":"Summary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.\nShareholders assuming Tesla's Price/Book multiple deflates from around 25 to 5 over the next 10 years need book value per share to grow 5x just to break even.\nSo far, Tesla's growth in book value is mostly from \"Additional Paid-In Capital\" (issuing new shares at high prices), rather than retained earnings.\nLong-term earnings estimates imply book value per share sums up to 150-250 by the end of 2030, meaning a breakeven Price/Book of 2.5-4x, which is well above most mature autos.\nI present a 1x2 put spread as an attractive trade both for long investors concerned about overvaluation, as well as those seeking to bet on a Price/Book multiple contraction.\n\nPhoto by Jag_cz/iStock Editorial via Getty Images\nBook value per share is likely not the first metric that comes to mind when you think of a \"growth company of the future\" like Tesla (TSLA), but in this article, I will explain why book value per share is the most important bottom line number long-term investors in this company should watch. As long as zero dividends are expected, a TSLA shareholder's total return will, by definition, be defined by the growth of Tesla's book value per share crossed against the change in the Price/Book (P/B) multiple of those shares. After looking at some numbers underlying TSLA's book value per share, and how much it will have to grow for current TSLA shareholders to make money, I conclude with three actionable option strategies based on expectations for how these numbers may change in the medium term. This article also can be seen as a follow up to the 2041 breakeven projection of Tesla I published last year.\nTesla Share Price Rise Follows Book Value\nThe first chart here shows how the rise in Tesla's share price has moved remarkably in line with TSLA's growth in book value per share. TSLA has so far never paid a dividend.\nData by YCharts\nMultiple Expansion and Contraction\nThe above chart, which is on a log scale, is far smoother than that of the (P/B) ratio between these two numbers. The multiple seemed to have stabilized between 2017 and late 2019, but its rise from below 7 in mid-2019 to over 40 in late 2020 and back to around 26 today explains much of TSLA's recent surge and volatility. Another way of thinking about it: TSLA's book value per share is up roughly 4-fold in the past two years, and its P/B is up about 4-fold over the past two years, which together explain why TSLA's shares are up about 16-fold over the past two years. The big question for investors at these levels is: What future combination of book value growth and P/B expansion or contraction can be expected to produce a satisfactory rate of return?\nData by YCharts\nUnderstanding Tesla's Book Value Growth\nAlthough the title of my Marketplace serviceLong Run Incomeimplies a preference for dividends, we believe high-quality book value growth is the best kind of \"dividend alternative\" for companies who can reinvest cash profits internally at far higher rates of return than I can externally. I would challenge any investor to explain why else to buy a low-dividend or no-dividend stock except for the expectation of higher returns from book value growth. For that reason, I have come to focus my analysis of growth companies on how well they seem able to grow book value per share.\nI break down Tesla's book value trajectory into two main parts: Retained Earnings, and Additional Paid In Capital. Although Tesla seems to have \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability, having reported 7 consecutive quarters of positive earnings since September 2019, accumulated profits still fall short of accumulated losses by over $4 billion.\nData by YCharts\nThe other \"half\" (actually over 100%) of Tesla's book value comes from the money paid in by investors. TSLA has continuously raised capital over the past several years by issuing new shares, and the higher the valuation multiple at which TSLA can issue new shares, the more it can accumulate in Additional Paid In Capital. These share issuances also raise the number of shares outstanding, which has the dual effect of raising Tesla's overall market value (since the price per share is now multiplied by more shares), and diluting each share's per-share book value. This increase in book value per share and decline in Price/Book in every recent new share issuance effectively reflects a \"profit\" earlier shareholders enjoy for having later investors pay a higher valuation to get into the company.\nData by YCharts\nPutting these above two charts together, we see that so far Tesla has \"made\" over $27 billion selling shares of its stock to investors, vs. losing over $4 billion in trying to sell cars and batteries to customers, and of course the latter eventually needs to overtake the former for investors to start making their money back.\nHow Tesla's Earnings Projections Add Up\nIf we assume that Tesla stops issuing new shares (a big assumption, but necessary to keep the math simple), then we can add up projected earnings per share to the book value per share to accumulate a projection of future book value per share. Projections of Tesla's future earnings deserve their own article or research report, so for the purposes of this update, I'll use the low vs high analyst forecasts on Tesla'sSeeking Alphaearnings page:\nSource:SeekingAlpha Earnings Page For TSLA\nNote that between 2025 and 2025, the low and median EPS estimates jump as the number of analysts covering the stock that far out falls from 11 to two, implying that the two analysts projecting TSLA's earnings out to 2030 are on the more optimistic end of the street. If we add up the low and high EPS estimates to today's starting book value per share of $23.90, we get a forecast of TSLA's book value of between $160 and $235 per share for the end of 2030. From today's price of around $623.90 per share, that means if TSLA's book value grows to around $200 (the middle of that optimistic range), then a contraction in TSLA's P/B from today's level of 26 to a still \"high for hardware\" multiple of 3 would mean shareholders would earn a 0% return between now and 2030. In other words, someone buying TSLA today would have to believe that either:\n\nTesla will grow its earnings and book value even faster than the most optimistic analyst estimates, or\nThat investors will continue paying P/B multiples well above 3 for the stock.\n\nOn forecasting what TSLA's P/B might be by 2030, there are three ways I can see expecting a multiple of 3 or higher:\n\nAnother valuation bubble: The P/B of Toyota Motor Corp. (TM), charted below, reached highs around 3 in Japan's late 1980s bubble, and again in the late 1990s \"echo bubble,\" and that was its high. If TSLA becomes like TM by 2030, this sort of broader stock valuation bubble may be needed to provide an attractive return on the exit price.\nBusiness transformation: The biggest TSLA bulls I speak to are those who believe TSLA may either remain a premium hardware maker with services on top like Apple Inc. (AAPL), or as a more asset-light, high return software platform like Microsoft (MSFT), whose P/B ratios are charted below Toyota's.\nFinancial engineering: One other driver of Apple's P/B expansion is buybacks, as I explained in this example with McDonald's. Buybacks at high P/B multiples reduce book value per share and raise the P/B multiple, all else equal, in ways exactly opposite to how Tesla has been only issuing (not buying back) shares so far.\n\nData by YCharts\nData by YCharts\nAnother way of comparing Tesla's $36 billion in annual sales vs. Toyota's $257 billion is on a revenue per capital basis. In other words, Tesla currently grosses around $5/year per person on the planet, vs. Toyota's roughly $37/year per human on earth. The growth question for 2030 is whether Tesla can still reach Toyota's number, especially given that:\n\nDemand for transportation, in terms of global population times the percentage of the global population that can afford a car, is likely to grow at a slower pace than historically, especially after 2030, and\nSelf-driving cars that aren't owned by one person, and so don't need to be parked idle most of the time, might actually decrease demand for new cars.\n\nWithout continued high growth past 2030, even 3x book might be on the high end for a car or battery company.\nData byYCharts\nTrading a TSLA P/B Contraction\nMy favorite actionable strategies on a stock like TSLA, which I don't expect to fundamentally collapse, but do expect to experience a significant multiple contraction, generally involve some form of option put spread. The option strategy described below works both for bears wanting to profit from an outright 20%-30% decline, or long-term bulls wanting to protect their shares' value against such a decline.\nOne challenge with simply buying put spreads on TSLA is that its option prices imply a significant \"positive skew,\" which makes put spreads relatively expensive to call spreads. In other words, the market is implying an expectation that TSLA shares are more likely than not to fall a little, offset by a smaller chance of a much larger upside move. Most of the near-the-money put spreads on TSLA cost more than 50% of the maximum payoff, even with longer-dated options or lower strike prices.\nFor the time horizon, I'm choosing the June 17, 2022, expiry date, which as of this writing is a little more than one year out. The main reasons I find first the expiry after one year to be a \"sweet spot\" for this type of strategy include:\n\nAs opposed to outright short selling, buying a put spread to profit from a decline in a share price may qualify for long-term capital gains tax treatment, as we would be holding a long position in a put spread longer than one year.\nAs opposed to even longer-dated options (say the two-year options expiring June 2023), rolling one-year options forces us to reevaluate our valuation and strike prices and decide if and in what form to roll the strategy after four more quarterly book value updates.\n\nIn this strategy, we buy 1x 650 strike put around 150 and then sell 2x 500 puts around 75 each, for roughly zero net up-front premium. Payoff scenarios based on TSLA's closing price at expiry include:\nSource: My Own Excel Calculation and Chart\nThe maximum payout ($150/share) divided by the maximum loss ($350/share) presents a \"maximum rate of return\" on this strategy is +42.8%, though getting that exact maximum payout is nearly impossible (as it requires TSLA to close at exactly $500/share on the expiry date). More likely, this option strategy would deliver a rate of return of more than 14.2% on the maximum loss if TSLA closes between 400-600 at expiry. If we follow the earlier earnings estimates and project TSLA's book value per share to be around $30/share by then, that means we expect a contract in P/B to between 13-20 by next summer.\nConclusion\nFor high-growth, non-dividend paying stocks like Tesla, return expectations break down into expectations of book value growth times expectation of P/B multiple expansion or contraction. Now that it's \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability and reached a respectable level of sales, I believe Tesla is less likely to be the next DeLorean Motor Company, and at best like Microsoft in 2000. To summarize an example I often reference inLong Run Income, from 2000 to 2010, Microsoft's business continued to grow, but investors who bought at the beginning of 2000 were still down over 36% 10 years later because Microsoft's P/B multiple declined by that much more than the business grew. Here is one chart showing that \"lost decade\" for MSFT shareholders.\nData by YCharts\nFor investors who want to hedge a decline in TSLA shares from here to $500, or those who believe TSLA may be a good company that is just wildly overvalued at these levels and may be worth buying below $500, the 1x2 put spread strategy described above may be worth considering.","news_type":1},"isVote":1,"likeStatus":false,"favoriteStatus":false,"reportStatus":false,"tweetType":1,"comments":[{"id":4569361,"gmtCreate":1622762409880,"gmtModify":1663227908445,"authorId":3578134255896974,"author":{"id":3578134255896974,"authorId":3578134255896974,"name":"kino318","avatar":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/e983f44b7853b7b8c10f1b3f6e19dc68","vip":1,"crmLevel":6,"crmLevelSwitch":0,"individualDisplayBadges":[]},"repliedAuthorId":0,"objectId":118732396,"type":1,"supId":0,"prevId":0,"content":"yes","text":"yes","html":"yes"},{"id":4569097,"gmtCreate":1622761693068,"gmtModify":1663227908234,"authorId":3576917742134919,"author":{"id":3576917742134919,"authorId":3576917742134919,"name":"T2C","avatar":"https://static.itradeup.com/news/bc988e20e446d98ea284e01ce997a013","vip":1,"crmLevel":2,"crmLevelSwitch":0,"individualDisplayBadges":[]},"repliedAuthorId":0,"objectId":118732396,"type":1,"supId":0,"prevId":0,"content":"Yes","text":"Yes","html":"Yes"}],"langContent":"EN"},{"id":118738514,"gmtCreate":1622761547338,"gmtModify":1704190507366,"author":{"id":"3578378653633666","authorId":"3578378653633666","authorIdStr":"3578378653633666","name":"Auggylol","avatar":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/b0bb374e9cca494786b45a0b2df1a21e","vip":1,"crmLevel":2,"crmLevelSwitch":0,"idStr":"3578378653633666"},"htmlText":"Nice","listText":"Nice","text":"Nice","images":[],"top":1,"highlighted":1,"essential":1,"paper":1,"likeSize":1,"commentSize":1,"repostSize":0,"link":"https://ttm.financial/post/118738514","repostId":1152573638,"repostType":4,"repost":{"id":"1152573638","pubTimestamp":1622732138,"share":"https://ttm.financial/m/news/1152573638?lang=&edition=fundamental","pubTime":"2021-06-03 22:55","market":"us","language":"en","title":"Tesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors","url":"https://stock-news.laohu8.com/highlight/detail?id=1152573638","media":"seekingalpha","summary":"Summary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very hi","content":"Summary\n<ul>\n <li>As long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.</li>\n <li>Shareholders assuming Tesla's Price/Book multiple deflates from around 25 to 5 over the next 10 years need book value per share to grow 5x just to break even.</li>\n <li>So far, Tesla's growth in book value is mostly from \"Additional Paid-In Capital\" (issuing new shares at high prices), rather than retained earnings.</li>\n <li>Long-term earnings estimates imply book value per share sums up to 150-250 by the end of 2030, meaning a breakeven Price/Book of 2.5-4x, which is well above most mature autos.</li>\n <li>I present a 1x2 put spread as an attractive trade both for long investors concerned about overvaluation, as well as those seeking to bet on a Price/Book multiple contraction.</li>\n</ul>\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/c329e23b2762c47b11d11d95ec584959\" tg-width=\"768\" tg-height=\"512\">Photo by Jag_cz/iStock Editorial via Getty Images\nBook value per share is likely not the first metric that comes to mind when you think of a \"growth company of the future\" like Tesla (TSLA), but in this article, I will explain why book value per share is the most important bottom line number long-term investors in this company should watch. As long as zero dividends are expected, a TSLA shareholder's total return will, by definition, be defined by the growth of Tesla's book value per share crossed against the change in the Price/Book (P/B) multiple of those shares. After looking at some numbers underlying TSLA's book value per share, and how much it will have to grow for current TSLA shareholders to make money, I conclude with three actionable option strategies based on expectations for how these numbers may change in the medium term. This article also can be seen as a follow up to the&nbsp;2041 breakeven projection of Tesla I published last year.\nTesla Share Price Rise Follows Book Value\nThe first chart here shows how the rise in Tesla's share price has moved remarkably in line with TSLA's growth in book value per share. TSLA has so far never paid a dividend.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/c1f994d62f1ec67c3b95ae15c3791fa8\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"458\">Data by YCharts\nMultiple Expansion and Contraction\nThe above chart, which is on a log scale, is far smoother than that of the (P/B) ratio between these two numbers. The multiple seemed to have stabilized between 2017 and late 2019, but its rise from below 7 in mid-2019 to over 40 in late 2020 and back to around 26 today explains much of TSLA's recent surge and volatility. Another way of thinking about it: TSLA's book value per share is up roughly 4-fold in the past two years, and its P/B is up about 4-fold over the past two years, which together explain why TSLA's shares are up about 16-fold over the past two years. The big question for investors at these levels is: What future combination of book value growth and P/B expansion or contraction can be expected to produce a satisfactory rate of return?\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/b8eb71b806f59aaabd5d09a6eb4b1606\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\nUnderstanding Tesla's Book Value Growth\nAlthough the title of my Marketplace serviceLong Run Incomeimplies a preference for dividends, we believe high-quality book value growth is the best kind of \"dividend alternative\" for companies who can reinvest cash profits internally at far higher rates of return than I can externally. I would challenge any investor to explain why else to buy a low-dividend or no-dividend stock except for the expectation of higher returns from book value growth. For that reason, I have come to focus my analysis of growth companies on how well they seem able to grow book value per share.\nI break down Tesla's book value trajectory into two main parts: Retained Earnings, and Additional Paid In Capital. Although Tesla seems to have \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability, having reported&nbsp;7 consecutive quarters of positive earnings since September 2019, accumulated profits still fall short of accumulated losses by over $4 billion.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/08701c599a8c6fa7a66efde3c0a12cac\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\nThe other \"half\" (actually over 100%) of Tesla's book value comes from the money paid in by investors. TSLA has continuously raised capital over the past several years by issuing new shares, and the higher the valuation multiple at which TSLA can issue new shares, the more it can accumulate in Additional Paid In Capital. These share issuances also raise the number of shares outstanding, which has the dual effect of raising Tesla's overall market value (since the price per share is now multiplied by more shares), and diluting each share's per-share book value. This increase in book value per share and decline in Price/Book in every recent new share issuance effectively reflects a \"profit\" earlier shareholders enjoy for having later investors pay a higher valuation to get into the company.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/971bf86f3d08fe938af2845121be8d4c\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"441\">Data by YCharts\nPutting these above two charts together, we see that so far Tesla has \"made\" over $27 billion selling shares of its stock to investors, vs. losing over $4 billion in trying to sell cars and batteries to customers, and of course the latter eventually needs to overtake the former for investors to start making their money back.\nHow Tesla's Earnings Projections Add Up\nIf we assume that Tesla stops issuing new shares (a big assumption, but necessary to keep the math simple), then we can add up projected earnings per share to the book value per share to accumulate a projection of future book value per share. Projections of Tesla's future earnings deserve their own article or research report, so for the purposes of this update, I'll use the low vs high analyst forecasts on Tesla'sSeeking Alphaearnings page:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/f36166f6653fb8e11941e3c58b313ccb\" tg-width=\"640\" tg-height=\"312\">Source:SeekingAlpha Earnings Page For TSLA\nNote that between 2025 and 2025, the low and median EPS estimates jump as the number of analysts covering the stock that far out falls from 11 to two, implying that the two analysts projecting TSLA's earnings out to 2030 are on the more optimistic end of the street. If we add up the low and high EPS estimates to today's starting book value per share of $23.90, we get a forecast of TSLA's book value of between $160 and $235 per share for the end of 2030. From today's price of around $623.90 per share, that means if TSLA's book value grows to around $200 (the middle of that optimistic range), then a contraction in TSLA's P/B from today's level of 26 to a still \"high for hardware\" multiple of 3 would mean shareholders would earn a 0% return between now and 2030. In other words, someone buying TSLA today would have to believe that either:\n<ol>\n <li>Tesla will grow its earnings and book value even faster than the most optimistic analyst estimates, or</li>\n <li>That investors will continue paying P/B multiples well above 3 for the stock.</li>\n</ol>\nOn forecasting what TSLA's P/B might be by 2030, there are three ways I can see expecting a multiple of 3 or higher:\n<ol>\n <li>Another valuation bubble: The P/B of Toyota Motor Corp. (TM), charted below, reached highs around 3 in Japan's late 1980s bubble, and again in the late 1990s \"echo bubble,\" and that was its high. If TSLA becomes like TM by 2030, this sort of broader stock valuation bubble may be needed to provide an attractive return on the exit price.</li>\n <li>Business transformation: The biggest TSLA bulls I speak to are those who believe TSLA may either remain a premium hardware maker with services on top like Apple Inc. (AAPL), or as a more asset-light, high return software platform like Microsoft (MSFT), whose P/B ratios are charted below Toyota's.</li>\n <li>Financial engineering: One other driver of Apple's&nbsp;P/B expansion is buybacks, as I explained in this example with McDonald's. Buybacks at high P/B multiples reduce book value per share and raise the P/B multiple, all else equal, in ways exactly opposite to how Tesla has been only issuing (not buying back) shares so far.</li>\n</ol>\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/59e353b1112fb465bf275bfd2e2f5c38\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/7432d2c24afe124c70d139e0320f2d0c\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"441\">Data by YCharts\nAnother way of comparing Tesla's $36 billion in annual sales vs. Toyota's $257 billion is on a revenue per capital basis. In other words, Tesla currently grosses around $5/year per person on the planet, vs. Toyota's roughly $37/year per human on earth. The growth question for 2030 is whether Tesla can still reach Toyota's number, especially given that:\n<ol>\n <li>Demand for transportation, in terms of global population times the percentage of the global population that can afford a car, is likely to grow at a slower pace than historically, especially after 2030, and</li>\n <li>Self-driving cars that aren't owned by one person, and so don't need to be parked idle most of the time, might actually decrease demand for new cars.</li>\n</ol>\nWithout continued high growth past 2030, even 3x book might be on the high end for a car or battery company.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/ed6900c059b599cc5885a2184ad6db05\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"537\">Data byYCharts\nTrading a TSLA P/B Contraction\nMy favorite actionable strategies on a stock like TSLA, which I don't expect to fundamentally collapse, but do expect to experience a significant multiple contraction, generally involve some form of option put spread. The option strategy described below works both for bears wanting to profit from an outright 20%-30% decline, or long-term bulls wanting to protect their shares' value against such a decline.\nOne challenge with simply buying put spreads on TSLA is that its option prices imply a significant \"positive skew,\" which makes put spreads relatively expensive to call spreads. In other words, the market is implying an expectation that TSLA shares are more likely than not to fall a little, offset by a smaller chance of a much larger upside move. Most of the near-the-money put spreads on TSLA cost more than 50% of the maximum payoff, even with longer-dated options or lower strike prices.\nFor the time horizon, I'm choosing the June 17, 2022, expiry date, which as of this writing is a little more than one year out. The main reasons I find first the expiry after one year to be a \"sweet spot\" for this type of strategy include:\n<ol>\n <li>As opposed to outright short selling, buying a put spread to profit from a decline in a share price may qualify for long-term capital gains tax treatment, as we would be holding a long position in a put spread longer than one year.</li>\n <li>As opposed to even longer-dated options (say the two-year options expiring June 2023), rolling one-year options forces us to reevaluate our valuation and strike prices and decide if and in what form to roll the strategy after four more quarterly book value updates.</li>\n</ol>\nIn this strategy, we buy 1x 650 strike put around 150 and then sell 2x 500 puts around 75 each, for roughly zero net up-front premium. Payoff scenarios based on TSLA's closing price at expiry include:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/d8d415689c4d898bc75eba42b9f79152\" tg-width=\"640\" tg-height=\"452\">Source: My Own Excel Calculation and Chart\nThe maximum payout ($150/share) divided by the maximum loss ($350/share) presents a \"maximum rate of return\" on this strategy is +42.8%, though getting that exact maximum payout is nearly impossible (as it requires TSLA to close at exactly $500/share on the expiry date). More likely, this option strategy would deliver a rate of return of more than 14.2% on the maximum loss if TSLA closes between 400-600 at expiry. If we follow the earlier earnings estimates and project TSLA's book value per share to be around $30/share by then, that means we expect a contract in P/B to between 13-20 by next summer.\nConclusion\nFor high-growth, non-dividend paying stocks like Tesla, return expectations break down into expectations of book value growth times expectation of P/B multiple expansion or contraction. Now that it's \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability and reached a respectable level of sales, I believe Tesla is less likely to be the next&nbsp;DeLorean Motor Company, and at best like Microsoft in 2000. To summarize an example I often reference inLong Run Income, from 2000 to 2010, Microsoft's business continued to grow, but investors who bought at the beginning of 2000 were still down over 36% 10 years later because Microsoft's P/B multiple declined by that much more than the business grew. Here is one chart showing that \"lost decade\" for MSFT shareholders.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/faaf554d7a7744d36d27ea7f92e9a9e2\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"475\">Data by YCharts\nFor investors who want to hedge a decline in TSLA shares from here to $500, or those who believe TSLA may be a good company that is just wildly overvalued at these levels and may be worth buying below $500, the 1x2 put spread strategy described above may be worth considering.","collect":0,"html":"<!DOCTYPE html>\n<html>\n<head>\n<meta http-equiv=\"Content-Type\" content=\"text/html; charset=utf-8\" />\n<meta name=\"viewport\" content=\"width=device-width,initial-scale=1.0,minimum-scale=1.0,maximum-scale=1.0,user-scalable=no\"/>\n<meta name=\"format-detection\" content=\"telephone=no,email=no,address=no\" />\n<title>Tesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors</title>\n<style type=\"text/css\">\na,abbr,acronym,address,applet,article,aside,audio,b,big,blockquote,body,canvas,caption,center,cite,code,dd,del,details,dfn,div,dl,dt,\nem,embed,fieldset,figcaption,figure,footer,form,h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6,header,hgroup,html,i,iframe,img,ins,kbd,label,legend,li,mark,menu,nav,\nobject,ol,output,p,pre,q,ruby,s,samp,section,small,span,strike,strong,sub,summary,sup,table,tbody,td,tfoot,th,thead,time,tr,tt,u,ul,var,video{ font:inherit;margin:0;padding:0;vertical-align:baseline;border:0 }\nbody{ font-size:16px; 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}\n.meta {color:#5e5c6d;font-size:13px;margin:0 0 .5em; }\na{text-decoration:none; color:#2a4b87;}\n.meta .head { display: inline-block; overflow: hidden}\n.head .h-thumb { width: 30px; height: 30px; margin: 0; padding: 0; border-radius: 50%; float: left;}\n.head .h-content { margin: 0; padding: 0 0 0 9px; float: left;}\n.head .h-name {font-size: 13px; color: #eee; margin: 0;}\n.head .h-time {font-size: 11px; color: #7E829C; margin: 0;line-height: 11px;}\n.small {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.9); -webkit-transform: scale(0.9); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.smaller {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.8); -webkit-transform: scale(0.8); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.bt-text {font-size: 12px;margin: 1.5em 0 0 0}\n.bt-text p {margin: 0}\n</style>\n</head>\n<body>\n<div class=\"wrapper\">\n<header>\n<h2 class=\"title\">\nTesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors\n</h2>\n\n<h4 class=\"meta\">\n\n\n2021-06-03 22:55 GMT+8&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<a href=https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors>seekingalpha</a>\n\n\n</h4>\n\n</header>\n<article>\n<div>\nSummary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.\nShareholders assuming Tesla's ...\n\n<a href=\"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors\">Web Link</a>\n\n</div>\n\n\n</article>\n</div>\n</body>\n</html>\n","type":0,"thumbnail":"","relate_stocks":{"TSLA":"特斯拉"},"source_url":"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors","is_english":true,"share_image_url":"https://static.laohu8.com/e9f99090a1c2ed51c021029395664489","article_id":"1152573638","content_text":"Summary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.\nShareholders assuming Tesla's Price/Book multiple deflates from around 25 to 5 over the next 10 years need book value per share to grow 5x just to break even.\nSo far, Tesla's growth in book value is mostly from \"Additional Paid-In Capital\" (issuing new shares at high prices), rather than retained earnings.\nLong-term earnings estimates imply book value per share sums up to 150-250 by the end of 2030, meaning a breakeven Price/Book of 2.5-4x, which is well above most mature autos.\nI present a 1x2 put spread as an attractive trade both for long investors concerned about overvaluation, as well as those seeking to bet on a Price/Book multiple contraction.\n\nPhoto by Jag_cz/iStock Editorial via Getty Images\nBook value per share is likely not the first metric that comes to mind when you think of a \"growth company of the future\" like Tesla (TSLA), but in this article, I will explain why book value per share is the most important bottom line number long-term investors in this company should watch. As long as zero dividends are expected, a TSLA shareholder's total return will, by definition, be defined by the growth of Tesla's book value per share crossed against the change in the Price/Book (P/B) multiple of those shares. After looking at some numbers underlying TSLA's book value per share, and how much it will have to grow for current TSLA shareholders to make money, I conclude with three actionable option strategies based on expectations for how these numbers may change in the medium term. This article also can be seen as a follow up to the 2041 breakeven projection of Tesla I published last year.\nTesla Share Price Rise Follows Book Value\nThe first chart here shows how the rise in Tesla's share price has moved remarkably in line with TSLA's growth in book value per share. TSLA has so far never paid a dividend.\nData by YCharts\nMultiple Expansion and Contraction\nThe above chart, which is on a log scale, is far smoother than that of the (P/B) ratio between these two numbers. The multiple seemed to have stabilized between 2017 and late 2019, but its rise from below 7 in mid-2019 to over 40 in late 2020 and back to around 26 today explains much of TSLA's recent surge and volatility. Another way of thinking about it: TSLA's book value per share is up roughly 4-fold in the past two years, and its P/B is up about 4-fold over the past two years, which together explain why TSLA's shares are up about 16-fold over the past two years. The big question for investors at these levels is: What future combination of book value growth and P/B expansion or contraction can be expected to produce a satisfactory rate of return?\nData by YCharts\nUnderstanding Tesla's Book Value Growth\nAlthough the title of my Marketplace serviceLong Run Incomeimplies a preference for dividends, we believe high-quality book value growth is the best kind of \"dividend alternative\" for companies who can reinvest cash profits internally at far higher rates of return than I can externally. I would challenge any investor to explain why else to buy a low-dividend or no-dividend stock except for the expectation of higher returns from book value growth. For that reason, I have come to focus my analysis of growth companies on how well they seem able to grow book value per share.\nI break down Tesla's book value trajectory into two main parts: Retained Earnings, and Additional Paid In Capital. Although Tesla seems to have \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability, having reported 7 consecutive quarters of positive earnings since September 2019, accumulated profits still fall short of accumulated losses by over $4 billion.\nData by YCharts\nThe other \"half\" (actually over 100%) of Tesla's book value comes from the money paid in by investors. TSLA has continuously raised capital over the past several years by issuing new shares, and the higher the valuation multiple at which TSLA can issue new shares, the more it can accumulate in Additional Paid In Capital. These share issuances also raise the number of shares outstanding, which has the dual effect of raising Tesla's overall market value (since the price per share is now multiplied by more shares), and diluting each share's per-share book value. This increase in book value per share and decline in Price/Book in every recent new share issuance effectively reflects a \"profit\" earlier shareholders enjoy for having later investors pay a higher valuation to get into the company.\nData by YCharts\nPutting these above two charts together, we see that so far Tesla has \"made\" over $27 billion selling shares of its stock to investors, vs. losing over $4 billion in trying to sell cars and batteries to customers, and of course the latter eventually needs to overtake the former for investors to start making their money back.\nHow Tesla's Earnings Projections Add Up\nIf we assume that Tesla stops issuing new shares (a big assumption, but necessary to keep the math simple), then we can add up projected earnings per share to the book value per share to accumulate a projection of future book value per share. Projections of Tesla's future earnings deserve their own article or research report, so for the purposes of this update, I'll use the low vs high analyst forecasts on Tesla'sSeeking Alphaearnings page:\nSource:SeekingAlpha Earnings Page For TSLA\nNote that between 2025 and 2025, the low and median EPS estimates jump as the number of analysts covering the stock that far out falls from 11 to two, implying that the two analysts projecting TSLA's earnings out to 2030 are on the more optimistic end of the street. If we add up the low and high EPS estimates to today's starting book value per share of $23.90, we get a forecast of TSLA's book value of between $160 and $235 per share for the end of 2030. From today's price of around $623.90 per share, that means if TSLA's book value grows to around $200 (the middle of that optimistic range), then a contraction in TSLA's P/B from today's level of 26 to a still \"high for hardware\" multiple of 3 would mean shareholders would earn a 0% return between now and 2030. In other words, someone buying TSLA today would have to believe that either:\n\nTesla will grow its earnings and book value even faster than the most optimistic analyst estimates, or\nThat investors will continue paying P/B multiples well above 3 for the stock.\n\nOn forecasting what TSLA's P/B might be by 2030, there are three ways I can see expecting a multiple of 3 or higher:\n\nAnother valuation bubble: The P/B of Toyota Motor Corp. (TM), charted below, reached highs around 3 in Japan's late 1980s bubble, and again in the late 1990s \"echo bubble,\" and that was its high. If TSLA becomes like TM by 2030, this sort of broader stock valuation bubble may be needed to provide an attractive return on the exit price.\nBusiness transformation: The biggest TSLA bulls I speak to are those who believe TSLA may either remain a premium hardware maker with services on top like Apple Inc. (AAPL), or as a more asset-light, high return software platform like Microsoft (MSFT), whose P/B ratios are charted below Toyota's.\nFinancial engineering: One other driver of Apple's P/B expansion is buybacks, as I explained in this example with McDonald's. Buybacks at high P/B multiples reduce book value per share and raise the P/B multiple, all else equal, in ways exactly opposite to how Tesla has been only issuing (not buying back) shares so far.\n\nData by YCharts\nData by YCharts\nAnother way of comparing Tesla's $36 billion in annual sales vs. Toyota's $257 billion is on a revenue per capital basis. In other words, Tesla currently grosses around $5/year per person on the planet, vs. Toyota's roughly $37/year per human on earth. The growth question for 2030 is whether Tesla can still reach Toyota's number, especially given that:\n\nDemand for transportation, in terms of global population times the percentage of the global population that can afford a car, is likely to grow at a slower pace than historically, especially after 2030, and\nSelf-driving cars that aren't owned by one person, and so don't need to be parked idle most of the time, might actually decrease demand for new cars.\n\nWithout continued high growth past 2030, even 3x book might be on the high end for a car or battery company.\nData byYCharts\nTrading a TSLA P/B Contraction\nMy favorite actionable strategies on a stock like TSLA, which I don't expect to fundamentally collapse, but do expect to experience a significant multiple contraction, generally involve some form of option put spread. The option strategy described below works both for bears wanting to profit from an outright 20%-30% decline, or long-term bulls wanting to protect their shares' value against such a decline.\nOne challenge with simply buying put spreads on TSLA is that its option prices imply a significant \"positive skew,\" which makes put spreads relatively expensive to call spreads. In other words, the market is implying an expectation that TSLA shares are more likely than not to fall a little, offset by a smaller chance of a much larger upside move. Most of the near-the-money put spreads on TSLA cost more than 50% of the maximum payoff, even with longer-dated options or lower strike prices.\nFor the time horizon, I'm choosing the June 17, 2022, expiry date, which as of this writing is a little more than one year out. The main reasons I find first the expiry after one year to be a \"sweet spot\" for this type of strategy include:\n\nAs opposed to outright short selling, buying a put spread to profit from a decline in a share price may qualify for long-term capital gains tax treatment, as we would be holding a long position in a put spread longer than one year.\nAs opposed to even longer-dated options (say the two-year options expiring June 2023), rolling one-year options forces us to reevaluate our valuation and strike prices and decide if and in what form to roll the strategy after four more quarterly book value updates.\n\nIn this strategy, we buy 1x 650 strike put around 150 and then sell 2x 500 puts around 75 each, for roughly zero net up-front premium. Payoff scenarios based on TSLA's closing price at expiry include:\nSource: My Own Excel Calculation and Chart\nThe maximum payout ($150/share) divided by the maximum loss ($350/share) presents a \"maximum rate of return\" on this strategy is +42.8%, though getting that exact maximum payout is nearly impossible (as it requires TSLA to close at exactly $500/share on the expiry date). More likely, this option strategy would deliver a rate of return of more than 14.2% on the maximum loss if TSLA closes between 400-600 at expiry. If we follow the earlier earnings estimates and project TSLA's book value per share to be around $30/share by then, that means we expect a contract in P/B to between 13-20 by next summer.\nConclusion\nFor high-growth, non-dividend paying stocks like Tesla, return expectations break down into expectations of book value growth times expectation of P/B multiple expansion or contraction. Now that it's \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability and reached a respectable level of sales, I believe Tesla is less likely to be the next DeLorean Motor Company, and at best like Microsoft in 2000. To summarize an example I often reference inLong Run Income, from 2000 to 2010, Microsoft's business continued to grow, but investors who bought at the beginning of 2000 were still down over 36% 10 years later because Microsoft's P/B multiple declined by that much more than the business grew. Here is one chart showing that \"lost decade\" for MSFT shareholders.\nData by YCharts\nFor investors who want to hedge a decline in TSLA shares from here to $500, or those who believe TSLA may be a good company that is just wildly overvalued at these levels and may be worth buying below $500, the 1x2 put spread strategy described above may be worth considering.","news_type":1},"isVote":1,"likeStatus":false,"favoriteStatus":false,"reportStatus":false,"tweetType":1,"comments":[{"id":4569131,"gmtCreate":1622761787548,"gmtModify":1663227906350,"authorId":3572430244287129,"author":{"id":3572430244287129,"authorId":3572430244287129,"name":"TANJH","avatar":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/08f0a812db3886c7089d529cb706b8fa","vip":1,"crmLevel":1,"crmLevelSwitch":0,"individualDisplayBadges":[]},"repliedAuthorId":0,"objectId":118738514,"type":1,"supId":0,"prevId":0,"content":"yup","text":"yup","html":"yup"}],"langContent":"EN"},{"id":118739962,"gmtCreate":1622761368456,"gmtModify":1704190502129,"author":{"id":"3582450584533032","authorId":"3582450584533032","authorIdStr":"3582450584533032","name":"KLok","avatar":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/7d135114c7d99f91051322404730d3e0","vip":1,"crmLevel":2,"crmLevelSwitch":0,"idStr":"3582450584533032"},"htmlText":"That's window dressing.......","listText":"That's window dressing.......","text":"That's window dressing.......","images":[],"top":1,"highlighted":1,"essential":1,"paper":1,"likeSize":2,"commentSize":0,"repostSize":0,"link":"https://ttm.financial/post/118739962","repostId":1152573638,"repostType":2,"repost":{"id":"1152573638","pubTimestamp":1622732138,"share":"https://ttm.financial/m/news/1152573638?lang=&edition=fundamental","pubTime":"2021-06-03 22:55","market":"us","language":"en","title":"Tesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors","url":"https://stock-news.laohu8.com/highlight/detail?id=1152573638","media":"seekingalpha","summary":"Summary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very hi","content":"Summary\n<ul>\n <li>As long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.</li>\n <li>Shareholders assuming Tesla's Price/Book multiple deflates from around 25 to 5 over the next 10 years need book value per share to grow 5x just to break even.</li>\n <li>So far, Tesla's growth in book value is mostly from \"Additional Paid-In Capital\" (issuing new shares at high prices), rather than retained earnings.</li>\n <li>Long-term earnings estimates imply book value per share sums up to 150-250 by the end of 2030, meaning a breakeven Price/Book of 2.5-4x, which is well above most mature autos.</li>\n <li>I present a 1x2 put spread as an attractive trade both for long investors concerned about overvaluation, as well as those seeking to bet on a Price/Book multiple contraction.</li>\n</ul>\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/c329e23b2762c47b11d11d95ec584959\" tg-width=\"768\" tg-height=\"512\">Photo by Jag_cz/iStock Editorial via Getty Images\nBook value per share is likely not the first metric that comes to mind when you think of a \"growth company of the future\" like Tesla (TSLA), but in this article, I will explain why book value per share is the most important bottom line number long-term investors in this company should watch. As long as zero dividends are expected, a TSLA shareholder's total return will, by definition, be defined by the growth of Tesla's book value per share crossed against the change in the Price/Book (P/B) multiple of those shares. After looking at some numbers underlying TSLA's book value per share, and how much it will have to grow for current TSLA shareholders to make money, I conclude with three actionable option strategies based on expectations for how these numbers may change in the medium term. This article also can be seen as a follow up to the&nbsp;2041 breakeven projection of Tesla I published last year.\nTesla Share Price Rise Follows Book Value\nThe first chart here shows how the rise in Tesla's share price has moved remarkably in line with TSLA's growth in book value per share. TSLA has so far never paid a dividend.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/c1f994d62f1ec67c3b95ae15c3791fa8\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"458\">Data by YCharts\nMultiple Expansion and Contraction\nThe above chart, which is on a log scale, is far smoother than that of the (P/B) ratio between these two numbers. The multiple seemed to have stabilized between 2017 and late 2019, but its rise from below 7 in mid-2019 to over 40 in late 2020 and back to around 26 today explains much of TSLA's recent surge and volatility. Another way of thinking about it: TSLA's book value per share is up roughly 4-fold in the past two years, and its P/B is up about 4-fold over the past two years, which together explain why TSLA's shares are up about 16-fold over the past two years. The big question for investors at these levels is: What future combination of book value growth and P/B expansion or contraction can be expected to produce a satisfactory rate of return?\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/b8eb71b806f59aaabd5d09a6eb4b1606\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\nUnderstanding Tesla's Book Value Growth\nAlthough the title of my Marketplace serviceLong Run Incomeimplies a preference for dividends, we believe high-quality book value growth is the best kind of \"dividend alternative\" for companies who can reinvest cash profits internally at far higher rates of return than I can externally. I would challenge any investor to explain why else to buy a low-dividend or no-dividend stock except for the expectation of higher returns from book value growth. For that reason, I have come to focus my analysis of growth companies on how well they seem able to grow book value per share.\nI break down Tesla's book value trajectory into two main parts: Retained Earnings, and Additional Paid In Capital. Although Tesla seems to have \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability, having reported&nbsp;7 consecutive quarters of positive earnings since September 2019, accumulated profits still fall short of accumulated losses by over $4 billion.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/08701c599a8c6fa7a66efde3c0a12cac\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\nThe other \"half\" (actually over 100%) of Tesla's book value comes from the money paid in by investors. TSLA has continuously raised capital over the past several years by issuing new shares, and the higher the valuation multiple at which TSLA can issue new shares, the more it can accumulate in Additional Paid In Capital. These share issuances also raise the number of shares outstanding, which has the dual effect of raising Tesla's overall market value (since the price per share is now multiplied by more shares), and diluting each share's per-share book value. This increase in book value per share and decline in Price/Book in every recent new share issuance effectively reflects a \"profit\" earlier shareholders enjoy for having later investors pay a higher valuation to get into the company.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/971bf86f3d08fe938af2845121be8d4c\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"441\">Data by YCharts\nPutting these above two charts together, we see that so far Tesla has \"made\" over $27 billion selling shares of its stock to investors, vs. losing over $4 billion in trying to sell cars and batteries to customers, and of course the latter eventually needs to overtake the former for investors to start making their money back.\nHow Tesla's Earnings Projections Add Up\nIf we assume that Tesla stops issuing new shares (a big assumption, but necessary to keep the math simple), then we can add up projected earnings per share to the book value per share to accumulate a projection of future book value per share. Projections of Tesla's future earnings deserve their own article or research report, so for the purposes of this update, I'll use the low vs high analyst forecasts on Tesla'sSeeking Alphaearnings page:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/f36166f6653fb8e11941e3c58b313ccb\" tg-width=\"640\" tg-height=\"312\">Source:SeekingAlpha Earnings Page For TSLA\nNote that between 2025 and 2025, the low and median EPS estimates jump as the number of analysts covering the stock that far out falls from 11 to two, implying that the two analysts projecting TSLA's earnings out to 2030 are on the more optimistic end of the street. If we add up the low and high EPS estimates to today's starting book value per share of $23.90, we get a forecast of TSLA's book value of between $160 and $235 per share for the end of 2030. From today's price of around $623.90 per share, that means if TSLA's book value grows to around $200 (the middle of that optimistic range), then a contraction in TSLA's P/B from today's level of 26 to a still \"high for hardware\" multiple of 3 would mean shareholders would earn a 0% return between now and 2030. In other words, someone buying TSLA today would have to believe that either:\n<ol>\n <li>Tesla will grow its earnings and book value even faster than the most optimistic analyst estimates, or</li>\n <li>That investors will continue paying P/B multiples well above 3 for the stock.</li>\n</ol>\nOn forecasting what TSLA's P/B might be by 2030, there are three ways I can see expecting a multiple of 3 or higher:\n<ol>\n <li>Another valuation bubble: The P/B of Toyota Motor Corp. (TM), charted below, reached highs around 3 in Japan's late 1980s bubble, and again in the late 1990s \"echo bubble,\" and that was its high. If TSLA becomes like TM by 2030, this sort of broader stock valuation bubble may be needed to provide an attractive return on the exit price.</li>\n <li>Business transformation: The biggest TSLA bulls I speak to are those who believe TSLA may either remain a premium hardware maker with services on top like Apple Inc. (AAPL), or as a more asset-light, high return software platform like Microsoft (MSFT), whose P/B ratios are charted below Toyota's.</li>\n <li>Financial engineering: One other driver of Apple's&nbsp;P/B expansion is buybacks, as I explained in this example with McDonald's. Buybacks at high P/B multiples reduce book value per share and raise the P/B multiple, all else equal, in ways exactly opposite to how Tesla has been only issuing (not buying back) shares so far.</li>\n</ol>\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/59e353b1112fb465bf275bfd2e2f5c38\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/7432d2c24afe124c70d139e0320f2d0c\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"441\">Data by YCharts\nAnother way of comparing Tesla's $36 billion in annual sales vs. Toyota's $257 billion is on a revenue per capital basis. In other words, Tesla currently grosses around $5/year per person on the planet, vs. Toyota's roughly $37/year per human on earth. The growth question for 2030 is whether Tesla can still reach Toyota's number, especially given that:\n<ol>\n <li>Demand for transportation, in terms of global population times the percentage of the global population that can afford a car, is likely to grow at a slower pace than historically, especially after 2030, and</li>\n <li>Self-driving cars that aren't owned by one person, and so don't need to be parked idle most of the time, might actually decrease demand for new cars.</li>\n</ol>\nWithout continued high growth past 2030, even 3x book might be on the high end for a car or battery company.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/ed6900c059b599cc5885a2184ad6db05\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"537\">Data byYCharts\nTrading a TSLA P/B Contraction\nMy favorite actionable strategies on a stock like TSLA, which I don't expect to fundamentally collapse, but do expect to experience a significant multiple contraction, generally involve some form of option put spread. The option strategy described below works both for bears wanting to profit from an outright 20%-30% decline, or long-term bulls wanting to protect their shares' value against such a decline.\nOne challenge with simply buying put spreads on TSLA is that its option prices imply a significant \"positive skew,\" which makes put spreads relatively expensive to call spreads. In other words, the market is implying an expectation that TSLA shares are more likely than not to fall a little, offset by a smaller chance of a much larger upside move. Most of the near-the-money put spreads on TSLA cost more than 50% of the maximum payoff, even with longer-dated options or lower strike prices.\nFor the time horizon, I'm choosing the June 17, 2022, expiry date, which as of this writing is a little more than one year out. The main reasons I find first the expiry after one year to be a \"sweet spot\" for this type of strategy include:\n<ol>\n <li>As opposed to outright short selling, buying a put spread to profit from a decline in a share price may qualify for long-term capital gains tax treatment, as we would be holding a long position in a put spread longer than one year.</li>\n <li>As opposed to even longer-dated options (say the two-year options expiring June 2023), rolling one-year options forces us to reevaluate our valuation and strike prices and decide if and in what form to roll the strategy after four more quarterly book value updates.</li>\n</ol>\nIn this strategy, we buy 1x 650 strike put around 150 and then sell 2x 500 puts around 75 each, for roughly zero net up-front premium. Payoff scenarios based on TSLA's closing price at expiry include:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/d8d415689c4d898bc75eba42b9f79152\" tg-width=\"640\" tg-height=\"452\">Source: My Own Excel Calculation and Chart\nThe maximum payout ($150/share) divided by the maximum loss ($350/share) presents a \"maximum rate of return\" on this strategy is +42.8%, though getting that exact maximum payout is nearly impossible (as it requires TSLA to close at exactly $500/share on the expiry date). More likely, this option strategy would deliver a rate of return of more than 14.2% on the maximum loss if TSLA closes between 400-600 at expiry. If we follow the earlier earnings estimates and project TSLA's book value per share to be around $30/share by then, that means we expect a contract in P/B to between 13-20 by next summer.\nConclusion\nFor high-growth, non-dividend paying stocks like Tesla, return expectations break down into expectations of book value growth times expectation of P/B multiple expansion or contraction. Now that it's \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability and reached a respectable level of sales, I believe Tesla is less likely to be the next&nbsp;DeLorean Motor Company, and at best like Microsoft in 2000. To summarize an example I often reference inLong Run Income, from 2000 to 2010, Microsoft's business continued to grow, but investors who bought at the beginning of 2000 were still down over 36% 10 years later because Microsoft's P/B multiple declined by that much more than the business grew. Here is one chart showing that \"lost decade\" for MSFT shareholders.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/faaf554d7a7744d36d27ea7f92e9a9e2\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"475\">Data by YCharts\nFor investors who want to hedge a decline in TSLA shares from here to $500, or those who believe TSLA may be a good company that is just wildly overvalued at these levels and may be worth buying below $500, the 1x2 put spread strategy described above may be worth considering.","collect":0,"html":"<!DOCTYPE html>\n<html>\n<head>\n<meta http-equiv=\"Content-Type\" content=\"text/html; charset=utf-8\" />\n<meta name=\"viewport\" content=\"width=device-width,initial-scale=1.0,minimum-scale=1.0,maximum-scale=1.0,user-scalable=no\"/>\n<meta name=\"format-detection\" content=\"telephone=no,email=no,address=no\" />\n<title>Tesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors</title>\n<style type=\"text/css\">\na,abbr,acronym,address,applet,article,aside,audio,b,big,blockquote,body,canvas,caption,center,cite,code,dd,del,details,dfn,div,dl,dt,\nem,embed,fieldset,figcaption,figure,footer,form,h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6,header,hgroup,html,i,iframe,img,ins,kbd,label,legend,li,mark,menu,nav,\nobject,ol,output,p,pre,q,ruby,s,samp,section,small,span,strike,strong,sub,summary,sup,table,tbody,td,tfoot,th,thead,time,tr,tt,u,ul,var,video{ font:inherit;margin:0;padding:0;vertical-align:baseline;border:0 }\nbody{ font-size:16px; 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}\n.meta {color:#5e5c6d;font-size:13px;margin:0 0 .5em; }\na{text-decoration:none; color:#2a4b87;}\n.meta .head { display: inline-block; overflow: hidden}\n.head .h-thumb { width: 30px; height: 30px; margin: 0; padding: 0; border-radius: 50%; float: left;}\n.head .h-content { margin: 0; padding: 0 0 0 9px; float: left;}\n.head .h-name {font-size: 13px; color: #eee; margin: 0;}\n.head .h-time {font-size: 11px; color: #7E829C; margin: 0;line-height: 11px;}\n.small {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.9); -webkit-transform: scale(0.9); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.smaller {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.8); -webkit-transform: scale(0.8); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.bt-text {font-size: 12px;margin: 1.5em 0 0 0}\n.bt-text p {margin: 0}\n</style>\n</head>\n<body>\n<div class=\"wrapper\">\n<header>\n<h2 class=\"title\">\nTesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors\n</h2>\n\n<h4 class=\"meta\">\n\n\n2021-06-03 22:55 GMT+8&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<a href=https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors>seekingalpha</a>\n\n\n</h4>\n\n</header>\n<article>\n<div>\nSummary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.\nShareholders assuming Tesla's ...\n\n<a href=\"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors\">Web Link</a>\n\n</div>\n\n\n</article>\n</div>\n</body>\n</html>\n","type":0,"thumbnail":"","relate_stocks":{"TSLA":"特斯拉"},"source_url":"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors","is_english":true,"share_image_url":"https://static.laohu8.com/e9f99090a1c2ed51c021029395664489","article_id":"1152573638","content_text":"Summary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.\nShareholders assuming Tesla's Price/Book multiple deflates from around 25 to 5 over the next 10 years need book value per share to grow 5x just to break even.\nSo far, Tesla's growth in book value is mostly from \"Additional Paid-In Capital\" (issuing new shares at high prices), rather than retained earnings.\nLong-term earnings estimates imply book value per share sums up to 150-250 by the end of 2030, meaning a breakeven Price/Book of 2.5-4x, which is well above most mature autos.\nI present a 1x2 put spread as an attractive trade both for long investors concerned about overvaluation, as well as those seeking to bet on a Price/Book multiple contraction.\n\nPhoto by Jag_cz/iStock Editorial via Getty Images\nBook value per share is likely not the first metric that comes to mind when you think of a \"growth company of the future\" like Tesla (TSLA), but in this article, I will explain why book value per share is the most important bottom line number long-term investors in this company should watch. As long as zero dividends are expected, a TSLA shareholder's total return will, by definition, be defined by the growth of Tesla's book value per share crossed against the change in the Price/Book (P/B) multiple of those shares. After looking at some numbers underlying TSLA's book value per share, and how much it will have to grow for current TSLA shareholders to make money, I conclude with three actionable option strategies based on expectations for how these numbers may change in the medium term. This article also can be seen as a follow up to the 2041 breakeven projection of Tesla I published last year.\nTesla Share Price Rise Follows Book Value\nThe first chart here shows how the rise in Tesla's share price has moved remarkably in line with TSLA's growth in book value per share. TSLA has so far never paid a dividend.\nData by YCharts\nMultiple Expansion and Contraction\nThe above chart, which is on a log scale, is far smoother than that of the (P/B) ratio between these two numbers. The multiple seemed to have stabilized between 2017 and late 2019, but its rise from below 7 in mid-2019 to over 40 in late 2020 and back to around 26 today explains much of TSLA's recent surge and volatility. Another way of thinking about it: TSLA's book value per share is up roughly 4-fold in the past two years, and its P/B is up about 4-fold over the past two years, which together explain why TSLA's shares are up about 16-fold over the past two years. The big question for investors at these levels is: What future combination of book value growth and P/B expansion or contraction can be expected to produce a satisfactory rate of return?\nData by YCharts\nUnderstanding Tesla's Book Value Growth\nAlthough the title of my Marketplace serviceLong Run Incomeimplies a preference for dividends, we believe high-quality book value growth is the best kind of \"dividend alternative\" for companies who can reinvest cash profits internally at far higher rates of return than I can externally. I would challenge any investor to explain why else to buy a low-dividend or no-dividend stock except for the expectation of higher returns from book value growth. For that reason, I have come to focus my analysis of growth companies on how well they seem able to grow book value per share.\nI break down Tesla's book value trajectory into two main parts: Retained Earnings, and Additional Paid In Capital. Although Tesla seems to have \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability, having reported 7 consecutive quarters of positive earnings since September 2019, accumulated profits still fall short of accumulated losses by over $4 billion.\nData by YCharts\nThe other \"half\" (actually over 100%) of Tesla's book value comes from the money paid in by investors. TSLA has continuously raised capital over the past several years by issuing new shares, and the higher the valuation multiple at which TSLA can issue new shares, the more it can accumulate in Additional Paid In Capital. These share issuances also raise the number of shares outstanding, which has the dual effect of raising Tesla's overall market value (since the price per share is now multiplied by more shares), and diluting each share's per-share book value. This increase in book value per share and decline in Price/Book in every recent new share issuance effectively reflects a \"profit\" earlier shareholders enjoy for having later investors pay a higher valuation to get into the company.\nData by YCharts\nPutting these above two charts together, we see that so far Tesla has \"made\" over $27 billion selling shares of its stock to investors, vs. losing over $4 billion in trying to sell cars and batteries to customers, and of course the latter eventually needs to overtake the former for investors to start making their money back.\nHow Tesla's Earnings Projections Add Up\nIf we assume that Tesla stops issuing new shares (a big assumption, but necessary to keep the math simple), then we can add up projected earnings per share to the book value per share to accumulate a projection of future book value per share. Projections of Tesla's future earnings deserve their own article or research report, so for the purposes of this update, I'll use the low vs high analyst forecasts on Tesla'sSeeking Alphaearnings page:\nSource:SeekingAlpha Earnings Page For TSLA\nNote that between 2025 and 2025, the low and median EPS estimates jump as the number of analysts covering the stock that far out falls from 11 to two, implying that the two analysts projecting TSLA's earnings out to 2030 are on the more optimistic end of the street. If we add up the low and high EPS estimates to today's starting book value per share of $23.90, we get a forecast of TSLA's book value of between $160 and $235 per share for the end of 2030. From today's price of around $623.90 per share, that means if TSLA's book value grows to around $200 (the middle of that optimistic range), then a contraction in TSLA's P/B from today's level of 26 to a still \"high for hardware\" multiple of 3 would mean shareholders would earn a 0% return between now and 2030. In other words, someone buying TSLA today would have to believe that either:\n\nTesla will grow its earnings and book value even faster than the most optimistic analyst estimates, or\nThat investors will continue paying P/B multiples well above 3 for the stock.\n\nOn forecasting what TSLA's P/B might be by 2030, there are three ways I can see expecting a multiple of 3 or higher:\n\nAnother valuation bubble: The P/B of Toyota Motor Corp. (TM), charted below, reached highs around 3 in Japan's late 1980s bubble, and again in the late 1990s \"echo bubble,\" and that was its high. If TSLA becomes like TM by 2030, this sort of broader stock valuation bubble may be needed to provide an attractive return on the exit price.\nBusiness transformation: The biggest TSLA bulls I speak to are those who believe TSLA may either remain a premium hardware maker with services on top like Apple Inc. (AAPL), or as a more asset-light, high return software platform like Microsoft (MSFT), whose P/B ratios are charted below Toyota's.\nFinancial engineering: One other driver of Apple's P/B expansion is buybacks, as I explained in this example with McDonald's. Buybacks at high P/B multiples reduce book value per share and raise the P/B multiple, all else equal, in ways exactly opposite to how Tesla has been only issuing (not buying back) shares so far.\n\nData by YCharts\nData by YCharts\nAnother way of comparing Tesla's $36 billion in annual sales vs. Toyota's $257 billion is on a revenue per capital basis. In other words, Tesla currently grosses around $5/year per person on the planet, vs. Toyota's roughly $37/year per human on earth. The growth question for 2030 is whether Tesla can still reach Toyota's number, especially given that:\n\nDemand for transportation, in terms of global population times the percentage of the global population that can afford a car, is likely to grow at a slower pace than historically, especially after 2030, and\nSelf-driving cars that aren't owned by one person, and so don't need to be parked idle most of the time, might actually decrease demand for new cars.\n\nWithout continued high growth past 2030, even 3x book might be on the high end for a car or battery company.\nData byYCharts\nTrading a TSLA P/B Contraction\nMy favorite actionable strategies on a stock like TSLA, which I don't expect to fundamentally collapse, but do expect to experience a significant multiple contraction, generally involve some form of option put spread. The option strategy described below works both for bears wanting to profit from an outright 20%-30% decline, or long-term bulls wanting to protect their shares' value against such a decline.\nOne challenge with simply buying put spreads on TSLA is that its option prices imply a significant \"positive skew,\" which makes put spreads relatively expensive to call spreads. In other words, the market is implying an expectation that TSLA shares are more likely than not to fall a little, offset by a smaller chance of a much larger upside move. Most of the near-the-money put spreads on TSLA cost more than 50% of the maximum payoff, even with longer-dated options or lower strike prices.\nFor the time horizon, I'm choosing the June 17, 2022, expiry date, which as of this writing is a little more than one year out. The main reasons I find first the expiry after one year to be a \"sweet spot\" for this type of strategy include:\n\nAs opposed to outright short selling, buying a put spread to profit from a decline in a share price may qualify for long-term capital gains tax treatment, as we would be holding a long position in a put spread longer than one year.\nAs opposed to even longer-dated options (say the two-year options expiring June 2023), rolling one-year options forces us to reevaluate our valuation and strike prices and decide if and in what form to roll the strategy after four more quarterly book value updates.\n\nIn this strategy, we buy 1x 650 strike put around 150 and then sell 2x 500 puts around 75 each, for roughly zero net up-front premium. Payoff scenarios based on TSLA's closing price at expiry include:\nSource: My Own Excel Calculation and Chart\nThe maximum payout ($150/share) divided by the maximum loss ($350/share) presents a \"maximum rate of return\" on this strategy is +42.8%, though getting that exact maximum payout is nearly impossible (as it requires TSLA to close at exactly $500/share on the expiry date). More likely, this option strategy would deliver a rate of return of more than 14.2% on the maximum loss if TSLA closes between 400-600 at expiry. If we follow the earlier earnings estimates and project TSLA's book value per share to be around $30/share by then, that means we expect a contract in P/B to between 13-20 by next summer.\nConclusion\nFor high-growth, non-dividend paying stocks like Tesla, return expectations break down into expectations of book value growth times expectation of P/B multiple expansion or contraction. Now that it's \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability and reached a respectable level of sales, I believe Tesla is less likely to be the next DeLorean Motor Company, and at best like Microsoft in 2000. To summarize an example I often reference inLong Run Income, from 2000 to 2010, Microsoft's business continued to grow, but investors who bought at the beginning of 2000 were still down over 36% 10 years later because Microsoft's P/B multiple declined by that much more than the business grew. Here is one chart showing that \"lost decade\" for MSFT shareholders.\nData by YCharts\nFor investors who want to hedge a decline in TSLA shares from here to $500, or those who believe TSLA may be a good company that is just wildly overvalued at these levels and may be worth buying below $500, the 1x2 put spread strategy described above may be worth considering.","news_type":1},"isVote":1,"likeStatus":false,"favoriteStatus":false,"reportStatus":false,"tweetType":1,"langContent":"EN"},{"id":118795043,"gmtCreate":1622761157182,"gmtModify":1704190496308,"author":{"id":"3576027044492853","authorId":"3576027044492853","authorIdStr":"3576027044492853","name":"keithwxy","avatar":"https://static.laohu8.com/default-avatar.jpg","vip":1,"crmLevel":4,"crmLevelSwitch":0,"idStr":"3576027044492853"},"htmlText":"Like and comment!","listText":"Like and comment!","text":"Like and comment!","images":[],"top":1,"highlighted":1,"essential":1,"paper":1,"likeSize":2,"commentSize":1,"repostSize":0,"link":"https://ttm.financial/post/118795043","repostId":1152573638,"repostType":4,"repost":{"id":"1152573638","pubTimestamp":1622732138,"share":"https://ttm.financial/m/news/1152573638?lang=&edition=fundamental","pubTime":"2021-06-03 22:55","market":"us","language":"en","title":"Tesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors","url":"https://stock-news.laohu8.com/highlight/detail?id=1152573638","media":"seekingalpha","summary":"Summary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very hi","content":"Summary\n<ul>\n <li>As long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.</li>\n <li>Shareholders assuming Tesla's Price/Book multiple deflates from around 25 to 5 over the next 10 years need book value per share to grow 5x just to break even.</li>\n <li>So far, Tesla's growth in book value is mostly from \"Additional Paid-In Capital\" (issuing new shares at high prices), rather than retained earnings.</li>\n <li>Long-term earnings estimates imply book value per share sums up to 150-250 by the end of 2030, meaning a breakeven Price/Book of 2.5-4x, which is well above most mature autos.</li>\n <li>I present a 1x2 put spread as an attractive trade both for long investors concerned about overvaluation, as well as those seeking to bet on a Price/Book multiple contraction.</li>\n</ul>\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/c329e23b2762c47b11d11d95ec584959\" tg-width=\"768\" tg-height=\"512\">Photo by Jag_cz/iStock Editorial via Getty Images\nBook value per share is likely not the first metric that comes to mind when you think of a \"growth company of the future\" like Tesla (TSLA), but in this article, I will explain why book value per share is the most important bottom line number long-term investors in this company should watch. As long as zero dividends are expected, a TSLA shareholder's total return will, by definition, be defined by the growth of Tesla's book value per share crossed against the change in the Price/Book (P/B) multiple of those shares. After looking at some numbers underlying TSLA's book value per share, and how much it will have to grow for current TSLA shareholders to make money, I conclude with three actionable option strategies based on expectations for how these numbers may change in the medium term. This article also can be seen as a follow up to the&nbsp;2041 breakeven projection of Tesla I published last year.\nTesla Share Price Rise Follows Book Value\nThe first chart here shows how the rise in Tesla's share price has moved remarkably in line with TSLA's growth in book value per share. TSLA has so far never paid a dividend.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/c1f994d62f1ec67c3b95ae15c3791fa8\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"458\">Data by YCharts\nMultiple Expansion and Contraction\nThe above chart, which is on a log scale, is far smoother than that of the (P/B) ratio between these two numbers. The multiple seemed to have stabilized between 2017 and late 2019, but its rise from below 7 in mid-2019 to over 40 in late 2020 and back to around 26 today explains much of TSLA's recent surge and volatility. Another way of thinking about it: TSLA's book value per share is up roughly 4-fold in the past two years, and its P/B is up about 4-fold over the past two years, which together explain why TSLA's shares are up about 16-fold over the past two years. The big question for investors at these levels is: What future combination of book value growth and P/B expansion or contraction can be expected to produce a satisfactory rate of return?\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/b8eb71b806f59aaabd5d09a6eb4b1606\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\nUnderstanding Tesla's Book Value Growth\nAlthough the title of my Marketplace serviceLong Run Incomeimplies a preference for dividends, we believe high-quality book value growth is the best kind of \"dividend alternative\" for companies who can reinvest cash profits internally at far higher rates of return than I can externally. I would challenge any investor to explain why else to buy a low-dividend or no-dividend stock except for the expectation of higher returns from book value growth. For that reason, I have come to focus my analysis of growth companies on how well they seem able to grow book value per share.\nI break down Tesla's book value trajectory into two main parts: Retained Earnings, and Additional Paid In Capital. Although Tesla seems to have \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability, having reported&nbsp;7 consecutive quarters of positive earnings since September 2019, accumulated profits still fall short of accumulated losses by over $4 billion.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/08701c599a8c6fa7a66efde3c0a12cac\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\nThe other \"half\" (actually over 100%) of Tesla's book value comes from the money paid in by investors. TSLA has continuously raised capital over the past several years by issuing new shares, and the higher the valuation multiple at which TSLA can issue new shares, the more it can accumulate in Additional Paid In Capital. These share issuances also raise the number of shares outstanding, which has the dual effect of raising Tesla's overall market value (since the price per share is now multiplied by more shares), and diluting each share's per-share book value. This increase in book value per share and decline in Price/Book in every recent new share issuance effectively reflects a \"profit\" earlier shareholders enjoy for having later investors pay a higher valuation to get into the company.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/971bf86f3d08fe938af2845121be8d4c\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"441\">Data by YCharts\nPutting these above two charts together, we see that so far Tesla has \"made\" over $27 billion selling shares of its stock to investors, vs. losing over $4 billion in trying to sell cars and batteries to customers, and of course the latter eventually needs to overtake the former for investors to start making their money back.\nHow Tesla's Earnings Projections Add Up\nIf we assume that Tesla stops issuing new shares (a big assumption, but necessary to keep the math simple), then we can add up projected earnings per share to the book value per share to accumulate a projection of future book value per share. Projections of Tesla's future earnings deserve their own article or research report, so for the purposes of this update, I'll use the low vs high analyst forecasts on Tesla'sSeeking Alphaearnings page:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/f36166f6653fb8e11941e3c58b313ccb\" tg-width=\"640\" tg-height=\"312\">Source:SeekingAlpha Earnings Page For TSLA\nNote that between 2025 and 2025, the low and median EPS estimates jump as the number of analysts covering the stock that far out falls from 11 to two, implying that the two analysts projecting TSLA's earnings out to 2030 are on the more optimistic end of the street. If we add up the low and high EPS estimates to today's starting book value per share of $23.90, we get a forecast of TSLA's book value of between $160 and $235 per share for the end of 2030. From today's price of around $623.90 per share, that means if TSLA's book value grows to around $200 (the middle of that optimistic range), then a contraction in TSLA's P/B from today's level of 26 to a still \"high for hardware\" multiple of 3 would mean shareholders would earn a 0% return between now and 2030. In other words, someone buying TSLA today would have to believe that either:\n<ol>\n <li>Tesla will grow its earnings and book value even faster than the most optimistic analyst estimates, or</li>\n <li>That investors will continue paying P/B multiples well above 3 for the stock.</li>\n</ol>\nOn forecasting what TSLA's P/B might be by 2030, there are three ways I can see expecting a multiple of 3 or higher:\n<ol>\n <li>Another valuation bubble: The P/B of Toyota Motor Corp. (TM), charted below, reached highs around 3 in Japan's late 1980s bubble, and again in the late 1990s \"echo bubble,\" and that was its high. If TSLA becomes like TM by 2030, this sort of broader stock valuation bubble may be needed to provide an attractive return on the exit price.</li>\n <li>Business transformation: The biggest TSLA bulls I speak to are those who believe TSLA may either remain a premium hardware maker with services on top like Apple Inc. (AAPL), or as a more asset-light, high return software platform like Microsoft (MSFT), whose P/B ratios are charted below Toyota's.</li>\n <li>Financial engineering: One other driver of Apple's&nbsp;P/B expansion is buybacks, as I explained in this example with McDonald's. Buybacks at high P/B multiples reduce book value per share and raise the P/B multiple, all else equal, in ways exactly opposite to how Tesla has been only issuing (not buying back) shares so far.</li>\n</ol>\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/59e353b1112fb465bf275bfd2e2f5c38\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/7432d2c24afe124c70d139e0320f2d0c\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"441\">Data by YCharts\nAnother way of comparing Tesla's $36 billion in annual sales vs. Toyota's $257 billion is on a revenue per capital basis. In other words, Tesla currently grosses around $5/year per person on the planet, vs. Toyota's roughly $37/year per human on earth. The growth question for 2030 is whether Tesla can still reach Toyota's number, especially given that:\n<ol>\n <li>Demand for transportation, in terms of global population times the percentage of the global population that can afford a car, is likely to grow at a slower pace than historically, especially after 2030, and</li>\n <li>Self-driving cars that aren't owned by one person, and so don't need to be parked idle most of the time, might actually decrease demand for new cars.</li>\n</ol>\nWithout continued high growth past 2030, even 3x book might be on the high end for a car or battery company.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/ed6900c059b599cc5885a2184ad6db05\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"537\">Data byYCharts\nTrading a TSLA P/B Contraction\nMy favorite actionable strategies on a stock like TSLA, which I don't expect to fundamentally collapse, but do expect to experience a significant multiple contraction, generally involve some form of option put spread. The option strategy described below works both for bears wanting to profit from an outright 20%-30% decline, or long-term bulls wanting to protect their shares' value against such a decline.\nOne challenge with simply buying put spreads on TSLA is that its option prices imply a significant \"positive skew,\" which makes put spreads relatively expensive to call spreads. In other words, the market is implying an expectation that TSLA shares are more likely than not to fall a little, offset by a smaller chance of a much larger upside move. Most of the near-the-money put spreads on TSLA cost more than 50% of the maximum payoff, even with longer-dated options or lower strike prices.\nFor the time horizon, I'm choosing the June 17, 2022, expiry date, which as of this writing is a little more than one year out. The main reasons I find first the expiry after one year to be a \"sweet spot\" for this type of strategy include:\n<ol>\n <li>As opposed to outright short selling, buying a put spread to profit from a decline in a share price may qualify for long-term capital gains tax treatment, as we would be holding a long position in a put spread longer than one year.</li>\n <li>As opposed to even longer-dated options (say the two-year options expiring June 2023), rolling one-year options forces us to reevaluate our valuation and strike prices and decide if and in what form to roll the strategy after four more quarterly book value updates.</li>\n</ol>\nIn this strategy, we buy 1x 650 strike put around 150 and then sell 2x 500 puts around 75 each, for roughly zero net up-front premium. Payoff scenarios based on TSLA's closing price at expiry include:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/d8d415689c4d898bc75eba42b9f79152\" tg-width=\"640\" tg-height=\"452\">Source: My Own Excel Calculation and Chart\nThe maximum payout ($150/share) divided by the maximum loss ($350/share) presents a \"maximum rate of return\" on this strategy is +42.8%, though getting that exact maximum payout is nearly impossible (as it requires TSLA to close at exactly $500/share on the expiry date). More likely, this option strategy would deliver a rate of return of more than 14.2% on the maximum loss if TSLA closes between 400-600 at expiry. If we follow the earlier earnings estimates and project TSLA's book value per share to be around $30/share by then, that means we expect a contract in P/B to between 13-20 by next summer.\nConclusion\nFor high-growth, non-dividend paying stocks like Tesla, return expectations break down into expectations of book value growth times expectation of P/B multiple expansion or contraction. Now that it's \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability and reached a respectable level of sales, I believe Tesla is less likely to be the next&nbsp;DeLorean Motor Company, and at best like Microsoft in 2000. To summarize an example I often reference inLong Run Income, from 2000 to 2010, Microsoft's business continued to grow, but investors who bought at the beginning of 2000 were still down over 36% 10 years later because Microsoft's P/B multiple declined by that much more than the business grew. Here is one chart showing that \"lost decade\" for MSFT shareholders.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/faaf554d7a7744d36d27ea7f92e9a9e2\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"475\">Data by YCharts\nFor investors who want to hedge a decline in TSLA shares from here to $500, or those who believe TSLA may be a good company that is just wildly overvalued at these levels and may be worth buying below $500, the 1x2 put spread strategy described above may be worth considering.","collect":0,"html":"<!DOCTYPE html>\n<html>\n<head>\n<meta http-equiv=\"Content-Type\" content=\"text/html; charset=utf-8\" />\n<meta name=\"viewport\" content=\"width=device-width,initial-scale=1.0,minimum-scale=1.0,maximum-scale=1.0,user-scalable=no\"/>\n<meta name=\"format-detection\" content=\"telephone=no,email=no,address=no\" />\n<title>Tesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors</title>\n<style type=\"text/css\">\na,abbr,acronym,address,applet,article,aside,audio,b,big,blockquote,body,canvas,caption,center,cite,code,dd,del,details,dfn,div,dl,dt,\nem,embed,fieldset,figcaption,figure,footer,form,h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6,header,hgroup,html,i,iframe,img,ins,kbd,label,legend,li,mark,menu,nav,\nobject,ol,output,p,pre,q,ruby,s,samp,section,small,span,strike,strong,sub,summary,sup,table,tbody,td,tfoot,th,thead,time,tr,tt,u,ul,var,video{ font:inherit;margin:0;padding:0;vertical-align:baseline;border:0 }\nbody{ font-size:16px; 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}\n.meta {color:#5e5c6d;font-size:13px;margin:0 0 .5em; }\na{text-decoration:none; color:#2a4b87;}\n.meta .head { display: inline-block; overflow: hidden}\n.head .h-thumb { width: 30px; height: 30px; margin: 0; padding: 0; border-radius: 50%; float: left;}\n.head .h-content { margin: 0; padding: 0 0 0 9px; float: left;}\n.head .h-name {font-size: 13px; color: #eee; margin: 0;}\n.head .h-time {font-size: 11px; color: #7E829C; margin: 0;line-height: 11px;}\n.small {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.9); -webkit-transform: scale(0.9); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.smaller {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.8); -webkit-transform: scale(0.8); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.bt-text {font-size: 12px;margin: 1.5em 0 0 0}\n.bt-text p {margin: 0}\n</style>\n</head>\n<body>\n<div class=\"wrapper\">\n<header>\n<h2 class=\"title\">\nTesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors\n</h2>\n\n<h4 class=\"meta\">\n\n\n2021-06-03 22:55 GMT+8&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<a href=https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors>seekingalpha</a>\n\n\n</h4>\n\n</header>\n<article>\n<div>\nSummary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.\nShareholders assuming Tesla's ...\n\n<a href=\"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors\">Web Link</a>\n\n</div>\n\n\n</article>\n</div>\n</body>\n</html>\n","type":0,"thumbnail":"","relate_stocks":{"TSLA":"特斯拉"},"source_url":"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors","is_english":true,"share_image_url":"https://static.laohu8.com/e9f99090a1c2ed51c021029395664489","article_id":"1152573638","content_text":"Summary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.\nShareholders assuming Tesla's Price/Book multiple deflates from around 25 to 5 over the next 10 years need book value per share to grow 5x just to break even.\nSo far, Tesla's growth in book value is mostly from \"Additional Paid-In Capital\" (issuing new shares at high prices), rather than retained earnings.\nLong-term earnings estimates imply book value per share sums up to 150-250 by the end of 2030, meaning a breakeven Price/Book of 2.5-4x, which is well above most mature autos.\nI present a 1x2 put spread as an attractive trade both for long investors concerned about overvaluation, as well as those seeking to bet on a Price/Book multiple contraction.\n\nPhoto by Jag_cz/iStock Editorial via Getty Images\nBook value per share is likely not the first metric that comes to mind when you think of a \"growth company of the future\" like Tesla (TSLA), but in this article, I will explain why book value per share is the most important bottom line number long-term investors in this company should watch. As long as zero dividends are expected, a TSLA shareholder's total return will, by definition, be defined by the growth of Tesla's book value per share crossed against the change in the Price/Book (P/B) multiple of those shares. After looking at some numbers underlying TSLA's book value per share, and how much it will have to grow for current TSLA shareholders to make money, I conclude with three actionable option strategies based on expectations for how these numbers may change in the medium term. This article also can be seen as a follow up to the 2041 breakeven projection of Tesla I published last year.\nTesla Share Price Rise Follows Book Value\nThe first chart here shows how the rise in Tesla's share price has moved remarkably in line with TSLA's growth in book value per share. TSLA has so far never paid a dividend.\nData by YCharts\nMultiple Expansion and Contraction\nThe above chart, which is on a log scale, is far smoother than that of the (P/B) ratio between these two numbers. The multiple seemed to have stabilized between 2017 and late 2019, but its rise from below 7 in mid-2019 to over 40 in late 2020 and back to around 26 today explains much of TSLA's recent surge and volatility. Another way of thinking about it: TSLA's book value per share is up roughly 4-fold in the past two years, and its P/B is up about 4-fold over the past two years, which together explain why TSLA's shares are up about 16-fold over the past two years. The big question for investors at these levels is: What future combination of book value growth and P/B expansion or contraction can be expected to produce a satisfactory rate of return?\nData by YCharts\nUnderstanding Tesla's Book Value Growth\nAlthough the title of my Marketplace serviceLong Run Incomeimplies a preference for dividends, we believe high-quality book value growth is the best kind of \"dividend alternative\" for companies who can reinvest cash profits internally at far higher rates of return than I can externally. I would challenge any investor to explain why else to buy a low-dividend or no-dividend stock except for the expectation of higher returns from book value growth. For that reason, I have come to focus my analysis of growth companies on how well they seem able to grow book value per share.\nI break down Tesla's book value trajectory into two main parts: Retained Earnings, and Additional Paid In Capital. Although Tesla seems to have \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability, having reported 7 consecutive quarters of positive earnings since September 2019, accumulated profits still fall short of accumulated losses by over $4 billion.\nData by YCharts\nThe other \"half\" (actually over 100%) of Tesla's book value comes from the money paid in by investors. TSLA has continuously raised capital over the past several years by issuing new shares, and the higher the valuation multiple at which TSLA can issue new shares, the more it can accumulate in Additional Paid In Capital. These share issuances also raise the number of shares outstanding, which has the dual effect of raising Tesla's overall market value (since the price per share is now multiplied by more shares), and diluting each share's per-share book value. This increase in book value per share and decline in Price/Book in every recent new share issuance effectively reflects a \"profit\" earlier shareholders enjoy for having later investors pay a higher valuation to get into the company.\nData by YCharts\nPutting these above two charts together, we see that so far Tesla has \"made\" over $27 billion selling shares of its stock to investors, vs. losing over $4 billion in trying to sell cars and batteries to customers, and of course the latter eventually needs to overtake the former for investors to start making their money back.\nHow Tesla's Earnings Projections Add Up\nIf we assume that Tesla stops issuing new shares (a big assumption, but necessary to keep the math simple), then we can add up projected earnings per share to the book value per share to accumulate a projection of future book value per share. Projections of Tesla's future earnings deserve their own article or research report, so for the purposes of this update, I'll use the low vs high analyst forecasts on Tesla'sSeeking Alphaearnings page:\nSource:SeekingAlpha Earnings Page For TSLA\nNote that between 2025 and 2025, the low and median EPS estimates jump as the number of analysts covering the stock that far out falls from 11 to two, implying that the two analysts projecting TSLA's earnings out to 2030 are on the more optimistic end of the street. If we add up the low and high EPS estimates to today's starting book value per share of $23.90, we get a forecast of TSLA's book value of between $160 and $235 per share for the end of 2030. From today's price of around $623.90 per share, that means if TSLA's book value grows to around $200 (the middle of that optimistic range), then a contraction in TSLA's P/B from today's level of 26 to a still \"high for hardware\" multiple of 3 would mean shareholders would earn a 0% return between now and 2030. In other words, someone buying TSLA today would have to believe that either:\n\nTesla will grow its earnings and book value even faster than the most optimistic analyst estimates, or\nThat investors will continue paying P/B multiples well above 3 for the stock.\n\nOn forecasting what TSLA's P/B might be by 2030, there are three ways I can see expecting a multiple of 3 or higher:\n\nAnother valuation bubble: The P/B of Toyota Motor Corp. (TM), charted below, reached highs around 3 in Japan's late 1980s bubble, and again in the late 1990s \"echo bubble,\" and that was its high. If TSLA becomes like TM by 2030, this sort of broader stock valuation bubble may be needed to provide an attractive return on the exit price.\nBusiness transformation: The biggest TSLA bulls I speak to are those who believe TSLA may either remain a premium hardware maker with services on top like Apple Inc. (AAPL), or as a more asset-light, high return software platform like Microsoft (MSFT), whose P/B ratios are charted below Toyota's.\nFinancial engineering: One other driver of Apple's P/B expansion is buybacks, as I explained in this example with McDonald's. Buybacks at high P/B multiples reduce book value per share and raise the P/B multiple, all else equal, in ways exactly opposite to how Tesla has been only issuing (not buying back) shares so far.\n\nData by YCharts\nData by YCharts\nAnother way of comparing Tesla's $36 billion in annual sales vs. Toyota's $257 billion is on a revenue per capital basis. In other words, Tesla currently grosses around $5/year per person on the planet, vs. Toyota's roughly $37/year per human on earth. The growth question for 2030 is whether Tesla can still reach Toyota's number, especially given that:\n\nDemand for transportation, in terms of global population times the percentage of the global population that can afford a car, is likely to grow at a slower pace than historically, especially after 2030, and\nSelf-driving cars that aren't owned by one person, and so don't need to be parked idle most of the time, might actually decrease demand for new cars.\n\nWithout continued high growth past 2030, even 3x book might be on the high end for a car or battery company.\nData byYCharts\nTrading a TSLA P/B Contraction\nMy favorite actionable strategies on a stock like TSLA, which I don't expect to fundamentally collapse, but do expect to experience a significant multiple contraction, generally involve some form of option put spread. The option strategy described below works both for bears wanting to profit from an outright 20%-30% decline, or long-term bulls wanting to protect their shares' value against such a decline.\nOne challenge with simply buying put spreads on TSLA is that its option prices imply a significant \"positive skew,\" which makes put spreads relatively expensive to call spreads. In other words, the market is implying an expectation that TSLA shares are more likely than not to fall a little, offset by a smaller chance of a much larger upside move. Most of the near-the-money put spreads on TSLA cost more than 50% of the maximum payoff, even with longer-dated options or lower strike prices.\nFor the time horizon, I'm choosing the June 17, 2022, expiry date, which as of this writing is a little more than one year out. The main reasons I find first the expiry after one year to be a \"sweet spot\" for this type of strategy include:\n\nAs opposed to outright short selling, buying a put spread to profit from a decline in a share price may qualify for long-term capital gains tax treatment, as we would be holding a long position in a put spread longer than one year.\nAs opposed to even longer-dated options (say the two-year options expiring June 2023), rolling one-year options forces us to reevaluate our valuation and strike prices and decide if and in what form to roll the strategy after four more quarterly book value updates.\n\nIn this strategy, we buy 1x 650 strike put around 150 and then sell 2x 500 puts around 75 each, for roughly zero net up-front premium. Payoff scenarios based on TSLA's closing price at expiry include:\nSource: My Own Excel Calculation and Chart\nThe maximum payout ($150/share) divided by the maximum loss ($350/share) presents a \"maximum rate of return\" on this strategy is +42.8%, though getting that exact maximum payout is nearly impossible (as it requires TSLA to close at exactly $500/share on the expiry date). More likely, this option strategy would deliver a rate of return of more than 14.2% on the maximum loss if TSLA closes between 400-600 at expiry. If we follow the earlier earnings estimates and project TSLA's book value per share to be around $30/share by then, that means we expect a contract in P/B to between 13-20 by next summer.\nConclusion\nFor high-growth, non-dividend paying stocks like Tesla, return expectations break down into expectations of book value growth times expectation of P/B multiple expansion or contraction. Now that it's \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability and reached a respectable level of sales, I believe Tesla is less likely to be the next DeLorean Motor Company, and at best like Microsoft in 2000. To summarize an example I often reference inLong Run Income, from 2000 to 2010, Microsoft's business continued to grow, but investors who bought at the beginning of 2000 were still down over 36% 10 years later because Microsoft's P/B multiple declined by that much more than the business grew. Here is one chart showing that \"lost decade\" for MSFT shareholders.\nData by YCharts\nFor investors who want to hedge a decline in TSLA shares from here to $500, or those who believe TSLA may be a good company that is just wildly overvalued at these levels and may be worth buying below $500, the 1x2 put spread strategy described above may be worth considering.","news_type":1},"isVote":1,"likeStatus":false,"favoriteStatus":false,"reportStatus":false,"tweetType":1,"comments":[{"id":4569028,"gmtCreate":1622761431512,"gmtModify":1663227906440,"authorId":3569643178216945,"author":{"id":3569643178216945,"authorId":3569643178216945,"name":"堵神","avatar":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/cacee5ba5c333e51bfcd4bed94dada85","vip":1,"crmLevel":2,"crmLevelSwitch":0,"individualDisplayBadges":[]},"repliedAuthorId":0,"objectId":118795043,"type":1,"supId":0,"prevId":0,"content":"done.. please reply thanks ☺️","text":"done.. please reply thanks ☺️","html":"done.. please reply thanks ☺️"}],"langContent":"EN"},{"id":118796090,"gmtCreate":1622761082310,"gmtModify":1704190492762,"author":{"id":"3579421475844844","authorId":"3579421475844844","authorIdStr":"3579421475844844","name":"ty91","avatar":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/6d9451c5894d6ca0b4485bad0568f720","vip":1,"crmLevel":8,"crmLevelSwitch":0,"idStr":"3579421475844844"},"htmlText":"Sad","listText":"Sad","text":"Sad","images":[],"top":1,"highlighted":1,"essential":1,"paper":1,"likeSize":3,"commentSize":0,"repostSize":0,"link":"https://ttm.financial/post/118796090","repostId":1152573638,"repostType":4,"repost":{"id":"1152573638","pubTimestamp":1622732138,"share":"https://ttm.financial/m/news/1152573638?lang=&edition=fundamental","pubTime":"2021-06-03 22:55","market":"us","language":"en","title":"Tesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors","url":"https://stock-news.laohu8.com/highlight/detail?id=1152573638","media":"seekingalpha","summary":"Summary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very hi","content":"Summary\n<ul>\n <li>As long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.</li>\n <li>Shareholders assuming Tesla's Price/Book multiple deflates from around 25 to 5 over the next 10 years need book value per share to grow 5x just to break even.</li>\n <li>So far, Tesla's growth in book value is mostly from \"Additional Paid-In Capital\" (issuing new shares at high prices), rather than retained earnings.</li>\n <li>Long-term earnings estimates imply book value per share sums up to 150-250 by the end of 2030, meaning a breakeven Price/Book of 2.5-4x, which is well above most mature autos.</li>\n <li>I present a 1x2 put spread as an attractive trade both for long investors concerned about overvaluation, as well as those seeking to bet on a Price/Book multiple contraction.</li>\n</ul>\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/c329e23b2762c47b11d11d95ec584959\" tg-width=\"768\" tg-height=\"512\">Photo by Jag_cz/iStock Editorial via Getty Images\nBook value per share is likely not the first metric that comes to mind when you think of a \"growth company of the future\" like Tesla (TSLA), but in this article, I will explain why book value per share is the most important bottom line number long-term investors in this company should watch. As long as zero dividends are expected, a TSLA shareholder's total return will, by definition, be defined by the growth of Tesla's book value per share crossed against the change in the Price/Book (P/B) multiple of those shares. After looking at some numbers underlying TSLA's book value per share, and how much it will have to grow for current TSLA shareholders to make money, I conclude with three actionable option strategies based on expectations for how these numbers may change in the medium term. This article also can be seen as a follow up to the&nbsp;2041 breakeven projection of Tesla I published last year.\nTesla Share Price Rise Follows Book Value\nThe first chart here shows how the rise in Tesla's share price has moved remarkably in line with TSLA's growth in book value per share. TSLA has so far never paid a dividend.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/c1f994d62f1ec67c3b95ae15c3791fa8\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"458\">Data by YCharts\nMultiple Expansion and Contraction\nThe above chart, which is on a log scale, is far smoother than that of the (P/B) ratio between these two numbers. The multiple seemed to have stabilized between 2017 and late 2019, but its rise from below 7 in mid-2019 to over 40 in late 2020 and back to around 26 today explains much of TSLA's recent surge and volatility. Another way of thinking about it: TSLA's book value per share is up roughly 4-fold in the past two years, and its P/B is up about 4-fold over the past two years, which together explain why TSLA's shares are up about 16-fold over the past two years. The big question for investors at these levels is: What future combination of book value growth and P/B expansion or contraction can be expected to produce a satisfactory rate of return?\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/b8eb71b806f59aaabd5d09a6eb4b1606\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\nUnderstanding Tesla's Book Value Growth\nAlthough the title of my Marketplace serviceLong Run Incomeimplies a preference for dividends, we believe high-quality book value growth is the best kind of \"dividend alternative\" for companies who can reinvest cash profits internally at far higher rates of return than I can externally. I would challenge any investor to explain why else to buy a low-dividend or no-dividend stock except for the expectation of higher returns from book value growth. For that reason, I have come to focus my analysis of growth companies on how well they seem able to grow book value per share.\nI break down Tesla's book value trajectory into two main parts: Retained Earnings, and Additional Paid In Capital. Although Tesla seems to have \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability, having reported&nbsp;7 consecutive quarters of positive earnings since September 2019, accumulated profits still fall short of accumulated losses by over $4 billion.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/08701c599a8c6fa7a66efde3c0a12cac\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\nThe other \"half\" (actually over 100%) of Tesla's book value comes from the money paid in by investors. TSLA has continuously raised capital over the past several years by issuing new shares, and the higher the valuation multiple at which TSLA can issue new shares, the more it can accumulate in Additional Paid In Capital. These share issuances also raise the number of shares outstanding, which has the dual effect of raising Tesla's overall market value (since the price per share is now multiplied by more shares), and diluting each share's per-share book value. This increase in book value per share and decline in Price/Book in every recent new share issuance effectively reflects a \"profit\" earlier shareholders enjoy for having later investors pay a higher valuation to get into the company.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/971bf86f3d08fe938af2845121be8d4c\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"441\">Data by YCharts\nPutting these above two charts together, we see that so far Tesla has \"made\" over $27 billion selling shares of its stock to investors, vs. losing over $4 billion in trying to sell cars and batteries to customers, and of course the latter eventually needs to overtake the former for investors to start making their money back.\nHow Tesla's Earnings Projections Add Up\nIf we assume that Tesla stops issuing new shares (a big assumption, but necessary to keep the math simple), then we can add up projected earnings per share to the book value per share to accumulate a projection of future book value per share. Projections of Tesla's future earnings deserve their own article or research report, so for the purposes of this update, I'll use the low vs high analyst forecasts on Tesla'sSeeking Alphaearnings page:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/f36166f6653fb8e11941e3c58b313ccb\" tg-width=\"640\" tg-height=\"312\">Source:SeekingAlpha Earnings Page For TSLA\nNote that between 2025 and 2025, the low and median EPS estimates jump as the number of analysts covering the stock that far out falls from 11 to two, implying that the two analysts projecting TSLA's earnings out to 2030 are on the more optimistic end of the street. If we add up the low and high EPS estimates to today's starting book value per share of $23.90, we get a forecast of TSLA's book value of between $160 and $235 per share for the end of 2030. From today's price of around $623.90 per share, that means if TSLA's book value grows to around $200 (the middle of that optimistic range), then a contraction in TSLA's P/B from today's level of 26 to a still \"high for hardware\" multiple of 3 would mean shareholders would earn a 0% return between now and 2030. In other words, someone buying TSLA today would have to believe that either:\n<ol>\n <li>Tesla will grow its earnings and book value even faster than the most optimistic analyst estimates, or</li>\n <li>That investors will continue paying P/B multiples well above 3 for the stock.</li>\n</ol>\nOn forecasting what TSLA's P/B might be by 2030, there are three ways I can see expecting a multiple of 3 or higher:\n<ol>\n <li>Another valuation bubble: The P/B of Toyota Motor Corp. (TM), charted below, reached highs around 3 in Japan's late 1980s bubble, and again in the late 1990s \"echo bubble,\" and that was its high. If TSLA becomes like TM by 2030, this sort of broader stock valuation bubble may be needed to provide an attractive return on the exit price.</li>\n <li>Business transformation: The biggest TSLA bulls I speak to are those who believe TSLA may either remain a premium hardware maker with services on top like Apple Inc. (AAPL), or as a more asset-light, high return software platform like Microsoft (MSFT), whose P/B ratios are charted below Toyota's.</li>\n <li>Financial engineering: One other driver of Apple's&nbsp;P/B expansion is buybacks, as I explained in this example with McDonald's. Buybacks at high P/B multiples reduce book value per share and raise the P/B multiple, all else equal, in ways exactly opposite to how Tesla has been only issuing (not buying back) shares so far.</li>\n</ol>\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/59e353b1112fb465bf275bfd2e2f5c38\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/7432d2c24afe124c70d139e0320f2d0c\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"441\">Data by YCharts\nAnother way of comparing Tesla's $36 billion in annual sales vs. Toyota's $257 billion is on a revenue per capital basis. In other words, Tesla currently grosses around $5/year per person on the planet, vs. Toyota's roughly $37/year per human on earth. The growth question for 2030 is whether Tesla can still reach Toyota's number, especially given that:\n<ol>\n <li>Demand for transportation, in terms of global population times the percentage of the global population that can afford a car, is likely to grow at a slower pace than historically, especially after 2030, and</li>\n <li>Self-driving cars that aren't owned by one person, and so don't need to be parked idle most of the time, might actually decrease demand for new cars.</li>\n</ol>\nWithout continued high growth past 2030, even 3x book might be on the high end for a car or battery company.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/ed6900c059b599cc5885a2184ad6db05\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"537\">Data byYCharts\nTrading a TSLA P/B Contraction\nMy favorite actionable strategies on a stock like TSLA, which I don't expect to fundamentally collapse, but do expect to experience a significant multiple contraction, generally involve some form of option put spread. The option strategy described below works both for bears wanting to profit from an outright 20%-30% decline, or long-term bulls wanting to protect their shares' value against such a decline.\nOne challenge with simply buying put spreads on TSLA is that its option prices imply a significant \"positive skew,\" which makes put spreads relatively expensive to call spreads. In other words, the market is implying an expectation that TSLA shares are more likely than not to fall a little, offset by a smaller chance of a much larger upside move. Most of the near-the-money put spreads on TSLA cost more than 50% of the maximum payoff, even with longer-dated options or lower strike prices.\nFor the time horizon, I'm choosing the June 17, 2022, expiry date, which as of this writing is a little more than one year out. The main reasons I find first the expiry after one year to be a \"sweet spot\" for this type of strategy include:\n<ol>\n <li>As opposed to outright short selling, buying a put spread to profit from a decline in a share price may qualify for long-term capital gains tax treatment, as we would be holding a long position in a put spread longer than one year.</li>\n <li>As opposed to even longer-dated options (say the two-year options expiring June 2023), rolling one-year options forces us to reevaluate our valuation and strike prices and decide if and in what form to roll the strategy after four more quarterly book value updates.</li>\n</ol>\nIn this strategy, we buy 1x 650 strike put around 150 and then sell 2x 500 puts around 75 each, for roughly zero net up-front premium. Payoff scenarios based on TSLA's closing price at expiry include:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/d8d415689c4d898bc75eba42b9f79152\" tg-width=\"640\" tg-height=\"452\">Source: My Own Excel Calculation and Chart\nThe maximum payout ($150/share) divided by the maximum loss ($350/share) presents a \"maximum rate of return\" on this strategy is +42.8%, though getting that exact maximum payout is nearly impossible (as it requires TSLA to close at exactly $500/share on the expiry date). More likely, this option strategy would deliver a rate of return of more than 14.2% on the maximum loss if TSLA closes between 400-600 at expiry. If we follow the earlier earnings estimates and project TSLA's book value per share to be around $30/share by then, that means we expect a contract in P/B to between 13-20 by next summer.\nConclusion\nFor high-growth, non-dividend paying stocks like Tesla, return expectations break down into expectations of book value growth times expectation of P/B multiple expansion or contraction. Now that it's \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability and reached a respectable level of sales, I believe Tesla is less likely to be the next&nbsp;DeLorean Motor Company, and at best like Microsoft in 2000. To summarize an example I often reference inLong Run Income, from 2000 to 2010, Microsoft's business continued to grow, but investors who bought at the beginning of 2000 were still down over 36% 10 years later because Microsoft's P/B multiple declined by that much more than the business grew. Here is one chart showing that \"lost decade\" for MSFT shareholders.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/faaf554d7a7744d36d27ea7f92e9a9e2\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"475\">Data by YCharts\nFor investors who want to hedge a decline in TSLA shares from here to $500, or those who believe TSLA may be a good company that is just wildly overvalued at these levels and may be worth buying below $500, the 1x2 put spread strategy described above may be worth considering.","collect":0,"html":"<!DOCTYPE html>\n<html>\n<head>\n<meta http-equiv=\"Content-Type\" content=\"text/html; charset=utf-8\" />\n<meta name=\"viewport\" content=\"width=device-width,initial-scale=1.0,minimum-scale=1.0,maximum-scale=1.0,user-scalable=no\"/>\n<meta name=\"format-detection\" content=\"telephone=no,email=no,address=no\" />\n<title>Tesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors</title>\n<style type=\"text/css\">\na,abbr,acronym,address,applet,article,aside,audio,b,big,blockquote,body,canvas,caption,center,cite,code,dd,del,details,dfn,div,dl,dt,\nem,embed,fieldset,figcaption,figure,footer,form,h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6,header,hgroup,html,i,iframe,img,ins,kbd,label,legend,li,mark,menu,nav,\nobject,ol,output,p,pre,q,ruby,s,samp,section,small,span,strike,strong,sub,summary,sup,table,tbody,td,tfoot,th,thead,time,tr,tt,u,ul,var,video{ font:inherit;margin:0;padding:0;vertical-align:baseline;border:0 }\nbody{ font-size:16px; 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}\n.meta {color:#5e5c6d;font-size:13px;margin:0 0 .5em; }\na{text-decoration:none; color:#2a4b87;}\n.meta .head { display: inline-block; overflow: hidden}\n.head .h-thumb { width: 30px; height: 30px; margin: 0; padding: 0; border-radius: 50%; float: left;}\n.head .h-content { margin: 0; padding: 0 0 0 9px; float: left;}\n.head .h-name {font-size: 13px; color: #eee; margin: 0;}\n.head .h-time {font-size: 11px; color: #7E829C; margin: 0;line-height: 11px;}\n.small {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.9); -webkit-transform: scale(0.9); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.smaller {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.8); -webkit-transform: scale(0.8); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.bt-text {font-size: 12px;margin: 1.5em 0 0 0}\n.bt-text p {margin: 0}\n</style>\n</head>\n<body>\n<div class=\"wrapper\">\n<header>\n<h2 class=\"title\">\nTesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors\n</h2>\n\n<h4 class=\"meta\">\n\n\n2021-06-03 22:55 GMT+8&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<a href=https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors>seekingalpha</a>\n\n\n</h4>\n\n</header>\n<article>\n<div>\nSummary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.\nShareholders assuming Tesla's ...\n\n<a href=\"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors\">Web Link</a>\n\n</div>\n\n\n</article>\n</div>\n</body>\n</html>\n","type":0,"thumbnail":"","relate_stocks":{"TSLA":"特斯拉"},"source_url":"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors","is_english":true,"share_image_url":"https://static.laohu8.com/e9f99090a1c2ed51c021029395664489","article_id":"1152573638","content_text":"Summary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.\nShareholders assuming Tesla's Price/Book multiple deflates from around 25 to 5 over the next 10 years need book value per share to grow 5x just to break even.\nSo far, Tesla's growth in book value is mostly from \"Additional Paid-In Capital\" (issuing new shares at high prices), rather than retained earnings.\nLong-term earnings estimates imply book value per share sums up to 150-250 by the end of 2030, meaning a breakeven Price/Book of 2.5-4x, which is well above most mature autos.\nI present a 1x2 put spread as an attractive trade both for long investors concerned about overvaluation, as well as those seeking to bet on a Price/Book multiple contraction.\n\nPhoto by Jag_cz/iStock Editorial via Getty Images\nBook value per share is likely not the first metric that comes to mind when you think of a \"growth company of the future\" like Tesla (TSLA), but in this article, I will explain why book value per share is the most important bottom line number long-term investors in this company should watch. As long as zero dividends are expected, a TSLA shareholder's total return will, by definition, be defined by the growth of Tesla's book value per share crossed against the change in the Price/Book (P/B) multiple of those shares. After looking at some numbers underlying TSLA's book value per share, and how much it will have to grow for current TSLA shareholders to make money, I conclude with three actionable option strategies based on expectations for how these numbers may change in the medium term. This article also can be seen as a follow up to the 2041 breakeven projection of Tesla I published last year.\nTesla Share Price Rise Follows Book Value\nThe first chart here shows how the rise in Tesla's share price has moved remarkably in line with TSLA's growth in book value per share. TSLA has so far never paid a dividend.\nData by YCharts\nMultiple Expansion and Contraction\nThe above chart, which is on a log scale, is far smoother than that of the (P/B) ratio between these two numbers. The multiple seemed to have stabilized between 2017 and late 2019, but its rise from below 7 in mid-2019 to over 40 in late 2020 and back to around 26 today explains much of TSLA's recent surge and volatility. Another way of thinking about it: TSLA's book value per share is up roughly 4-fold in the past two years, and its P/B is up about 4-fold over the past two years, which together explain why TSLA's shares are up about 16-fold over the past two years. The big question for investors at these levels is: What future combination of book value growth and P/B expansion or contraction can be expected to produce a satisfactory rate of return?\nData by YCharts\nUnderstanding Tesla's Book Value Growth\nAlthough the title of my Marketplace serviceLong Run Incomeimplies a preference for dividends, we believe high-quality book value growth is the best kind of \"dividend alternative\" for companies who can reinvest cash profits internally at far higher rates of return than I can externally. I would challenge any investor to explain why else to buy a low-dividend or no-dividend stock except for the expectation of higher returns from book value growth. For that reason, I have come to focus my analysis of growth companies on how well they seem able to grow book value per share.\nI break down Tesla's book value trajectory into two main parts: Retained Earnings, and Additional Paid In Capital. Although Tesla seems to have \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability, having reported 7 consecutive quarters of positive earnings since September 2019, accumulated profits still fall short of accumulated losses by over $4 billion.\nData by YCharts\nThe other \"half\" (actually over 100%) of Tesla's book value comes from the money paid in by investors. TSLA has continuously raised capital over the past several years by issuing new shares, and the higher the valuation multiple at which TSLA can issue new shares, the more it can accumulate in Additional Paid In Capital. These share issuances also raise the number of shares outstanding, which has the dual effect of raising Tesla's overall market value (since the price per share is now multiplied by more shares), and diluting each share's per-share book value. This increase in book value per share and decline in Price/Book in every recent new share issuance effectively reflects a \"profit\" earlier shareholders enjoy for having later investors pay a higher valuation to get into the company.\nData by YCharts\nPutting these above two charts together, we see that so far Tesla has \"made\" over $27 billion selling shares of its stock to investors, vs. losing over $4 billion in trying to sell cars and batteries to customers, and of course the latter eventually needs to overtake the former for investors to start making their money back.\nHow Tesla's Earnings Projections Add Up\nIf we assume that Tesla stops issuing new shares (a big assumption, but necessary to keep the math simple), then we can add up projected earnings per share to the book value per share to accumulate a projection of future book value per share. Projections of Tesla's future earnings deserve their own article or research report, so for the purposes of this update, I'll use the low vs high analyst forecasts on Tesla'sSeeking Alphaearnings page:\nSource:SeekingAlpha Earnings Page For TSLA\nNote that between 2025 and 2025, the low and median EPS estimates jump as the number of analysts covering the stock that far out falls from 11 to two, implying that the two analysts projecting TSLA's earnings out to 2030 are on the more optimistic end of the street. If we add up the low and high EPS estimates to today's starting book value per share of $23.90, we get a forecast of TSLA's book value of between $160 and $235 per share for the end of 2030. From today's price of around $623.90 per share, that means if TSLA's book value grows to around $200 (the middle of that optimistic range), then a contraction in TSLA's P/B from today's level of 26 to a still \"high for hardware\" multiple of 3 would mean shareholders would earn a 0% return between now and 2030. In other words, someone buying TSLA today would have to believe that either:\n\nTesla will grow its earnings and book value even faster than the most optimistic analyst estimates, or\nThat investors will continue paying P/B multiples well above 3 for the stock.\n\nOn forecasting what TSLA's P/B might be by 2030, there are three ways I can see expecting a multiple of 3 or higher:\n\nAnother valuation bubble: The P/B of Toyota Motor Corp. (TM), charted below, reached highs around 3 in Japan's late 1980s bubble, and again in the late 1990s \"echo bubble,\" and that was its high. If TSLA becomes like TM by 2030, this sort of broader stock valuation bubble may be needed to provide an attractive return on the exit price.\nBusiness transformation: The biggest TSLA bulls I speak to are those who believe TSLA may either remain a premium hardware maker with services on top like Apple Inc. (AAPL), or as a more asset-light, high return software platform like Microsoft (MSFT), whose P/B ratios are charted below Toyota's.\nFinancial engineering: One other driver of Apple's P/B expansion is buybacks, as I explained in this example with McDonald's. Buybacks at high P/B multiples reduce book value per share and raise the P/B multiple, all else equal, in ways exactly opposite to how Tesla has been only issuing (not buying back) shares so far.\n\nData by YCharts\nData by YCharts\nAnother way of comparing Tesla's $36 billion in annual sales vs. Toyota's $257 billion is on a revenue per capital basis. In other words, Tesla currently grosses around $5/year per person on the planet, vs. Toyota's roughly $37/year per human on earth. The growth question for 2030 is whether Tesla can still reach Toyota's number, especially given that:\n\nDemand for transportation, in terms of global population times the percentage of the global population that can afford a car, is likely to grow at a slower pace than historically, especially after 2030, and\nSelf-driving cars that aren't owned by one person, and so don't need to be parked idle most of the time, might actually decrease demand for new cars.\n\nWithout continued high growth past 2030, even 3x book might be on the high end for a car or battery company.\nData byYCharts\nTrading a TSLA P/B Contraction\nMy favorite actionable strategies on a stock like TSLA, which I don't expect to fundamentally collapse, but do expect to experience a significant multiple contraction, generally involve some form of option put spread. The option strategy described below works both for bears wanting to profit from an outright 20%-30% decline, or long-term bulls wanting to protect their shares' value against such a decline.\nOne challenge with simply buying put spreads on TSLA is that its option prices imply a significant \"positive skew,\" which makes put spreads relatively expensive to call spreads. In other words, the market is implying an expectation that TSLA shares are more likely than not to fall a little, offset by a smaller chance of a much larger upside move. Most of the near-the-money put spreads on TSLA cost more than 50% of the maximum payoff, even with longer-dated options or lower strike prices.\nFor the time horizon, I'm choosing the June 17, 2022, expiry date, which as of this writing is a little more than one year out. The main reasons I find first the expiry after one year to be a \"sweet spot\" for this type of strategy include:\n\nAs opposed to outright short selling, buying a put spread to profit from a decline in a share price may qualify for long-term capital gains tax treatment, as we would be holding a long position in a put spread longer than one year.\nAs opposed to even longer-dated options (say the two-year options expiring June 2023), rolling one-year options forces us to reevaluate our valuation and strike prices and decide if and in what form to roll the strategy after four more quarterly book value updates.\n\nIn this strategy, we buy 1x 650 strike put around 150 and then sell 2x 500 puts around 75 each, for roughly zero net up-front premium. Payoff scenarios based on TSLA's closing price at expiry include:\nSource: My Own Excel Calculation and Chart\nThe maximum payout ($150/share) divided by the maximum loss ($350/share) presents a \"maximum rate of return\" on this strategy is +42.8%, though getting that exact maximum payout is nearly impossible (as it requires TSLA to close at exactly $500/share on the expiry date). More likely, this option strategy would deliver a rate of return of more than 14.2% on the maximum loss if TSLA closes between 400-600 at expiry. If we follow the earlier earnings estimates and project TSLA's book value per share to be around $30/share by then, that means we expect a contract in P/B to between 13-20 by next summer.\nConclusion\nFor high-growth, non-dividend paying stocks like Tesla, return expectations break down into expectations of book value growth times expectation of P/B multiple expansion or contraction. Now that it's \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability and reached a respectable level of sales, I believe Tesla is less likely to be the next DeLorean Motor Company, and at best like Microsoft in 2000. To summarize an example I often reference inLong Run Income, from 2000 to 2010, Microsoft's business continued to grow, but investors who bought at the beginning of 2000 were still down over 36% 10 years later because Microsoft's P/B multiple declined by that much more than the business grew. Here is one chart showing that \"lost decade\" for MSFT shareholders.\nData by YCharts\nFor investors who want to hedge a decline in TSLA shares from here to $500, or those who believe TSLA may be a good company that is just wildly overvalued at these levels and may be worth buying below $500, the 1x2 put spread strategy described above may be worth considering.","news_type":1},"isVote":1,"likeStatus":false,"favoriteStatus":false,"reportStatus":false,"tweetType":1,"langContent":"EN"},{"id":118473714,"gmtCreate":1622759858438,"gmtModify":1704190464846,"author":{"id":"3581993357014262","authorId":"3581993357014262","authorIdStr":"3581993357014262","name":"Slee49","avatar":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/a4a9c556617a3ec3446f5c1c667b4aa0","vip":1,"hat":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/f84d87792f02cf78e80ee34979fd31e5","crmLevel":5,"crmLevelSwitch":1,"idStr":"3581993357014262"},"htmlText":"Nice","listText":"Nice","text":"Nice","images":[],"top":1,"highlighted":1,"essential":1,"paper":1,"likeSize":3,"commentSize":0,"repostSize":0,"link":"https://ttm.financial/post/118473714","repostId":1152573638,"repostType":4,"repost":{"id":"1152573638","pubTimestamp":1622732138,"share":"https://ttm.financial/m/news/1152573638?lang=&edition=fundamental","pubTime":"2021-06-03 22:55","market":"us","language":"en","title":"Tesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors","url":"https://stock-news.laohu8.com/highlight/detail?id=1152573638","media":"seekingalpha","summary":"Summary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very hi","content":"Summary\n<ul>\n <li>As long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.</li>\n <li>Shareholders assuming Tesla's Price/Book multiple deflates from around 25 to 5 over the next 10 years need book value per share to grow 5x just to break even.</li>\n <li>So far, Tesla's growth in book value is mostly from \"Additional Paid-In Capital\" (issuing new shares at high prices), rather than retained earnings.</li>\n <li>Long-term earnings estimates imply book value per share sums up to 150-250 by the end of 2030, meaning a breakeven Price/Book of 2.5-4x, which is well above most mature autos.</li>\n <li>I present a 1x2 put spread as an attractive trade both for long investors concerned about overvaluation, as well as those seeking to bet on a Price/Book multiple contraction.</li>\n</ul>\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/c329e23b2762c47b11d11d95ec584959\" tg-width=\"768\" tg-height=\"512\">Photo by Jag_cz/iStock Editorial via Getty Images\nBook value per share is likely not the first metric that comes to mind when you think of a \"growth company of the future\" like Tesla (TSLA), but in this article, I will explain why book value per share is the most important bottom line number long-term investors in this company should watch. As long as zero dividends are expected, a TSLA shareholder's total return will, by definition, be defined by the growth of Tesla's book value per share crossed against the change in the Price/Book (P/B) multiple of those shares. After looking at some numbers underlying TSLA's book value per share, and how much it will have to grow for current TSLA shareholders to make money, I conclude with three actionable option strategies based on expectations for how these numbers may change in the medium term. This article also can be seen as a follow up to the&nbsp;2041 breakeven projection of Tesla I published last year.\nTesla Share Price Rise Follows Book Value\nThe first chart here shows how the rise in Tesla's share price has moved remarkably in line with TSLA's growth in book value per share. TSLA has so far never paid a dividend.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/c1f994d62f1ec67c3b95ae15c3791fa8\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"458\">Data by YCharts\nMultiple Expansion and Contraction\nThe above chart, which is on a log scale, is far smoother than that of the (P/B) ratio between these two numbers. The multiple seemed to have stabilized between 2017 and late 2019, but its rise from below 7 in mid-2019 to over 40 in late 2020 and back to around 26 today explains much of TSLA's recent surge and volatility. Another way of thinking about it: TSLA's book value per share is up roughly 4-fold in the past two years, and its P/B is up about 4-fold over the past two years, which together explain why TSLA's shares are up about 16-fold over the past two years. The big question for investors at these levels is: What future combination of book value growth and P/B expansion or contraction can be expected to produce a satisfactory rate of return?\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/b8eb71b806f59aaabd5d09a6eb4b1606\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\nUnderstanding Tesla's Book Value Growth\nAlthough the title of my Marketplace serviceLong Run Incomeimplies a preference for dividends, we believe high-quality book value growth is the best kind of \"dividend alternative\" for companies who can reinvest cash profits internally at far higher rates of return than I can externally. I would challenge any investor to explain why else to buy a low-dividend or no-dividend stock except for the expectation of higher returns from book value growth. For that reason, I have come to focus my analysis of growth companies on how well they seem able to grow book value per share.\nI break down Tesla's book value trajectory into two main parts: Retained Earnings, and Additional Paid In Capital. Although Tesla seems to have \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability, having reported&nbsp;7 consecutive quarters of positive earnings since September 2019, accumulated profits still fall short of accumulated losses by over $4 billion.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/08701c599a8c6fa7a66efde3c0a12cac\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\nThe other \"half\" (actually over 100%) of Tesla's book value comes from the money paid in by investors. TSLA has continuously raised capital over the past several years by issuing new shares, and the higher the valuation multiple at which TSLA can issue new shares, the more it can accumulate in Additional Paid In Capital. These share issuances also raise the number of shares outstanding, which has the dual effect of raising Tesla's overall market value (since the price per share is now multiplied by more shares), and diluting each share's per-share book value. This increase in book value per share and decline in Price/Book in every recent new share issuance effectively reflects a \"profit\" earlier shareholders enjoy for having later investors pay a higher valuation to get into the company.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/971bf86f3d08fe938af2845121be8d4c\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"441\">Data by YCharts\nPutting these above two charts together, we see that so far Tesla has \"made\" over $27 billion selling shares of its stock to investors, vs. losing over $4 billion in trying to sell cars and batteries to customers, and of course the latter eventually needs to overtake the former for investors to start making their money back.\nHow Tesla's Earnings Projections Add Up\nIf we assume that Tesla stops issuing new shares (a big assumption, but necessary to keep the math simple), then we can add up projected earnings per share to the book value per share to accumulate a projection of future book value per share. Projections of Tesla's future earnings deserve their own article or research report, so for the purposes of this update, I'll use the low vs high analyst forecasts on Tesla'sSeeking Alphaearnings page:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/f36166f6653fb8e11941e3c58b313ccb\" tg-width=\"640\" tg-height=\"312\">Source:SeekingAlpha Earnings Page For TSLA\nNote that between 2025 and 2025, the low and median EPS estimates jump as the number of analysts covering the stock that far out falls from 11 to two, implying that the two analysts projecting TSLA's earnings out to 2030 are on the more optimistic end of the street. If we add up the low and high EPS estimates to today's starting book value per share of $23.90, we get a forecast of TSLA's book value of between $160 and $235 per share for the end of 2030. From today's price of around $623.90 per share, that means if TSLA's book value grows to around $200 (the middle of that optimistic range), then a contraction in TSLA's P/B from today's level of 26 to a still \"high for hardware\" multiple of 3 would mean shareholders would earn a 0% return between now and 2030. In other words, someone buying TSLA today would have to believe that either:\n<ol>\n <li>Tesla will grow its earnings and book value even faster than the most optimistic analyst estimates, or</li>\n <li>That investors will continue paying P/B multiples well above 3 for the stock.</li>\n</ol>\nOn forecasting what TSLA's P/B might be by 2030, there are three ways I can see expecting a multiple of 3 or higher:\n<ol>\n <li>Another valuation bubble: The P/B of Toyota Motor Corp. (TM), charted below, reached highs around 3 in Japan's late 1980s bubble, and again in the late 1990s \"echo bubble,\" and that was its high. If TSLA becomes like TM by 2030, this sort of broader stock valuation bubble may be needed to provide an attractive return on the exit price.</li>\n <li>Business transformation: The biggest TSLA bulls I speak to are those who believe TSLA may either remain a premium hardware maker with services on top like Apple Inc. (AAPL), or as a more asset-light, high return software platform like Microsoft (MSFT), whose P/B ratios are charted below Toyota's.</li>\n <li>Financial engineering: One other driver of Apple's&nbsp;P/B expansion is buybacks, as I explained in this example with McDonald's. Buybacks at high P/B multiples reduce book value per share and raise the P/B multiple, all else equal, in ways exactly opposite to how Tesla has been only issuing (not buying back) shares so far.</li>\n</ol>\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/59e353b1112fb465bf275bfd2e2f5c38\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/7432d2c24afe124c70d139e0320f2d0c\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"441\">Data by YCharts\nAnother way of comparing Tesla's $36 billion in annual sales vs. Toyota's $257 billion is on a revenue per capital basis. In other words, Tesla currently grosses around $5/year per person on the planet, vs. Toyota's roughly $37/year per human on earth. The growth question for 2030 is whether Tesla can still reach Toyota's number, especially given that:\n<ol>\n <li>Demand for transportation, in terms of global population times the percentage of the global population that can afford a car, is likely to grow at a slower pace than historically, especially after 2030, and</li>\n <li>Self-driving cars that aren't owned by one person, and so don't need to be parked idle most of the time, might actually decrease demand for new cars.</li>\n</ol>\nWithout continued high growth past 2030, even 3x book might be on the high end for a car or battery company.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/ed6900c059b599cc5885a2184ad6db05\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"537\">Data byYCharts\nTrading a TSLA P/B Contraction\nMy favorite actionable strategies on a stock like TSLA, which I don't expect to fundamentally collapse, but do expect to experience a significant multiple contraction, generally involve some form of option put spread. The option strategy described below works both for bears wanting to profit from an outright 20%-30% decline, or long-term bulls wanting to protect their shares' value against such a decline.\nOne challenge with simply buying put spreads on TSLA is that its option prices imply a significant \"positive skew,\" which makes put spreads relatively expensive to call spreads. In other words, the market is implying an expectation that TSLA shares are more likely than not to fall a little, offset by a smaller chance of a much larger upside move. Most of the near-the-money put spreads on TSLA cost more than 50% of the maximum payoff, even with longer-dated options or lower strike prices.\nFor the time horizon, I'm choosing the June 17, 2022, expiry date, which as of this writing is a little more than one year out. The main reasons I find first the expiry after one year to be a \"sweet spot\" for this type of strategy include:\n<ol>\n <li>As opposed to outright short selling, buying a put spread to profit from a decline in a share price may qualify for long-term capital gains tax treatment, as we would be holding a long position in a put spread longer than one year.</li>\n <li>As opposed to even longer-dated options (say the two-year options expiring June 2023), rolling one-year options forces us to reevaluate our valuation and strike prices and decide if and in what form to roll the strategy after four more quarterly book value updates.</li>\n</ol>\nIn this strategy, we buy 1x 650 strike put around 150 and then sell 2x 500 puts around 75 each, for roughly zero net up-front premium. Payoff scenarios based on TSLA's closing price at expiry include:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/d8d415689c4d898bc75eba42b9f79152\" tg-width=\"640\" tg-height=\"452\">Source: My Own Excel Calculation and Chart\nThe maximum payout ($150/share) divided by the maximum loss ($350/share) presents a \"maximum rate of return\" on this strategy is +42.8%, though getting that exact maximum payout is nearly impossible (as it requires TSLA to close at exactly $500/share on the expiry date). More likely, this option strategy would deliver a rate of return of more than 14.2% on the maximum loss if TSLA closes between 400-600 at expiry. If we follow the earlier earnings estimates and project TSLA's book value per share to be around $30/share by then, that means we expect a contract in P/B to between 13-20 by next summer.\nConclusion\nFor high-growth, non-dividend paying stocks like Tesla, return expectations break down into expectations of book value growth times expectation of P/B multiple expansion or contraction. Now that it's \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability and reached a respectable level of sales, I believe Tesla is less likely to be the next&nbsp;DeLorean Motor Company, and at best like Microsoft in 2000. To summarize an example I often reference inLong Run Income, from 2000 to 2010, Microsoft's business continued to grow, but investors who bought at the beginning of 2000 were still down over 36% 10 years later because Microsoft's P/B multiple declined by that much more than the business grew. Here is one chart showing that \"lost decade\" for MSFT shareholders.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/faaf554d7a7744d36d27ea7f92e9a9e2\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"475\">Data by YCharts\nFor investors who want to hedge a decline in TSLA shares from here to $500, or those who believe TSLA may be a good company that is just wildly overvalued at these levels and may be worth buying below $500, the 1x2 put spread strategy described above may be worth considering.","collect":0,"html":"<!DOCTYPE html>\n<html>\n<head>\n<meta http-equiv=\"Content-Type\" content=\"text/html; charset=utf-8\" />\n<meta name=\"viewport\" content=\"width=device-width,initial-scale=1.0,minimum-scale=1.0,maximum-scale=1.0,user-scalable=no\"/>\n<meta name=\"format-detection\" content=\"telephone=no,email=no,address=no\" />\n<title>Tesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors</title>\n<style type=\"text/css\">\na,abbr,acronym,address,applet,article,aside,audio,b,big,blockquote,body,canvas,caption,center,cite,code,dd,del,details,dfn,div,dl,dt,\nem,embed,fieldset,figcaption,figure,footer,form,h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6,header,hgroup,html,i,iframe,img,ins,kbd,label,legend,li,mark,menu,nav,\nobject,ol,output,p,pre,q,ruby,s,samp,section,small,span,strike,strong,sub,summary,sup,table,tbody,td,tfoot,th,thead,time,tr,tt,u,ul,var,video{ font:inherit;margin:0;padding:0;vertical-align:baseline;border:0 }\nbody{ font-size:16px; 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}\n.meta {color:#5e5c6d;font-size:13px;margin:0 0 .5em; }\na{text-decoration:none; color:#2a4b87;}\n.meta .head { display: inline-block; overflow: hidden}\n.head .h-thumb { width: 30px; height: 30px; margin: 0; padding: 0; border-radius: 50%; float: left;}\n.head .h-content { margin: 0; padding: 0 0 0 9px; float: left;}\n.head .h-name {font-size: 13px; color: #eee; margin: 0;}\n.head .h-time {font-size: 11px; color: #7E829C; margin: 0;line-height: 11px;}\n.small {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.9); -webkit-transform: scale(0.9); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.smaller {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.8); -webkit-transform: scale(0.8); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.bt-text {font-size: 12px;margin: 1.5em 0 0 0}\n.bt-text p {margin: 0}\n</style>\n</head>\n<body>\n<div class=\"wrapper\">\n<header>\n<h2 class=\"title\">\nTesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors\n</h2>\n\n<h4 class=\"meta\">\n\n\n2021-06-03 22:55 GMT+8&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<a href=https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors>seekingalpha</a>\n\n\n</h4>\n\n</header>\n<article>\n<div>\nSummary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.\nShareholders assuming Tesla's ...\n\n<a href=\"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors\">Web Link</a>\n\n</div>\n\n\n</article>\n</div>\n</body>\n</html>\n","type":0,"thumbnail":"","relate_stocks":{"TSLA":"特斯拉"},"source_url":"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors","is_english":true,"share_image_url":"https://static.laohu8.com/e9f99090a1c2ed51c021029395664489","article_id":"1152573638","content_text":"Summary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.\nShareholders assuming Tesla's Price/Book multiple deflates from around 25 to 5 over the next 10 years need book value per share to grow 5x just to break even.\nSo far, Tesla's growth in book value is mostly from \"Additional Paid-In Capital\" (issuing new shares at high prices), rather than retained earnings.\nLong-term earnings estimates imply book value per share sums up to 150-250 by the end of 2030, meaning a breakeven Price/Book of 2.5-4x, which is well above most mature autos.\nI present a 1x2 put spread as an attractive trade both for long investors concerned about overvaluation, as well as those seeking to bet on a Price/Book multiple contraction.\n\nPhoto by Jag_cz/iStock Editorial via Getty Images\nBook value per share is likely not the first metric that comes to mind when you think of a \"growth company of the future\" like Tesla (TSLA), but in this article, I will explain why book value per share is the most important bottom line number long-term investors in this company should watch. As long as zero dividends are expected, a TSLA shareholder's total return will, by definition, be defined by the growth of Tesla's book value per share crossed against the change in the Price/Book (P/B) multiple of those shares. After looking at some numbers underlying TSLA's book value per share, and how much it will have to grow for current TSLA shareholders to make money, I conclude with three actionable option strategies based on expectations for how these numbers may change in the medium term. This article also can be seen as a follow up to the 2041 breakeven projection of Tesla I published last year.\nTesla Share Price Rise Follows Book Value\nThe first chart here shows how the rise in Tesla's share price has moved remarkably in line with TSLA's growth in book value per share. TSLA has so far never paid a dividend.\nData by YCharts\nMultiple Expansion and Contraction\nThe above chart, which is on a log scale, is far smoother than that of the (P/B) ratio between these two numbers. The multiple seemed to have stabilized between 2017 and late 2019, but its rise from below 7 in mid-2019 to over 40 in late 2020 and back to around 26 today explains much of TSLA's recent surge and volatility. Another way of thinking about it: TSLA's book value per share is up roughly 4-fold in the past two years, and its P/B is up about 4-fold over the past two years, which together explain why TSLA's shares are up about 16-fold over the past two years. The big question for investors at these levels is: What future combination of book value growth and P/B expansion or contraction can be expected to produce a satisfactory rate of return?\nData by YCharts\nUnderstanding Tesla's Book Value Growth\nAlthough the title of my Marketplace serviceLong Run Incomeimplies a preference for dividends, we believe high-quality book value growth is the best kind of \"dividend alternative\" for companies who can reinvest cash profits internally at far higher rates of return than I can externally. I would challenge any investor to explain why else to buy a low-dividend or no-dividend stock except for the expectation of higher returns from book value growth. For that reason, I have come to focus my analysis of growth companies on how well they seem able to grow book value per share.\nI break down Tesla's book value trajectory into two main parts: Retained Earnings, and Additional Paid In Capital. Although Tesla seems to have \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability, having reported 7 consecutive quarters of positive earnings since September 2019, accumulated profits still fall short of accumulated losses by over $4 billion.\nData by YCharts\nThe other \"half\" (actually over 100%) of Tesla's book value comes from the money paid in by investors. TSLA has continuously raised capital over the past several years by issuing new shares, and the higher the valuation multiple at which TSLA can issue new shares, the more it can accumulate in Additional Paid In Capital. These share issuances also raise the number of shares outstanding, which has the dual effect of raising Tesla's overall market value (since the price per share is now multiplied by more shares), and diluting each share's per-share book value. This increase in book value per share and decline in Price/Book in every recent new share issuance effectively reflects a \"profit\" earlier shareholders enjoy for having later investors pay a higher valuation to get into the company.\nData by YCharts\nPutting these above two charts together, we see that so far Tesla has \"made\" over $27 billion selling shares of its stock to investors, vs. losing over $4 billion in trying to sell cars and batteries to customers, and of course the latter eventually needs to overtake the former for investors to start making their money back.\nHow Tesla's Earnings Projections Add Up\nIf we assume that Tesla stops issuing new shares (a big assumption, but necessary to keep the math simple), then we can add up projected earnings per share to the book value per share to accumulate a projection of future book value per share. Projections of Tesla's future earnings deserve their own article or research report, so for the purposes of this update, I'll use the low vs high analyst forecasts on Tesla'sSeeking Alphaearnings page:\nSource:SeekingAlpha Earnings Page For TSLA\nNote that between 2025 and 2025, the low and median EPS estimates jump as the number of analysts covering the stock that far out falls from 11 to two, implying that the two analysts projecting TSLA's earnings out to 2030 are on the more optimistic end of the street. If we add up the low and high EPS estimates to today's starting book value per share of $23.90, we get a forecast of TSLA's book value of between $160 and $235 per share for the end of 2030. From today's price of around $623.90 per share, that means if TSLA's book value grows to around $200 (the middle of that optimistic range), then a contraction in TSLA's P/B from today's level of 26 to a still \"high for hardware\" multiple of 3 would mean shareholders would earn a 0% return between now and 2030. In other words, someone buying TSLA today would have to believe that either:\n\nTesla will grow its earnings and book value even faster than the most optimistic analyst estimates, or\nThat investors will continue paying P/B multiples well above 3 for the stock.\n\nOn forecasting what TSLA's P/B might be by 2030, there are three ways I can see expecting a multiple of 3 or higher:\n\nAnother valuation bubble: The P/B of Toyota Motor Corp. (TM), charted below, reached highs around 3 in Japan's late 1980s bubble, and again in the late 1990s \"echo bubble,\" and that was its high. If TSLA becomes like TM by 2030, this sort of broader stock valuation bubble may be needed to provide an attractive return on the exit price.\nBusiness transformation: The biggest TSLA bulls I speak to are those who believe TSLA may either remain a premium hardware maker with services on top like Apple Inc. (AAPL), or as a more asset-light, high return software platform like Microsoft (MSFT), whose P/B ratios are charted below Toyota's.\nFinancial engineering: One other driver of Apple's P/B expansion is buybacks, as I explained in this example with McDonald's. Buybacks at high P/B multiples reduce book value per share and raise the P/B multiple, all else equal, in ways exactly opposite to how Tesla has been only issuing (not buying back) shares so far.\n\nData by YCharts\nData by YCharts\nAnother way of comparing Tesla's $36 billion in annual sales vs. Toyota's $257 billion is on a revenue per capital basis. In other words, Tesla currently grosses around $5/year per person on the planet, vs. Toyota's roughly $37/year per human on earth. The growth question for 2030 is whether Tesla can still reach Toyota's number, especially given that:\n\nDemand for transportation, in terms of global population times the percentage of the global population that can afford a car, is likely to grow at a slower pace than historically, especially after 2030, and\nSelf-driving cars that aren't owned by one person, and so don't need to be parked idle most of the time, might actually decrease demand for new cars.\n\nWithout continued high growth past 2030, even 3x book might be on the high end for a car or battery company.\nData byYCharts\nTrading a TSLA P/B Contraction\nMy favorite actionable strategies on a stock like TSLA, which I don't expect to fundamentally collapse, but do expect to experience a significant multiple contraction, generally involve some form of option put spread. The option strategy described below works both for bears wanting to profit from an outright 20%-30% decline, or long-term bulls wanting to protect their shares' value against such a decline.\nOne challenge with simply buying put spreads on TSLA is that its option prices imply a significant \"positive skew,\" which makes put spreads relatively expensive to call spreads. In other words, the market is implying an expectation that TSLA shares are more likely than not to fall a little, offset by a smaller chance of a much larger upside move. Most of the near-the-money put spreads on TSLA cost more than 50% of the maximum payoff, even with longer-dated options or lower strike prices.\nFor the time horizon, I'm choosing the June 17, 2022, expiry date, which as of this writing is a little more than one year out. The main reasons I find first the expiry after one year to be a \"sweet spot\" for this type of strategy include:\n\nAs opposed to outright short selling, buying a put spread to profit from a decline in a share price may qualify for long-term capital gains tax treatment, as we would be holding a long position in a put spread longer than one year.\nAs opposed to even longer-dated options (say the two-year options expiring June 2023), rolling one-year options forces us to reevaluate our valuation and strike prices and decide if and in what form to roll the strategy after four more quarterly book value updates.\n\nIn this strategy, we buy 1x 650 strike put around 150 and then sell 2x 500 puts around 75 each, for roughly zero net up-front premium. Payoff scenarios based on TSLA's closing price at expiry include:\nSource: My Own Excel Calculation and Chart\nThe maximum payout ($150/share) divided by the maximum loss ($350/share) presents a \"maximum rate of return\" on this strategy is +42.8%, though getting that exact maximum payout is nearly impossible (as it requires TSLA to close at exactly $500/share on the expiry date). More likely, this option strategy would deliver a rate of return of more than 14.2% on the maximum loss if TSLA closes between 400-600 at expiry. If we follow the earlier earnings estimates and project TSLA's book value per share to be around $30/share by then, that means we expect a contract in P/B to between 13-20 by next summer.\nConclusion\nFor high-growth, non-dividend paying stocks like Tesla, return expectations break down into expectations of book value growth times expectation of P/B multiple expansion or contraction. Now that it's \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability and reached a respectable level of sales, I believe Tesla is less likely to be the next DeLorean Motor Company, and at best like Microsoft in 2000. To summarize an example I often reference inLong Run Income, from 2000 to 2010, Microsoft's business continued to grow, but investors who bought at the beginning of 2000 were still down over 36% 10 years later because Microsoft's P/B multiple declined by that much more than the business grew. Here is one chart showing that \"lost decade\" for MSFT shareholders.\nData by YCharts\nFor investors who want to hedge a decline in TSLA shares from here to $500, or those who believe TSLA may be a good company that is just wildly overvalued at these levels and may be worth buying below $500, the 1x2 put spread strategy described above may be worth considering.","news_type":1},"isVote":1,"likeStatus":false,"favoriteStatus":false,"reportStatus":false,"tweetType":1,"langContent":"EN"},{"id":118467850,"gmtCreate":1622756212270,"gmtModify":1704190420573,"author":{"id":"3565819252889467","authorId":"3565819252889467","authorIdStr":"3565819252889467","name":"e13v3n","avatar":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/387ab24895655e32d7ddaf87ded7da37","vip":1,"crmLevel":2,"crmLevelSwitch":0,"idStr":"3565819252889467"},"htmlText":"pl like n comment","listText":"pl like n comment","text":"pl like n comment","images":[],"top":1,"highlighted":1,"essential":1,"paper":1,"likeSize":2,"commentSize":2,"repostSize":0,"link":"https://ttm.financial/post/118467850","repostId":1152573638,"repostType":4,"repost":{"id":"1152573638","pubTimestamp":1622732138,"share":"https://ttm.financial/m/news/1152573638?lang=&edition=fundamental","pubTime":"2021-06-03 22:55","market":"us","language":"en","title":"Tesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors","url":"https://stock-news.laohu8.com/highlight/detail?id=1152573638","media":"seekingalpha","summary":"Summary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very hi","content":"Summary\n<ul>\n <li>As long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.</li>\n <li>Shareholders assuming Tesla's Price/Book multiple deflates from around 25 to 5 over the next 10 years need book value per share to grow 5x just to break even.</li>\n <li>So far, Tesla's growth in book value is mostly from \"Additional Paid-In Capital\" (issuing new shares at high prices), rather than retained earnings.</li>\n <li>Long-term earnings estimates imply book value per share sums up to 150-250 by the end of 2030, meaning a breakeven Price/Book of 2.5-4x, which is well above most mature autos.</li>\n <li>I present a 1x2 put spread as an attractive trade both for long investors concerned about overvaluation, as well as those seeking to bet on a Price/Book multiple contraction.</li>\n</ul>\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/c329e23b2762c47b11d11d95ec584959\" tg-width=\"768\" tg-height=\"512\">Photo by Jag_cz/iStock Editorial via Getty Images\nBook value per share is likely not the first metric that comes to mind when you think of a \"growth company of the future\" like Tesla (TSLA), but in this article, I will explain why book value per share is the most important bottom line number long-term investors in this company should watch. As long as zero dividends are expected, a TSLA shareholder's total return will, by definition, be defined by the growth of Tesla's book value per share crossed against the change in the Price/Book (P/B) multiple of those shares. After looking at some numbers underlying TSLA's book value per share, and how much it will have to grow for current TSLA shareholders to make money, I conclude with three actionable option strategies based on expectations for how these numbers may change in the medium term. This article also can be seen as a follow up to the&nbsp;2041 breakeven projection of Tesla I published last year.\nTesla Share Price Rise Follows Book Value\nThe first chart here shows how the rise in Tesla's share price has moved remarkably in line with TSLA's growth in book value per share. TSLA has so far never paid a dividend.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/c1f994d62f1ec67c3b95ae15c3791fa8\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"458\">Data by YCharts\nMultiple Expansion and Contraction\nThe above chart, which is on a log scale, is far smoother than that of the (P/B) ratio between these two numbers. The multiple seemed to have stabilized between 2017 and late 2019, but its rise from below 7 in mid-2019 to over 40 in late 2020 and back to around 26 today explains much of TSLA's recent surge and volatility. Another way of thinking about it: TSLA's book value per share is up roughly 4-fold in the past two years, and its P/B is up about 4-fold over the past two years, which together explain why TSLA's shares are up about 16-fold over the past two years. The big question for investors at these levels is: What future combination of book value growth and P/B expansion or contraction can be expected to produce a satisfactory rate of return?\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/b8eb71b806f59aaabd5d09a6eb4b1606\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\nUnderstanding Tesla's Book Value Growth\nAlthough the title of my Marketplace serviceLong Run Incomeimplies a preference for dividends, we believe high-quality book value growth is the best kind of \"dividend alternative\" for companies who can reinvest cash profits internally at far higher rates of return than I can externally. I would challenge any investor to explain why else to buy a low-dividend or no-dividend stock except for the expectation of higher returns from book value growth. For that reason, I have come to focus my analysis of growth companies on how well they seem able to grow book value per share.\nI break down Tesla's book value trajectory into two main parts: Retained Earnings, and Additional Paid In Capital. Although Tesla seems to have \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability, having reported&nbsp;7 consecutive quarters of positive earnings since September 2019, accumulated profits still fall short of accumulated losses by over $4 billion.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/08701c599a8c6fa7a66efde3c0a12cac\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\nThe other \"half\" (actually over 100%) of Tesla's book value comes from the money paid in by investors. TSLA has continuously raised capital over the past several years by issuing new shares, and the higher the valuation multiple at which TSLA can issue new shares, the more it can accumulate in Additional Paid In Capital. These share issuances also raise the number of shares outstanding, which has the dual effect of raising Tesla's overall market value (since the price per share is now multiplied by more shares), and diluting each share's per-share book value. This increase in book value per share and decline in Price/Book in every recent new share issuance effectively reflects a \"profit\" earlier shareholders enjoy for having later investors pay a higher valuation to get into the company.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/971bf86f3d08fe938af2845121be8d4c\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"441\">Data by YCharts\nPutting these above two charts together, we see that so far Tesla has \"made\" over $27 billion selling shares of its stock to investors, vs. losing over $4 billion in trying to sell cars and batteries to customers, and of course the latter eventually needs to overtake the former for investors to start making their money back.\nHow Tesla's Earnings Projections Add Up\nIf we assume that Tesla stops issuing new shares (a big assumption, but necessary to keep the math simple), then we can add up projected earnings per share to the book value per share to accumulate a projection of future book value per share. Projections of Tesla's future earnings deserve their own article or research report, so for the purposes of this update, I'll use the low vs high analyst forecasts on Tesla'sSeeking Alphaearnings page:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/f36166f6653fb8e11941e3c58b313ccb\" tg-width=\"640\" tg-height=\"312\">Source:SeekingAlpha Earnings Page For TSLA\nNote that between 2025 and 2025, the low and median EPS estimates jump as the number of analysts covering the stock that far out falls from 11 to two, implying that the two analysts projecting TSLA's earnings out to 2030 are on the more optimistic end of the street. If we add up the low and high EPS estimates to today's starting book value per share of $23.90, we get a forecast of TSLA's book value of between $160 and $235 per share for the end of 2030. From today's price of around $623.90 per share, that means if TSLA's book value grows to around $200 (the middle of that optimistic range), then a contraction in TSLA's P/B from today's level of 26 to a still \"high for hardware\" multiple of 3 would mean shareholders would earn a 0% return between now and 2030. In other words, someone buying TSLA today would have to believe that either:\n<ol>\n <li>Tesla will grow its earnings and book value even faster than the most optimistic analyst estimates, or</li>\n <li>That investors will continue paying P/B multiples well above 3 for the stock.</li>\n</ol>\nOn forecasting what TSLA's P/B might be by 2030, there are three ways I can see expecting a multiple of 3 or higher:\n<ol>\n <li>Another valuation bubble: The P/B of Toyota Motor Corp. (TM), charted below, reached highs around 3 in Japan's late 1980s bubble, and again in the late 1990s \"echo bubble,\" and that was its high. If TSLA becomes like TM by 2030, this sort of broader stock valuation bubble may be needed to provide an attractive return on the exit price.</li>\n <li>Business transformation: The biggest TSLA bulls I speak to are those who believe TSLA may either remain a premium hardware maker with services on top like Apple Inc. (AAPL), or as a more asset-light, high return software platform like Microsoft (MSFT), whose P/B ratios are charted below Toyota's.</li>\n <li>Financial engineering: One other driver of Apple's&nbsp;P/B expansion is buybacks, as I explained in this example with McDonald's. Buybacks at high P/B multiples reduce book value per share and raise the P/B multiple, all else equal, in ways exactly opposite to how Tesla has been only issuing (not buying back) shares so far.</li>\n</ol>\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/59e353b1112fb465bf275bfd2e2f5c38\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/7432d2c24afe124c70d139e0320f2d0c\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"441\">Data by YCharts\nAnother way of comparing Tesla's $36 billion in annual sales vs. Toyota's $257 billion is on a revenue per capital basis. In other words, Tesla currently grosses around $5/year per person on the planet, vs. Toyota's roughly $37/year per human on earth. The growth question for 2030 is whether Tesla can still reach Toyota's number, especially given that:\n<ol>\n <li>Demand for transportation, in terms of global population times the percentage of the global population that can afford a car, is likely to grow at a slower pace than historically, especially after 2030, and</li>\n <li>Self-driving cars that aren't owned by one person, and so don't need to be parked idle most of the time, might actually decrease demand for new cars.</li>\n</ol>\nWithout continued high growth past 2030, even 3x book might be on the high end for a car or battery company.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/ed6900c059b599cc5885a2184ad6db05\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"537\">Data byYCharts\nTrading a TSLA P/B Contraction\nMy favorite actionable strategies on a stock like TSLA, which I don't expect to fundamentally collapse, but do expect to experience a significant multiple contraction, generally involve some form of option put spread. The option strategy described below works both for bears wanting to profit from an outright 20%-30% decline, or long-term bulls wanting to protect their shares' value against such a decline.\nOne challenge with simply buying put spreads on TSLA is that its option prices imply a significant \"positive skew,\" which makes put spreads relatively expensive to call spreads. In other words, the market is implying an expectation that TSLA shares are more likely than not to fall a little, offset by a smaller chance of a much larger upside move. Most of the near-the-money put spreads on TSLA cost more than 50% of the maximum payoff, even with longer-dated options or lower strike prices.\nFor the time horizon, I'm choosing the June 17, 2022, expiry date, which as of this writing is a little more than one year out. The main reasons I find first the expiry after one year to be a \"sweet spot\" for this type of strategy include:\n<ol>\n <li>As opposed to outright short selling, buying a put spread to profit from a decline in a share price may qualify for long-term capital gains tax treatment, as we would be holding a long position in a put spread longer than one year.</li>\n <li>As opposed to even longer-dated options (say the two-year options expiring June 2023), rolling one-year options forces us to reevaluate our valuation and strike prices and decide if and in what form to roll the strategy after four more quarterly book value updates.</li>\n</ol>\nIn this strategy, we buy 1x 650 strike put around 150 and then sell 2x 500 puts around 75 each, for roughly zero net up-front premium. Payoff scenarios based on TSLA's closing price at expiry include:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/d8d415689c4d898bc75eba42b9f79152\" tg-width=\"640\" tg-height=\"452\">Source: My Own Excel Calculation and Chart\nThe maximum payout ($150/share) divided by the maximum loss ($350/share) presents a \"maximum rate of return\" on this strategy is +42.8%, though getting that exact maximum payout is nearly impossible (as it requires TSLA to close at exactly $500/share on the expiry date). More likely, this option strategy would deliver a rate of return of more than 14.2% on the maximum loss if TSLA closes between 400-600 at expiry. If we follow the earlier earnings estimates and project TSLA's book value per share to be around $30/share by then, that means we expect a contract in P/B to between 13-20 by next summer.\nConclusion\nFor high-growth, non-dividend paying stocks like Tesla, return expectations break down into expectations of book value growth times expectation of P/B multiple expansion or contraction. Now that it's \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability and reached a respectable level of sales, I believe Tesla is less likely to be the next&nbsp;DeLorean Motor Company, and at best like Microsoft in 2000. To summarize an example I often reference inLong Run Income, from 2000 to 2010, Microsoft's business continued to grow, but investors who bought at the beginning of 2000 were still down over 36% 10 years later because Microsoft's P/B multiple declined by that much more than the business grew. Here is one chart showing that \"lost decade\" for MSFT shareholders.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/faaf554d7a7744d36d27ea7f92e9a9e2\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"475\">Data by YCharts\nFor investors who want to hedge a decline in TSLA shares from here to $500, or those who believe TSLA may be a good company that is just wildly overvalued at these levels and may be worth buying below $500, the 1x2 put spread strategy described above may be worth considering.","collect":0,"html":"<!DOCTYPE html>\n<html>\n<head>\n<meta http-equiv=\"Content-Type\" content=\"text/html; charset=utf-8\" />\n<meta name=\"viewport\" content=\"width=device-width,initial-scale=1.0,minimum-scale=1.0,maximum-scale=1.0,user-scalable=no\"/>\n<meta name=\"format-detection\" content=\"telephone=no,email=no,address=no\" />\n<title>Tesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors</title>\n<style type=\"text/css\">\na,abbr,acronym,address,applet,article,aside,audio,b,big,blockquote,body,canvas,caption,center,cite,code,dd,del,details,dfn,div,dl,dt,\nem,embed,fieldset,figcaption,figure,footer,form,h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6,header,hgroup,html,i,iframe,img,ins,kbd,label,legend,li,mark,menu,nav,\nobject,ol,output,p,pre,q,ruby,s,samp,section,small,span,strike,strong,sub,summary,sup,table,tbody,td,tfoot,th,thead,time,tr,tt,u,ul,var,video{ font:inherit;margin:0;padding:0;vertical-align:baseline;border:0 }\nbody{ font-size:16px; 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}\n.meta {color:#5e5c6d;font-size:13px;margin:0 0 .5em; }\na{text-decoration:none; color:#2a4b87;}\n.meta .head { display: inline-block; overflow: hidden}\n.head .h-thumb { width: 30px; height: 30px; margin: 0; padding: 0; border-radius: 50%; float: left;}\n.head .h-content { margin: 0; padding: 0 0 0 9px; float: left;}\n.head .h-name {font-size: 13px; color: #eee; margin: 0;}\n.head .h-time {font-size: 11px; color: #7E829C; margin: 0;line-height: 11px;}\n.small {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.9); -webkit-transform: scale(0.9); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.smaller {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.8); -webkit-transform: scale(0.8); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.bt-text {font-size: 12px;margin: 1.5em 0 0 0}\n.bt-text p {margin: 0}\n</style>\n</head>\n<body>\n<div class=\"wrapper\">\n<header>\n<h2 class=\"title\">\nTesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors\n</h2>\n\n<h4 class=\"meta\">\n\n\n2021-06-03 22:55 GMT+8&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<a href=https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors>seekingalpha</a>\n\n\n</h4>\n\n</header>\n<article>\n<div>\nSummary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.\nShareholders assuming Tesla's ...\n\n<a href=\"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors\">Web Link</a>\n\n</div>\n\n\n</article>\n</div>\n</body>\n</html>\n","type":0,"thumbnail":"","relate_stocks":{"TSLA":"特斯拉"},"source_url":"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors","is_english":true,"share_image_url":"https://static.laohu8.com/e9f99090a1c2ed51c021029395664489","article_id":"1152573638","content_text":"Summary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.\nShareholders assuming Tesla's Price/Book multiple deflates from around 25 to 5 over the next 10 years need book value per share to grow 5x just to break even.\nSo far, Tesla's growth in book value is mostly from \"Additional Paid-In Capital\" (issuing new shares at high prices), rather than retained earnings.\nLong-term earnings estimates imply book value per share sums up to 150-250 by the end of 2030, meaning a breakeven Price/Book of 2.5-4x, which is well above most mature autos.\nI present a 1x2 put spread as an attractive trade both for long investors concerned about overvaluation, as well as those seeking to bet on a Price/Book multiple contraction.\n\nPhoto by Jag_cz/iStock Editorial via Getty Images\nBook value per share is likely not the first metric that comes to mind when you think of a \"growth company of the future\" like Tesla (TSLA), but in this article, I will explain why book value per share is the most important bottom line number long-term investors in this company should watch. As long as zero dividends are expected, a TSLA shareholder's total return will, by definition, be defined by the growth of Tesla's book value per share crossed against the change in the Price/Book (P/B) multiple of those shares. After looking at some numbers underlying TSLA's book value per share, and how much it will have to grow for current TSLA shareholders to make money, I conclude with three actionable option strategies based on expectations for how these numbers may change in the medium term. This article also can be seen as a follow up to the 2041 breakeven projection of Tesla I published last year.\nTesla Share Price Rise Follows Book Value\nThe first chart here shows how the rise in Tesla's share price has moved remarkably in line with TSLA's growth in book value per share. TSLA has so far never paid a dividend.\nData by YCharts\nMultiple Expansion and Contraction\nThe above chart, which is on a log scale, is far smoother than that of the (P/B) ratio between these two numbers. The multiple seemed to have stabilized between 2017 and late 2019, but its rise from below 7 in mid-2019 to over 40 in late 2020 and back to around 26 today explains much of TSLA's recent surge and volatility. Another way of thinking about it: TSLA's book value per share is up roughly 4-fold in the past two years, and its P/B is up about 4-fold over the past two years, which together explain why TSLA's shares are up about 16-fold over the past two years. The big question for investors at these levels is: What future combination of book value growth and P/B expansion or contraction can be expected to produce a satisfactory rate of return?\nData by YCharts\nUnderstanding Tesla's Book Value Growth\nAlthough the title of my Marketplace serviceLong Run Incomeimplies a preference for dividends, we believe high-quality book value growth is the best kind of \"dividend alternative\" for companies who can reinvest cash profits internally at far higher rates of return than I can externally. I would challenge any investor to explain why else to buy a low-dividend or no-dividend stock except for the expectation of higher returns from book value growth. For that reason, I have come to focus my analysis of growth companies on how well they seem able to grow book value per share.\nI break down Tesla's book value trajectory into two main parts: Retained Earnings, and Additional Paid In Capital. Although Tesla seems to have \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability, having reported 7 consecutive quarters of positive earnings since September 2019, accumulated profits still fall short of accumulated losses by over $4 billion.\nData by YCharts\nThe other \"half\" (actually over 100%) of Tesla's book value comes from the money paid in by investors. TSLA has continuously raised capital over the past several years by issuing new shares, and the higher the valuation multiple at which TSLA can issue new shares, the more it can accumulate in Additional Paid In Capital. These share issuances also raise the number of shares outstanding, which has the dual effect of raising Tesla's overall market value (since the price per share is now multiplied by more shares), and diluting each share's per-share book value. This increase in book value per share and decline in Price/Book in every recent new share issuance effectively reflects a \"profit\" earlier shareholders enjoy for having later investors pay a higher valuation to get into the company.\nData by YCharts\nPutting these above two charts together, we see that so far Tesla has \"made\" over $27 billion selling shares of its stock to investors, vs. losing over $4 billion in trying to sell cars and batteries to customers, and of course the latter eventually needs to overtake the former for investors to start making their money back.\nHow Tesla's Earnings Projections Add Up\nIf we assume that Tesla stops issuing new shares (a big assumption, but necessary to keep the math simple), then we can add up projected earnings per share to the book value per share to accumulate a projection of future book value per share. Projections of Tesla's future earnings deserve their own article or research report, so for the purposes of this update, I'll use the low vs high analyst forecasts on Tesla'sSeeking Alphaearnings page:\nSource:SeekingAlpha Earnings Page For TSLA\nNote that between 2025 and 2025, the low and median EPS estimates jump as the number of analysts covering the stock that far out falls from 11 to two, implying that the two analysts projecting TSLA's earnings out to 2030 are on the more optimistic end of the street. If we add up the low and high EPS estimates to today's starting book value per share of $23.90, we get a forecast of TSLA's book value of between $160 and $235 per share for the end of 2030. From today's price of around $623.90 per share, that means if TSLA's book value grows to around $200 (the middle of that optimistic range), then a contraction in TSLA's P/B from today's level of 26 to a still \"high for hardware\" multiple of 3 would mean shareholders would earn a 0% return between now and 2030. In other words, someone buying TSLA today would have to believe that either:\n\nTesla will grow its earnings and book value even faster than the most optimistic analyst estimates, or\nThat investors will continue paying P/B multiples well above 3 for the stock.\n\nOn forecasting what TSLA's P/B might be by 2030, there are three ways I can see expecting a multiple of 3 or higher:\n\nAnother valuation bubble: The P/B of Toyota Motor Corp. (TM), charted below, reached highs around 3 in Japan's late 1980s bubble, and again in the late 1990s \"echo bubble,\" and that was its high. If TSLA becomes like TM by 2030, this sort of broader stock valuation bubble may be needed to provide an attractive return on the exit price.\nBusiness transformation: The biggest TSLA bulls I speak to are those who believe TSLA may either remain a premium hardware maker with services on top like Apple Inc. (AAPL), or as a more asset-light, high return software platform like Microsoft (MSFT), whose P/B ratios are charted below Toyota's.\nFinancial engineering: One other driver of Apple's P/B expansion is buybacks, as I explained in this example with McDonald's. Buybacks at high P/B multiples reduce book value per share and raise the P/B multiple, all else equal, in ways exactly opposite to how Tesla has been only issuing (not buying back) shares so far.\n\nData by YCharts\nData by YCharts\nAnother way of comparing Tesla's $36 billion in annual sales vs. Toyota's $257 billion is on a revenue per capital basis. In other words, Tesla currently grosses around $5/year per person on the planet, vs. Toyota's roughly $37/year per human on earth. The growth question for 2030 is whether Tesla can still reach Toyota's number, especially given that:\n\nDemand for transportation, in terms of global population times the percentage of the global population that can afford a car, is likely to grow at a slower pace than historically, especially after 2030, and\nSelf-driving cars that aren't owned by one person, and so don't need to be parked idle most of the time, might actually decrease demand for new cars.\n\nWithout continued high growth past 2030, even 3x book might be on the high end for a car or battery company.\nData byYCharts\nTrading a TSLA P/B Contraction\nMy favorite actionable strategies on a stock like TSLA, which I don't expect to fundamentally collapse, but do expect to experience a significant multiple contraction, generally involve some form of option put spread. The option strategy described below works both for bears wanting to profit from an outright 20%-30% decline, or long-term bulls wanting to protect their shares' value against such a decline.\nOne challenge with simply buying put spreads on TSLA is that its option prices imply a significant \"positive skew,\" which makes put spreads relatively expensive to call spreads. In other words, the market is implying an expectation that TSLA shares are more likely than not to fall a little, offset by a smaller chance of a much larger upside move. Most of the near-the-money put spreads on TSLA cost more than 50% of the maximum payoff, even with longer-dated options or lower strike prices.\nFor the time horizon, I'm choosing the June 17, 2022, expiry date, which as of this writing is a little more than one year out. The main reasons I find first the expiry after one year to be a \"sweet spot\" for this type of strategy include:\n\nAs opposed to outright short selling, buying a put spread to profit from a decline in a share price may qualify for long-term capital gains tax treatment, as we would be holding a long position in a put spread longer than one year.\nAs opposed to even longer-dated options (say the two-year options expiring June 2023), rolling one-year options forces us to reevaluate our valuation and strike prices and decide if and in what form to roll the strategy after four more quarterly book value updates.\n\nIn this strategy, we buy 1x 650 strike put around 150 and then sell 2x 500 puts around 75 each, for roughly zero net up-front premium. Payoff scenarios based on TSLA's closing price at expiry include:\nSource: My Own Excel Calculation and Chart\nThe maximum payout ($150/share) divided by the maximum loss ($350/share) presents a \"maximum rate of return\" on this strategy is +42.8%, though getting that exact maximum payout is nearly impossible (as it requires TSLA to close at exactly $500/share on the expiry date). More likely, this option strategy would deliver a rate of return of more than 14.2% on the maximum loss if TSLA closes between 400-600 at expiry. If we follow the earlier earnings estimates and project TSLA's book value per share to be around $30/share by then, that means we expect a contract in P/B to between 13-20 by next summer.\nConclusion\nFor high-growth, non-dividend paying stocks like Tesla, return expectations break down into expectations of book value growth times expectation of P/B multiple expansion or contraction. Now that it's \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability and reached a respectable level of sales, I believe Tesla is less likely to be the next DeLorean Motor Company, and at best like Microsoft in 2000. To summarize an example I often reference inLong Run Income, from 2000 to 2010, Microsoft's business continued to grow, but investors who bought at the beginning of 2000 were still down over 36% 10 years later because Microsoft's P/B multiple declined by that much more than the business grew. Here is one chart showing that \"lost decade\" for MSFT shareholders.\nData by YCharts\nFor investors who want to hedge a decline in TSLA shares from here to $500, or those who believe TSLA may be a good company that is just wildly overvalued at these levels and may be worth buying below $500, the 1x2 put spread strategy described above may be worth considering.","news_type":1},"isVote":1,"likeStatus":false,"favoriteStatus":false,"reportStatus":false,"tweetType":1,"comments":[{"id":4569055,"gmtCreate":1622761566293,"gmtModify":1663227907362,"authorId":3578378653633666,"author":{"id":3578378653633666,"authorId":3578378653633666,"name":"Auggylol","avatar":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/b0bb374e9cca494786b45a0b2df1a21e","vip":1,"crmLevel":2,"crmLevelSwitch":0,"individualDisplayBadges":[]},"repliedAuthorId":0,"objectId":118467850,"type":1,"supId":4568770,"prevId":0,"content":"comment","text":"comment","html":"comment"},{"id":4568770,"gmtCreate":1622760362160,"gmtModify":1663227906537,"authorId":3578111487107537,"author":{"id":3578111487107537,"authorId":3578111487107537,"name":"Chimpsey","avatar":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/ab58cb989ba2205bb2646f1c4d97c579","vip":1,"crmLevel":5,"crmLevelSwitch":0,"individualDisplayBadges":[]},"repliedAuthorId":0,"objectId":118467850,"type":1,"supId":0,"prevId":0,"content":"Comment","text":"Comment","html":"Comment"}],"langContent":"EN"},{"id":118487157,"gmtCreate":1622754008879,"gmtModify":1704190406293,"author":{"id":"3582100057751905","authorId":"3582100057751905","authorIdStr":"3582100057751905","name":"Tesladudesg","avatar":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/0fef532bc32aab69609478180bdcbad9","vip":1,"crmLevel":1,"crmLevelSwitch":0,"idStr":"3582100057751905"},"htmlText":"?","listText":"?","text":"?","images":[],"top":1,"highlighted":1,"essential":1,"paper":1,"likeSize":1,"commentSize":1,"repostSize":0,"link":"https://ttm.financial/post/118487157","repostId":1152573638,"repostType":4,"repost":{"id":"1152573638","pubTimestamp":1622732138,"share":"https://ttm.financial/m/news/1152573638?lang=&edition=fundamental","pubTime":"2021-06-03 22:55","market":"us","language":"en","title":"Tesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors","url":"https://stock-news.laohu8.com/highlight/detail?id=1152573638","media":"seekingalpha","summary":"Summary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very hi","content":"Summary\n<ul>\n <li>As long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.</li>\n <li>Shareholders assuming Tesla's Price/Book multiple deflates from around 25 to 5 over the next 10 years need book value per share to grow 5x just to break even.</li>\n <li>So far, Tesla's growth in book value is mostly from \"Additional Paid-In Capital\" (issuing new shares at high prices), rather than retained earnings.</li>\n <li>Long-term earnings estimates imply book value per share sums up to 150-250 by the end of 2030, meaning a breakeven Price/Book of 2.5-4x, which is well above most mature autos.</li>\n <li>I present a 1x2 put spread as an attractive trade both for long investors concerned about overvaluation, as well as those seeking to bet on a Price/Book multiple contraction.</li>\n</ul>\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/c329e23b2762c47b11d11d95ec584959\" tg-width=\"768\" tg-height=\"512\">Photo by Jag_cz/iStock Editorial via Getty Images\nBook value per share is likely not the first metric that comes to mind when you think of a \"growth company of the future\" like Tesla (TSLA), but in this article, I will explain why book value per share is the most important bottom line number long-term investors in this company should watch. As long as zero dividends are expected, a TSLA shareholder's total return will, by definition, be defined by the growth of Tesla's book value per share crossed against the change in the Price/Book (P/B) multiple of those shares. After looking at some numbers underlying TSLA's book value per share, and how much it will have to grow for current TSLA shareholders to make money, I conclude with three actionable option strategies based on expectations for how these numbers may change in the medium term. This article also can be seen as a follow up to the&nbsp;2041 breakeven projection of Tesla I published last year.\nTesla Share Price Rise Follows Book Value\nThe first chart here shows how the rise in Tesla's share price has moved remarkably in line with TSLA's growth in book value per share. TSLA has so far never paid a dividend.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/c1f994d62f1ec67c3b95ae15c3791fa8\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"458\">Data by YCharts\nMultiple Expansion and Contraction\nThe above chart, which is on a log scale, is far smoother than that of the (P/B) ratio between these two numbers. The multiple seemed to have stabilized between 2017 and late 2019, but its rise from below 7 in mid-2019 to over 40 in late 2020 and back to around 26 today explains much of TSLA's recent surge and volatility. Another way of thinking about it: TSLA's book value per share is up roughly 4-fold in the past two years, and its P/B is up about 4-fold over the past two years, which together explain why TSLA's shares are up about 16-fold over the past two years. The big question for investors at these levels is: What future combination of book value growth and P/B expansion or contraction can be expected to produce a satisfactory rate of return?\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/b8eb71b806f59aaabd5d09a6eb4b1606\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\nUnderstanding Tesla's Book Value Growth\nAlthough the title of my Marketplace serviceLong Run Incomeimplies a preference for dividends, we believe high-quality book value growth is the best kind of \"dividend alternative\" for companies who can reinvest cash profits internally at far higher rates of return than I can externally. I would challenge any investor to explain why else to buy a low-dividend or no-dividend stock except for the expectation of higher returns from book value growth. For that reason, I have come to focus my analysis of growth companies on how well they seem able to grow book value per share.\nI break down Tesla's book value trajectory into two main parts: Retained Earnings, and Additional Paid In Capital. Although Tesla seems to have \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability, having reported&nbsp;7 consecutive quarters of positive earnings since September 2019, accumulated profits still fall short of accumulated losses by over $4 billion.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/08701c599a8c6fa7a66efde3c0a12cac\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\nThe other \"half\" (actually over 100%) of Tesla's book value comes from the money paid in by investors. TSLA has continuously raised capital over the past several years by issuing new shares, and the higher the valuation multiple at which TSLA can issue new shares, the more it can accumulate in Additional Paid In Capital. These share issuances also raise the number of shares outstanding, which has the dual effect of raising Tesla's overall market value (since the price per share is now multiplied by more shares), and diluting each share's per-share book value. This increase in book value per share and decline in Price/Book in every recent new share issuance effectively reflects a \"profit\" earlier shareholders enjoy for having later investors pay a higher valuation to get into the company.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/971bf86f3d08fe938af2845121be8d4c\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"441\">Data by YCharts\nPutting these above two charts together, we see that so far Tesla has \"made\" over $27 billion selling shares of its stock to investors, vs. losing over $4 billion in trying to sell cars and batteries to customers, and of course the latter eventually needs to overtake the former for investors to start making their money back.\nHow Tesla's Earnings Projections Add Up\nIf we assume that Tesla stops issuing new shares (a big assumption, but necessary to keep the math simple), then we can add up projected earnings per share to the book value per share to accumulate a projection of future book value per share. Projections of Tesla's future earnings deserve their own article or research report, so for the purposes of this update, I'll use the low vs high analyst forecasts on Tesla'sSeeking Alphaearnings page:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/f36166f6653fb8e11941e3c58b313ccb\" tg-width=\"640\" tg-height=\"312\">Source:SeekingAlpha Earnings Page For TSLA\nNote that between 2025 and 2025, the low and median EPS estimates jump as the number of analysts covering the stock that far out falls from 11 to two, implying that the two analysts projecting TSLA's earnings out to 2030 are on the more optimistic end of the street. If we add up the low and high EPS estimates to today's starting book value per share of $23.90, we get a forecast of TSLA's book value of between $160 and $235 per share for the end of 2030. From today's price of around $623.90 per share, that means if TSLA's book value grows to around $200 (the middle of that optimistic range), then a contraction in TSLA's P/B from today's level of 26 to a still \"high for hardware\" multiple of 3 would mean shareholders would earn a 0% return between now and 2030. In other words, someone buying TSLA today would have to believe that either:\n<ol>\n <li>Tesla will grow its earnings and book value even faster than the most optimistic analyst estimates, or</li>\n <li>That investors will continue paying P/B multiples well above 3 for the stock.</li>\n</ol>\nOn forecasting what TSLA's P/B might be by 2030, there are three ways I can see expecting a multiple of 3 or higher:\n<ol>\n <li>Another valuation bubble: The P/B of Toyota Motor Corp. (TM), charted below, reached highs around 3 in Japan's late 1980s bubble, and again in the late 1990s \"echo bubble,\" and that was its high. If TSLA becomes like TM by 2030, this sort of broader stock valuation bubble may be needed to provide an attractive return on the exit price.</li>\n <li>Business transformation: The biggest TSLA bulls I speak to are those who believe TSLA may either remain a premium hardware maker with services on top like Apple Inc. (AAPL), or as a more asset-light, high return software platform like Microsoft (MSFT), whose P/B ratios are charted below Toyota's.</li>\n <li>Financial engineering: One other driver of Apple's&nbsp;P/B expansion is buybacks, as I explained in this example with McDonald's. Buybacks at high P/B multiples reduce book value per share and raise the P/B multiple, all else equal, in ways exactly opposite to how Tesla has been only issuing (not buying back) shares so far.</li>\n</ol>\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/59e353b1112fb465bf275bfd2e2f5c38\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/7432d2c24afe124c70d139e0320f2d0c\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"441\">Data by YCharts\nAnother way of comparing Tesla's $36 billion in annual sales vs. Toyota's $257 billion is on a revenue per capital basis. In other words, Tesla currently grosses around $5/year per person on the planet, vs. Toyota's roughly $37/year per human on earth. The growth question for 2030 is whether Tesla can still reach Toyota's number, especially given that:\n<ol>\n <li>Demand for transportation, in terms of global population times the percentage of the global population that can afford a car, is likely to grow at a slower pace than historically, especially after 2030, and</li>\n <li>Self-driving cars that aren't owned by one person, and so don't need to be parked idle most of the time, might actually decrease demand for new cars.</li>\n</ol>\nWithout continued high growth past 2030, even 3x book might be on the high end for a car or battery company.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/ed6900c059b599cc5885a2184ad6db05\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"537\">Data byYCharts\nTrading a TSLA P/B Contraction\nMy favorite actionable strategies on a stock like TSLA, which I don't expect to fundamentally collapse, but do expect to experience a significant multiple contraction, generally involve some form of option put spread. The option strategy described below works both for bears wanting to profit from an outright 20%-30% decline, or long-term bulls wanting to protect their shares' value against such a decline.\nOne challenge with simply buying put spreads on TSLA is that its option prices imply a significant \"positive skew,\" which makes put spreads relatively expensive to call spreads. In other words, the market is implying an expectation that TSLA shares are more likely than not to fall a little, offset by a smaller chance of a much larger upside move. Most of the near-the-money put spreads on TSLA cost more than 50% of the maximum payoff, even with longer-dated options or lower strike prices.\nFor the time horizon, I'm choosing the June 17, 2022, expiry date, which as of this writing is a little more than one year out. The main reasons I find first the expiry after one year to be a \"sweet spot\" for this type of strategy include:\n<ol>\n <li>As opposed to outright short selling, buying a put spread to profit from a decline in a share price may qualify for long-term capital gains tax treatment, as we would be holding a long position in a put spread longer than one year.</li>\n <li>As opposed to even longer-dated options (say the two-year options expiring June 2023), rolling one-year options forces us to reevaluate our valuation and strike prices and decide if and in what form to roll the strategy after four more quarterly book value updates.</li>\n</ol>\nIn this strategy, we buy 1x 650 strike put around 150 and then sell 2x 500 puts around 75 each, for roughly zero net up-front premium. Payoff scenarios based on TSLA's closing price at expiry include:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/d8d415689c4d898bc75eba42b9f79152\" tg-width=\"640\" tg-height=\"452\">Source: My Own Excel Calculation and Chart\nThe maximum payout ($150/share) divided by the maximum loss ($350/share) presents a \"maximum rate of return\" on this strategy is +42.8%, though getting that exact maximum payout is nearly impossible (as it requires TSLA to close at exactly $500/share on the expiry date). More likely, this option strategy would deliver a rate of return of more than 14.2% on the maximum loss if TSLA closes between 400-600 at expiry. If we follow the earlier earnings estimates and project TSLA's book value per share to be around $30/share by then, that means we expect a contract in P/B to between 13-20 by next summer.\nConclusion\nFor high-growth, non-dividend paying stocks like Tesla, return expectations break down into expectations of book value growth times expectation of P/B multiple expansion or contraction. Now that it's \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability and reached a respectable level of sales, I believe Tesla is less likely to be the next&nbsp;DeLorean Motor Company, and at best like Microsoft in 2000. To summarize an example I often reference inLong Run Income, from 2000 to 2010, Microsoft's business continued to grow, but investors who bought at the beginning of 2000 were still down over 36% 10 years later because Microsoft's P/B multiple declined by that much more than the business grew. Here is one chart showing that \"lost decade\" for MSFT shareholders.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/faaf554d7a7744d36d27ea7f92e9a9e2\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"475\">Data by YCharts\nFor investors who want to hedge a decline in TSLA shares from here to $500, or those who believe TSLA may be a good company that is just wildly overvalued at these levels and may be worth buying below $500, the 1x2 put spread strategy described above may be worth considering.","collect":0,"html":"<!DOCTYPE html>\n<html>\n<head>\n<meta http-equiv=\"Content-Type\" content=\"text/html; charset=utf-8\" />\n<meta name=\"viewport\" content=\"width=device-width,initial-scale=1.0,minimum-scale=1.0,maximum-scale=1.0,user-scalable=no\"/>\n<meta name=\"format-detection\" content=\"telephone=no,email=no,address=no\" />\n<title>Tesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors</title>\n<style type=\"text/css\">\na,abbr,acronym,address,applet,article,aside,audio,b,big,blockquote,body,canvas,caption,center,cite,code,dd,del,details,dfn,div,dl,dt,\nem,embed,fieldset,figcaption,figure,footer,form,h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6,header,hgroup,html,i,iframe,img,ins,kbd,label,legend,li,mark,menu,nav,\nobject,ol,output,p,pre,q,ruby,s,samp,section,small,span,strike,strong,sub,summary,sup,table,tbody,td,tfoot,th,thead,time,tr,tt,u,ul,var,video{ font:inherit;margin:0;padding:0;vertical-align:baseline;border:0 }\nbody{ font-size:16px; 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}\n.meta {color:#5e5c6d;font-size:13px;margin:0 0 .5em; }\na{text-decoration:none; color:#2a4b87;}\n.meta .head { display: inline-block; overflow: hidden}\n.head .h-thumb { width: 30px; height: 30px; margin: 0; padding: 0; border-radius: 50%; float: left;}\n.head .h-content { margin: 0; padding: 0 0 0 9px; float: left;}\n.head .h-name {font-size: 13px; color: #eee; margin: 0;}\n.head .h-time {font-size: 11px; color: #7E829C; margin: 0;line-height: 11px;}\n.small {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.9); -webkit-transform: scale(0.9); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.smaller {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.8); -webkit-transform: scale(0.8); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.bt-text {font-size: 12px;margin: 1.5em 0 0 0}\n.bt-text p {margin: 0}\n</style>\n</head>\n<body>\n<div class=\"wrapper\">\n<header>\n<h2 class=\"title\">\nTesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors\n</h2>\n\n<h4 class=\"meta\">\n\n\n2021-06-03 22:55 GMT+8&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<a href=https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors>seekingalpha</a>\n\n\n</h4>\n\n</header>\n<article>\n<div>\nSummary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.\nShareholders assuming Tesla's ...\n\n<a href=\"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors\">Web Link</a>\n\n</div>\n\n\n</article>\n</div>\n</body>\n</html>\n","type":0,"thumbnail":"","relate_stocks":{"TSLA":"特斯拉"},"source_url":"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors","is_english":true,"share_image_url":"https://static.laohu8.com/e9f99090a1c2ed51c021029395664489","article_id":"1152573638","content_text":"Summary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.\nShareholders assuming Tesla's Price/Book multiple deflates from around 25 to 5 over the next 10 years need book value per share to grow 5x just to break even.\nSo far, Tesla's growth in book value is mostly from \"Additional Paid-In Capital\" (issuing new shares at high prices), rather than retained earnings.\nLong-term earnings estimates imply book value per share sums up to 150-250 by the end of 2030, meaning a breakeven Price/Book of 2.5-4x, which is well above most mature autos.\nI present a 1x2 put spread as an attractive trade both for long investors concerned about overvaluation, as well as those seeking to bet on a Price/Book multiple contraction.\n\nPhoto by Jag_cz/iStock Editorial via Getty Images\nBook value per share is likely not the first metric that comes to mind when you think of a \"growth company of the future\" like Tesla (TSLA), but in this article, I will explain why book value per share is the most important bottom line number long-term investors in this company should watch. As long as zero dividends are expected, a TSLA shareholder's total return will, by definition, be defined by the growth of Tesla's book value per share crossed against the change in the Price/Book (P/B) multiple of those shares. After looking at some numbers underlying TSLA's book value per share, and how much it will have to grow for current TSLA shareholders to make money, I conclude with three actionable option strategies based on expectations for how these numbers may change in the medium term. This article also can be seen as a follow up to the 2041 breakeven projection of Tesla I published last year.\nTesla Share Price Rise Follows Book Value\nThe first chart here shows how the rise in Tesla's share price has moved remarkably in line with TSLA's growth in book value per share. TSLA has so far never paid a dividend.\nData by YCharts\nMultiple Expansion and Contraction\nThe above chart, which is on a log scale, is far smoother than that of the (P/B) ratio between these two numbers. The multiple seemed to have stabilized between 2017 and late 2019, but its rise from below 7 in mid-2019 to over 40 in late 2020 and back to around 26 today explains much of TSLA's recent surge and volatility. Another way of thinking about it: TSLA's book value per share is up roughly 4-fold in the past two years, and its P/B is up about 4-fold over the past two years, which together explain why TSLA's shares are up about 16-fold over the past two years. The big question for investors at these levels is: What future combination of book value growth and P/B expansion or contraction can be expected to produce a satisfactory rate of return?\nData by YCharts\nUnderstanding Tesla's Book Value Growth\nAlthough the title of my Marketplace serviceLong Run Incomeimplies a preference for dividends, we believe high-quality book value growth is the best kind of \"dividend alternative\" for companies who can reinvest cash profits internally at far higher rates of return than I can externally. I would challenge any investor to explain why else to buy a low-dividend or no-dividend stock except for the expectation of higher returns from book value growth. For that reason, I have come to focus my analysis of growth companies on how well they seem able to grow book value per share.\nI break down Tesla's book value trajectory into two main parts: Retained Earnings, and Additional Paid In Capital. Although Tesla seems to have \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability, having reported 7 consecutive quarters of positive earnings since September 2019, accumulated profits still fall short of accumulated losses by over $4 billion.\nData by YCharts\nThe other \"half\" (actually over 100%) of Tesla's book value comes from the money paid in by investors. TSLA has continuously raised capital over the past several years by issuing new shares, and the higher the valuation multiple at which TSLA can issue new shares, the more it can accumulate in Additional Paid In Capital. These share issuances also raise the number of shares outstanding, which has the dual effect of raising Tesla's overall market value (since the price per share is now multiplied by more shares), and diluting each share's per-share book value. This increase in book value per share and decline in Price/Book in every recent new share issuance effectively reflects a \"profit\" earlier shareholders enjoy for having later investors pay a higher valuation to get into the company.\nData by YCharts\nPutting these above two charts together, we see that so far Tesla has \"made\" over $27 billion selling shares of its stock to investors, vs. losing over $4 billion in trying to sell cars and batteries to customers, and of course the latter eventually needs to overtake the former for investors to start making their money back.\nHow Tesla's Earnings Projections Add Up\nIf we assume that Tesla stops issuing new shares (a big assumption, but necessary to keep the math simple), then we can add up projected earnings per share to the book value per share to accumulate a projection of future book value per share. Projections of Tesla's future earnings deserve their own article or research report, so for the purposes of this update, I'll use the low vs high analyst forecasts on Tesla'sSeeking Alphaearnings page:\nSource:SeekingAlpha Earnings Page For TSLA\nNote that between 2025 and 2025, the low and median EPS estimates jump as the number of analysts covering the stock that far out falls from 11 to two, implying that the two analysts projecting TSLA's earnings out to 2030 are on the more optimistic end of the street. If we add up the low and high EPS estimates to today's starting book value per share of $23.90, we get a forecast of TSLA's book value of between $160 and $235 per share for the end of 2030. From today's price of around $623.90 per share, that means if TSLA's book value grows to around $200 (the middle of that optimistic range), then a contraction in TSLA's P/B from today's level of 26 to a still \"high for hardware\" multiple of 3 would mean shareholders would earn a 0% return between now and 2030. In other words, someone buying TSLA today would have to believe that either:\n\nTesla will grow its earnings and book value even faster than the most optimistic analyst estimates, or\nThat investors will continue paying P/B multiples well above 3 for the stock.\n\nOn forecasting what TSLA's P/B might be by 2030, there are three ways I can see expecting a multiple of 3 or higher:\n\nAnother valuation bubble: The P/B of Toyota Motor Corp. (TM), charted below, reached highs around 3 in Japan's late 1980s bubble, and again in the late 1990s \"echo bubble,\" and that was its high. If TSLA becomes like TM by 2030, this sort of broader stock valuation bubble may be needed to provide an attractive return on the exit price.\nBusiness transformation: The biggest TSLA bulls I speak to are those who believe TSLA may either remain a premium hardware maker with services on top like Apple Inc. (AAPL), or as a more asset-light, high return software platform like Microsoft (MSFT), whose P/B ratios are charted below Toyota's.\nFinancial engineering: One other driver of Apple's P/B expansion is buybacks, as I explained in this example with McDonald's. Buybacks at high P/B multiples reduce book value per share and raise the P/B multiple, all else equal, in ways exactly opposite to how Tesla has been only issuing (not buying back) shares so far.\n\nData by YCharts\nData by YCharts\nAnother way of comparing Tesla's $36 billion in annual sales vs. Toyota's $257 billion is on a revenue per capital basis. In other words, Tesla currently grosses around $5/year per person on the planet, vs. Toyota's roughly $37/year per human on earth. The growth question for 2030 is whether Tesla can still reach Toyota's number, especially given that:\n\nDemand for transportation, in terms of global population times the percentage of the global population that can afford a car, is likely to grow at a slower pace than historically, especially after 2030, and\nSelf-driving cars that aren't owned by one person, and so don't need to be parked idle most of the time, might actually decrease demand for new cars.\n\nWithout continued high growth past 2030, even 3x book might be on the high end for a car or battery company.\nData byYCharts\nTrading a TSLA P/B Contraction\nMy favorite actionable strategies on a stock like TSLA, which I don't expect to fundamentally collapse, but do expect to experience a significant multiple contraction, generally involve some form of option put spread. The option strategy described below works both for bears wanting to profit from an outright 20%-30% decline, or long-term bulls wanting to protect their shares' value against such a decline.\nOne challenge with simply buying put spreads on TSLA is that its option prices imply a significant \"positive skew,\" which makes put spreads relatively expensive to call spreads. In other words, the market is implying an expectation that TSLA shares are more likely than not to fall a little, offset by a smaller chance of a much larger upside move. Most of the near-the-money put spreads on TSLA cost more than 50% of the maximum payoff, even with longer-dated options or lower strike prices.\nFor the time horizon, I'm choosing the June 17, 2022, expiry date, which as of this writing is a little more than one year out. The main reasons I find first the expiry after one year to be a \"sweet spot\" for this type of strategy include:\n\nAs opposed to outright short selling, buying a put spread to profit from a decline in a share price may qualify for long-term capital gains tax treatment, as we would be holding a long position in a put spread longer than one year.\nAs opposed to even longer-dated options (say the two-year options expiring June 2023), rolling one-year options forces us to reevaluate our valuation and strike prices and decide if and in what form to roll the strategy after four more quarterly book value updates.\n\nIn this strategy, we buy 1x 650 strike put around 150 and then sell 2x 500 puts around 75 each, for roughly zero net up-front premium. Payoff scenarios based on TSLA's closing price at expiry include:\nSource: My Own Excel Calculation and Chart\nThe maximum payout ($150/share) divided by the maximum loss ($350/share) presents a \"maximum rate of return\" on this strategy is +42.8%, though getting that exact maximum payout is nearly impossible (as it requires TSLA to close at exactly $500/share on the expiry date). More likely, this option strategy would deliver a rate of return of more than 14.2% on the maximum loss if TSLA closes between 400-600 at expiry. If we follow the earlier earnings estimates and project TSLA's book value per share to be around $30/share by then, that means we expect a contract in P/B to between 13-20 by next summer.\nConclusion\nFor high-growth, non-dividend paying stocks like Tesla, return expectations break down into expectations of book value growth times expectation of P/B multiple expansion or contraction. Now that it's \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability and reached a respectable level of sales, I believe Tesla is less likely to be the next DeLorean Motor Company, and at best like Microsoft in 2000. To summarize an example I often reference inLong Run Income, from 2000 to 2010, Microsoft's business continued to grow, but investors who bought at the beginning of 2000 were still down over 36% 10 years later because Microsoft's P/B multiple declined by that much more than the business grew. Here is one chart showing that \"lost decade\" for MSFT shareholders.\nData by YCharts\nFor investors who want to hedge a decline in TSLA shares from here to $500, or those who believe TSLA may be a good company that is just wildly overvalued at these levels and may be worth buying below $500, the 1x2 put spread strategy described above may be worth considering.","news_type":1},"isVote":1,"likeStatus":false,"favoriteStatus":false,"reportStatus":false,"tweetType":1,"comments":[{"id":4568616,"gmtCreate":1622759768265,"gmtModify":1663227903153,"authorId":3573725658355720,"author":{"id":3573725658355720,"authorId":3573725658355720,"name":"Laus","avatar":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/378271708d4733ee22a03d619150e6f2","vip":1,"crmLevel":2,"crmLevelSwitch":0,"individualDisplayBadges":[]},"repliedAuthorId":0,"objectId":118487157,"type":1,"supId":0,"prevId":0,"content":"Nice and good","text":"Nice and good","html":"Nice and good"}],"langContent":"EN"},{"id":118513170,"gmtCreate":1622737926990,"gmtModify":1704190258283,"author":{"id":"3581043736108095","authorId":"3581043736108095","authorIdStr":"3581043736108095","name":"Xylta","avatar":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/37b6717156404221cc7bec84a2a31de6","vip":1,"crmLevel":2,"crmLevelSwitch":0,"idStr":"3581043736108095"},"htmlText":"[Great]&nbsp;","listText":"[Great]&nbsp;","text":"[Great]","images":[],"top":1,"highlighted":1,"essential":1,"paper":1,"likeSize":1,"commentSize":2,"repostSize":0,"link":"https://ttm.financial/post/118513170","repostId":1152573638,"repostType":2,"repost":{"id":"1152573638","pubTimestamp":1622732138,"share":"https://ttm.financial/m/news/1152573638?lang=&edition=fundamental","pubTime":"2021-06-03 22:55","market":"us","language":"en","title":"Tesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors","url":"https://stock-news.laohu8.com/highlight/detail?id=1152573638","media":"seekingalpha","summary":"Summary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very hi","content":"Summary\n<ul>\n <li>As long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.</li>\n <li>Shareholders assuming Tesla's Price/Book multiple deflates from around 25 to 5 over the next 10 years need book value per share to grow 5x just to break even.</li>\n <li>So far, Tesla's growth in book value is mostly from \"Additional Paid-In Capital\" (issuing new shares at high prices), rather than retained earnings.</li>\n <li>Long-term earnings estimates imply book value per share sums up to 150-250 by the end of 2030, meaning a breakeven Price/Book of 2.5-4x, which is well above most mature autos.</li>\n <li>I present a 1x2 put spread as an attractive trade both for long investors concerned about overvaluation, as well as those seeking to bet on a Price/Book multiple contraction.</li>\n</ul>\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/c329e23b2762c47b11d11d95ec584959\" tg-width=\"768\" tg-height=\"512\">Photo by Jag_cz/iStock Editorial via Getty Images\nBook value per share is likely not the first metric that comes to mind when you think of a \"growth company of the future\" like Tesla (TSLA), but in this article, I will explain why book value per share is the most important bottom line number long-term investors in this company should watch. As long as zero dividends are expected, a TSLA shareholder's total return will, by definition, be defined by the growth of Tesla's book value per share crossed against the change in the Price/Book (P/B) multiple of those shares. After looking at some numbers underlying TSLA's book value per share, and how much it will have to grow for current TSLA shareholders to make money, I conclude with three actionable option strategies based on expectations for how these numbers may change in the medium term. This article also can be seen as a follow up to the&nbsp;2041 breakeven projection of Tesla I published last year.\nTesla Share Price Rise Follows Book Value\nThe first chart here shows how the rise in Tesla's share price has moved remarkably in line with TSLA's growth in book value per share. TSLA has so far never paid a dividend.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/c1f994d62f1ec67c3b95ae15c3791fa8\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"458\">Data by YCharts\nMultiple Expansion and Contraction\nThe above chart, which is on a log scale, is far smoother than that of the (P/B) ratio between these two numbers. The multiple seemed to have stabilized between 2017 and late 2019, but its rise from below 7 in mid-2019 to over 40 in late 2020 and back to around 26 today explains much of TSLA's recent surge and volatility. Another way of thinking about it: TSLA's book value per share is up roughly 4-fold in the past two years, and its P/B is up about 4-fold over the past two years, which together explain why TSLA's shares are up about 16-fold over the past two years. The big question for investors at these levels is: What future combination of book value growth and P/B expansion or contraction can be expected to produce a satisfactory rate of return?\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/b8eb71b806f59aaabd5d09a6eb4b1606\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\nUnderstanding Tesla's Book Value Growth\nAlthough the title of my Marketplace serviceLong Run Incomeimplies a preference for dividends, we believe high-quality book value growth is the best kind of \"dividend alternative\" for companies who can reinvest cash profits internally at far higher rates of return than I can externally. I would challenge any investor to explain why else to buy a low-dividend or no-dividend stock except for the expectation of higher returns from book value growth. For that reason, I have come to focus my analysis of growth companies on how well they seem able to grow book value per share.\nI break down Tesla's book value trajectory into two main parts: Retained Earnings, and Additional Paid In Capital. Although Tesla seems to have \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability, having reported&nbsp;7 consecutive quarters of positive earnings since September 2019, accumulated profits still fall short of accumulated losses by over $4 billion.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/08701c599a8c6fa7a66efde3c0a12cac\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\nThe other \"half\" (actually over 100%) of Tesla's book value comes from the money paid in by investors. TSLA has continuously raised capital over the past several years by issuing new shares, and the higher the valuation multiple at which TSLA can issue new shares, the more it can accumulate in Additional Paid In Capital. These share issuances also raise the number of shares outstanding, which has the dual effect of raising Tesla's overall market value (since the price per share is now multiplied by more shares), and diluting each share's per-share book value. This increase in book value per share and decline in Price/Book in every recent new share issuance effectively reflects a \"profit\" earlier shareholders enjoy for having later investors pay a higher valuation to get into the company.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/971bf86f3d08fe938af2845121be8d4c\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"441\">Data by YCharts\nPutting these above two charts together, we see that so far Tesla has \"made\" over $27 billion selling shares of its stock to investors, vs. losing over $4 billion in trying to sell cars and batteries to customers, and of course the latter eventually needs to overtake the former for investors to start making their money back.\nHow Tesla's Earnings Projections Add Up\nIf we assume that Tesla stops issuing new shares (a big assumption, but necessary to keep the math simple), then we can add up projected earnings per share to the book value per share to accumulate a projection of future book value per share. Projections of Tesla's future earnings deserve their own article or research report, so for the purposes of this update, I'll use the low vs high analyst forecasts on Tesla'sSeeking Alphaearnings page:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/f36166f6653fb8e11941e3c58b313ccb\" tg-width=\"640\" tg-height=\"312\">Source:SeekingAlpha Earnings Page For TSLA\nNote that between 2025 and 2025, the low and median EPS estimates jump as the number of analysts covering the stock that far out falls from 11 to two, implying that the two analysts projecting TSLA's earnings out to 2030 are on the more optimistic end of the street. If we add up the low and high EPS estimates to today's starting book value per share of $23.90, we get a forecast of TSLA's book value of between $160 and $235 per share for the end of 2030. From today's price of around $623.90 per share, that means if TSLA's book value grows to around $200 (the middle of that optimistic range), then a contraction in TSLA's P/B from today's level of 26 to a still \"high for hardware\" multiple of 3 would mean shareholders would earn a 0% return between now and 2030. In other words, someone buying TSLA today would have to believe that either:\n<ol>\n <li>Tesla will grow its earnings and book value even faster than the most optimistic analyst estimates, or</li>\n <li>That investors will continue paying P/B multiples well above 3 for the stock.</li>\n</ol>\nOn forecasting what TSLA's P/B might be by 2030, there are three ways I can see expecting a multiple of 3 or higher:\n<ol>\n <li>Another valuation bubble: The P/B of Toyota Motor Corp. (TM), charted below, reached highs around 3 in Japan's late 1980s bubble, and again in the late 1990s \"echo bubble,\" and that was its high. If TSLA becomes like TM by 2030, this sort of broader stock valuation bubble may be needed to provide an attractive return on the exit price.</li>\n <li>Business transformation: The biggest TSLA bulls I speak to are those who believe TSLA may either remain a premium hardware maker with services on top like Apple Inc. (AAPL), or as a more asset-light, high return software platform like Microsoft (MSFT), whose P/B ratios are charted below Toyota's.</li>\n <li>Financial engineering: One other driver of Apple's&nbsp;P/B expansion is buybacks, as I explained in this example with McDonald's. Buybacks at high P/B multiples reduce book value per share and raise the P/B multiple, all else equal, in ways exactly opposite to how Tesla has been only issuing (not buying back) shares so far.</li>\n</ol>\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/59e353b1112fb465bf275bfd2e2f5c38\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/7432d2c24afe124c70d139e0320f2d0c\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"441\">Data by YCharts\nAnother way of comparing Tesla's $36 billion in annual sales vs. Toyota's $257 billion is on a revenue per capital basis. In other words, Tesla currently grosses around $5/year per person on the planet, vs. Toyota's roughly $37/year per human on earth. The growth question for 2030 is whether Tesla can still reach Toyota's number, especially given that:\n<ol>\n <li>Demand for transportation, in terms of global population times the percentage of the global population that can afford a car, is likely to grow at a slower pace than historically, especially after 2030, and</li>\n <li>Self-driving cars that aren't owned by one person, and so don't need to be parked idle most of the time, might actually decrease demand for new cars.</li>\n</ol>\nWithout continued high growth past 2030, even 3x book might be on the high end for a car or battery company.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/ed6900c059b599cc5885a2184ad6db05\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"537\">Data byYCharts\nTrading a TSLA P/B Contraction\nMy favorite actionable strategies on a stock like TSLA, which I don't expect to fundamentally collapse, but do expect to experience a significant multiple contraction, generally involve some form of option put spread. The option strategy described below works both for bears wanting to profit from an outright 20%-30% decline, or long-term bulls wanting to protect their shares' value against such a decline.\nOne challenge with simply buying put spreads on TSLA is that its option prices imply a significant \"positive skew,\" which makes put spreads relatively expensive to call spreads. In other words, the market is implying an expectation that TSLA shares are more likely than not to fall a little, offset by a smaller chance of a much larger upside move. Most of the near-the-money put spreads on TSLA cost more than 50% of the maximum payoff, even with longer-dated options or lower strike prices.\nFor the time horizon, I'm choosing the June 17, 2022, expiry date, which as of this writing is a little more than one year out. The main reasons I find first the expiry after one year to be a \"sweet spot\" for this type of strategy include:\n<ol>\n <li>As opposed to outright short selling, buying a put spread to profit from a decline in a share price may qualify for long-term capital gains tax treatment, as we would be holding a long position in a put spread longer than one year.</li>\n <li>As opposed to even longer-dated options (say the two-year options expiring June 2023), rolling one-year options forces us to reevaluate our valuation and strike prices and decide if and in what form to roll the strategy after four more quarterly book value updates.</li>\n</ol>\nIn this strategy, we buy 1x 650 strike put around 150 and then sell 2x 500 puts around 75 each, for roughly zero net up-front premium. Payoff scenarios based on TSLA's closing price at expiry include:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/d8d415689c4d898bc75eba42b9f79152\" tg-width=\"640\" tg-height=\"452\">Source: My Own Excel Calculation and Chart\nThe maximum payout ($150/share) divided by the maximum loss ($350/share) presents a \"maximum rate of return\" on this strategy is +42.8%, though getting that exact maximum payout is nearly impossible (as it requires TSLA to close at exactly $500/share on the expiry date). More likely, this option strategy would deliver a rate of return of more than 14.2% on the maximum loss if TSLA closes between 400-600 at expiry. If we follow the earlier earnings estimates and project TSLA's book value per share to be around $30/share by then, that means we expect a contract in P/B to between 13-20 by next summer.\nConclusion\nFor high-growth, non-dividend paying stocks like Tesla, return expectations break down into expectations of book value growth times expectation of P/B multiple expansion or contraction. Now that it's \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability and reached a respectable level of sales, I believe Tesla is less likely to be the next&nbsp;DeLorean Motor Company, and at best like Microsoft in 2000. To summarize an example I often reference inLong Run Income, from 2000 to 2010, Microsoft's business continued to grow, but investors who bought at the beginning of 2000 were still down over 36% 10 years later because Microsoft's P/B multiple declined by that much more than the business grew. Here is one chart showing that \"lost decade\" for MSFT shareholders.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/faaf554d7a7744d36d27ea7f92e9a9e2\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"475\">Data by YCharts\nFor investors who want to hedge a decline in TSLA shares from here to $500, or those who believe TSLA may be a good company that is just wildly overvalued at these levels and may be worth buying below $500, the 1x2 put spread strategy described above may be worth considering.","collect":0,"html":"<!DOCTYPE html>\n<html>\n<head>\n<meta http-equiv=\"Content-Type\" content=\"text/html; charset=utf-8\" />\n<meta name=\"viewport\" content=\"width=device-width,initial-scale=1.0,minimum-scale=1.0,maximum-scale=1.0,user-scalable=no\"/>\n<meta name=\"format-detection\" content=\"telephone=no,email=no,address=no\" />\n<title>Tesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors</title>\n<style type=\"text/css\">\na,abbr,acronym,address,applet,article,aside,audio,b,big,blockquote,body,canvas,caption,center,cite,code,dd,del,details,dfn,div,dl,dt,\nem,embed,fieldset,figcaption,figure,footer,form,h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6,header,hgroup,html,i,iframe,img,ins,kbd,label,legend,li,mark,menu,nav,\nobject,ol,output,p,pre,q,ruby,s,samp,section,small,span,strike,strong,sub,summary,sup,table,tbody,td,tfoot,th,thead,time,tr,tt,u,ul,var,video{ font:inherit;margin:0;padding:0;vertical-align:baseline;border:0 }\nbody{ font-size:16px; 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}\n.meta {color:#5e5c6d;font-size:13px;margin:0 0 .5em; }\na{text-decoration:none; color:#2a4b87;}\n.meta .head { display: inline-block; overflow: hidden}\n.head .h-thumb { width: 30px; height: 30px; margin: 0; padding: 0; border-radius: 50%; float: left;}\n.head .h-content { margin: 0; padding: 0 0 0 9px; float: left;}\n.head .h-name {font-size: 13px; color: #eee; margin: 0;}\n.head .h-time {font-size: 11px; color: #7E829C; margin: 0;line-height: 11px;}\n.small {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.9); -webkit-transform: scale(0.9); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.smaller {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.8); -webkit-transform: scale(0.8); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.bt-text {font-size: 12px;margin: 1.5em 0 0 0}\n.bt-text p {margin: 0}\n</style>\n</head>\n<body>\n<div class=\"wrapper\">\n<header>\n<h2 class=\"title\">\nTesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors\n</h2>\n\n<h4 class=\"meta\">\n\n\n2021-06-03 22:55 GMT+8&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<a href=https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors>seekingalpha</a>\n\n\n</h4>\n\n</header>\n<article>\n<div>\nSummary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.\nShareholders assuming Tesla's ...\n\n<a href=\"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors\">Web Link</a>\n\n</div>\n\n\n</article>\n</div>\n</body>\n</html>\n","type":0,"thumbnail":"","relate_stocks":{"TSLA":"特斯拉"},"source_url":"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors","is_english":true,"share_image_url":"https://static.laohu8.com/e9f99090a1c2ed51c021029395664489","article_id":"1152573638","content_text":"Summary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.\nShareholders assuming Tesla's Price/Book multiple deflates from around 25 to 5 over the next 10 years need book value per share to grow 5x just to break even.\nSo far, Tesla's growth in book value is mostly from \"Additional Paid-In Capital\" (issuing new shares at high prices), rather than retained earnings.\nLong-term earnings estimates imply book value per share sums up to 150-250 by the end of 2030, meaning a breakeven Price/Book of 2.5-4x, which is well above most mature autos.\nI present a 1x2 put spread as an attractive trade both for long investors concerned about overvaluation, as well as those seeking to bet on a Price/Book multiple contraction.\n\nPhoto by Jag_cz/iStock Editorial via Getty Images\nBook value per share is likely not the first metric that comes to mind when you think of a \"growth company of the future\" like Tesla (TSLA), but in this article, I will explain why book value per share is the most important bottom line number long-term investors in this company should watch. As long as zero dividends are expected, a TSLA shareholder's total return will, by definition, be defined by the growth of Tesla's book value per share crossed against the change in the Price/Book (P/B) multiple of those shares. After looking at some numbers underlying TSLA's book value per share, and how much it will have to grow for current TSLA shareholders to make money, I conclude with three actionable option strategies based on expectations for how these numbers may change in the medium term. This article also can be seen as a follow up to the 2041 breakeven projection of Tesla I published last year.\nTesla Share Price Rise Follows Book Value\nThe first chart here shows how the rise in Tesla's share price has moved remarkably in line with TSLA's growth in book value per share. TSLA has so far never paid a dividend.\nData by YCharts\nMultiple Expansion and Contraction\nThe above chart, which is on a log scale, is far smoother than that of the (P/B) ratio between these two numbers. The multiple seemed to have stabilized between 2017 and late 2019, but its rise from below 7 in mid-2019 to over 40 in late 2020 and back to around 26 today explains much of TSLA's recent surge and volatility. Another way of thinking about it: TSLA's book value per share is up roughly 4-fold in the past two years, and its P/B is up about 4-fold over the past two years, which together explain why TSLA's shares are up about 16-fold over the past two years. The big question for investors at these levels is: What future combination of book value growth and P/B expansion or contraction can be expected to produce a satisfactory rate of return?\nData by YCharts\nUnderstanding Tesla's Book Value Growth\nAlthough the title of my Marketplace serviceLong Run Incomeimplies a preference for dividends, we believe high-quality book value growth is the best kind of \"dividend alternative\" for companies who can reinvest cash profits internally at far higher rates of return than I can externally. I would challenge any investor to explain why else to buy a low-dividend or no-dividend stock except for the expectation of higher returns from book value growth. For that reason, I have come to focus my analysis of growth companies on how well they seem able to grow book value per share.\nI break down Tesla's book value trajectory into two main parts: Retained Earnings, and Additional Paid In Capital. Although Tesla seems to have \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability, having reported 7 consecutive quarters of positive earnings since September 2019, accumulated profits still fall short of accumulated losses by over $4 billion.\nData by YCharts\nThe other \"half\" (actually over 100%) of Tesla's book value comes from the money paid in by investors. TSLA has continuously raised capital over the past several years by issuing new shares, and the higher the valuation multiple at which TSLA can issue new shares, the more it can accumulate in Additional Paid In Capital. These share issuances also raise the number of shares outstanding, which has the dual effect of raising Tesla's overall market value (since the price per share is now multiplied by more shares), and diluting each share's per-share book value. This increase in book value per share and decline in Price/Book in every recent new share issuance effectively reflects a \"profit\" earlier shareholders enjoy for having later investors pay a higher valuation to get into the company.\nData by YCharts\nPutting these above two charts together, we see that so far Tesla has \"made\" over $27 billion selling shares of its stock to investors, vs. losing over $4 billion in trying to sell cars and batteries to customers, and of course the latter eventually needs to overtake the former for investors to start making their money back.\nHow Tesla's Earnings Projections Add Up\nIf we assume that Tesla stops issuing new shares (a big assumption, but necessary to keep the math simple), then we can add up projected earnings per share to the book value per share to accumulate a projection of future book value per share. Projections of Tesla's future earnings deserve their own article or research report, so for the purposes of this update, I'll use the low vs high analyst forecasts on Tesla'sSeeking Alphaearnings page:\nSource:SeekingAlpha Earnings Page For TSLA\nNote that between 2025 and 2025, the low and median EPS estimates jump as the number of analysts covering the stock that far out falls from 11 to two, implying that the two analysts projecting TSLA's earnings out to 2030 are on the more optimistic end of the street. If we add up the low and high EPS estimates to today's starting book value per share of $23.90, we get a forecast of TSLA's book value of between $160 and $235 per share for the end of 2030. From today's price of around $623.90 per share, that means if TSLA's book value grows to around $200 (the middle of that optimistic range), then a contraction in TSLA's P/B from today's level of 26 to a still \"high for hardware\" multiple of 3 would mean shareholders would earn a 0% return between now and 2030. In other words, someone buying TSLA today would have to believe that either:\n\nTesla will grow its earnings and book value even faster than the most optimistic analyst estimates, or\nThat investors will continue paying P/B multiples well above 3 for the stock.\n\nOn forecasting what TSLA's P/B might be by 2030, there are three ways I can see expecting a multiple of 3 or higher:\n\nAnother valuation bubble: The P/B of Toyota Motor Corp. (TM), charted below, reached highs around 3 in Japan's late 1980s bubble, and again in the late 1990s \"echo bubble,\" and that was its high. If TSLA becomes like TM by 2030, this sort of broader stock valuation bubble may be needed to provide an attractive return on the exit price.\nBusiness transformation: The biggest TSLA bulls I speak to are those who believe TSLA may either remain a premium hardware maker with services on top like Apple Inc. (AAPL), or as a more asset-light, high return software platform like Microsoft (MSFT), whose P/B ratios are charted below Toyota's.\nFinancial engineering: One other driver of Apple's P/B expansion is buybacks, as I explained in this example with McDonald's. Buybacks at high P/B multiples reduce book value per share and raise the P/B multiple, all else equal, in ways exactly opposite to how Tesla has been only issuing (not buying back) shares so far.\n\nData by YCharts\nData by YCharts\nAnother way of comparing Tesla's $36 billion in annual sales vs. Toyota's $257 billion is on a revenue per capital basis. In other words, Tesla currently grosses around $5/year per person on the planet, vs. Toyota's roughly $37/year per human on earth. The growth question for 2030 is whether Tesla can still reach Toyota's number, especially given that:\n\nDemand for transportation, in terms of global population times the percentage of the global population that can afford a car, is likely to grow at a slower pace than historically, especially after 2030, and\nSelf-driving cars that aren't owned by one person, and so don't need to be parked idle most of the time, might actually decrease demand for new cars.\n\nWithout continued high growth past 2030, even 3x book might be on the high end for a car or battery company.\nData byYCharts\nTrading a TSLA P/B Contraction\nMy favorite actionable strategies on a stock like TSLA, which I don't expect to fundamentally collapse, but do expect to experience a significant multiple contraction, generally involve some form of option put spread. The option strategy described below works both for bears wanting to profit from an outright 20%-30% decline, or long-term bulls wanting to protect their shares' value against such a decline.\nOne challenge with simply buying put spreads on TSLA is that its option prices imply a significant \"positive skew,\" which makes put spreads relatively expensive to call spreads. In other words, the market is implying an expectation that TSLA shares are more likely than not to fall a little, offset by a smaller chance of a much larger upside move. Most of the near-the-money put spreads on TSLA cost more than 50% of the maximum payoff, even with longer-dated options or lower strike prices.\nFor the time horizon, I'm choosing the June 17, 2022, expiry date, which as of this writing is a little more than one year out. The main reasons I find first the expiry after one year to be a \"sweet spot\" for this type of strategy include:\n\nAs opposed to outright short selling, buying a put spread to profit from a decline in a share price may qualify for long-term capital gains tax treatment, as we would be holding a long position in a put spread longer than one year.\nAs opposed to even longer-dated options (say the two-year options expiring June 2023), rolling one-year options forces us to reevaluate our valuation and strike prices and decide if and in what form to roll the strategy after four more quarterly book value updates.\n\nIn this strategy, we buy 1x 650 strike put around 150 and then sell 2x 500 puts around 75 each, for roughly zero net up-front premium. Payoff scenarios based on TSLA's closing price at expiry include:\nSource: My Own Excel Calculation and Chart\nThe maximum payout ($150/share) divided by the maximum loss ($350/share) presents a \"maximum rate of return\" on this strategy is +42.8%, though getting that exact maximum payout is nearly impossible (as it requires TSLA to close at exactly $500/share on the expiry date). More likely, this option strategy would deliver a rate of return of more than 14.2% on the maximum loss if TSLA closes between 400-600 at expiry. If we follow the earlier earnings estimates and project TSLA's book value per share to be around $30/share by then, that means we expect a contract in P/B to between 13-20 by next summer.\nConclusion\nFor high-growth, non-dividend paying stocks like Tesla, return expectations break down into expectations of book value growth times expectation of P/B multiple expansion or contraction. Now that it's \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability and reached a respectable level of sales, I believe Tesla is less likely to be the next DeLorean Motor Company, and at best like Microsoft in 2000. To summarize an example I often reference inLong Run Income, from 2000 to 2010, Microsoft's business continued to grow, but investors who bought at the beginning of 2000 were still down over 36% 10 years later because Microsoft's P/B multiple declined by that much more than the business grew. Here is one chart showing that \"lost decade\" for MSFT shareholders.\nData by YCharts\nFor investors who want to hedge a decline in TSLA shares from here to $500, or those who believe TSLA may be a good company that is just wildly overvalued at these levels and may be worth buying below $500, the 1x2 put spread strategy described above may be worth considering.","news_type":1},"isVote":1,"likeStatus":false,"favoriteStatus":false,"reportStatus":false,"tweetType":1,"comments":[{"id":4566983,"gmtCreate":1622737961456,"gmtModify":1663227899428,"authorId":3581043736108095,"author":{"id":3581043736108095,"authorId":3581043736108095,"name":"Xylta","avatar":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/37b6717156404221cc7bec84a2a31de6","vip":1,"crmLevel":2,"crmLevelSwitch":0,"individualDisplayBadges":[]},"repliedAuthorId":0,"objectId":118513170,"type":1,"supId":0,"prevId":0,"content":"[Cool]","text":"[Cool]","html":"[Cool]"},{"id":4566989,"gmtCreate":1622737977980,"gmtModify":1663227899235,"authorId":3581043736108095,"author":{"id":3581043736108095,"authorId":3581043736108095,"name":"Xylta","avatar":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/37b6717156404221cc7bec84a2a31de6","vip":1,"crmLevel":2,"crmLevelSwitch":0,"individualDisplayBadges":[]},"repliedAuthorId":0,"objectId":118513170,"type":1,"supId":4566983,"prevId":0,"content":"[Great]","text":"[Great]","html":"[Great]"}],"langContent":"EN"},{"id":118510024,"gmtCreate":1622737762068,"gmtModify":1704190255351,"author":{"id":"3584615568525197","authorId":"3584615568525197","authorIdStr":"3584615568525197","name":"afht","avatar":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/14782ffec9d44af04209a36cb90d9db1","vip":1,"crmLevel":2,"crmLevelSwitch":0,"idStr":"3584615568525197"},"htmlText":"Great read!&nbsp;","listText":"Great read!&nbsp;","text":"Great read!","images":[],"top":1,"highlighted":1,"essential":1,"paper":1,"likeSize":2,"commentSize":2,"repostSize":0,"link":"https://ttm.financial/post/118510024","repostId":1152573638,"repostType":2,"repost":{"id":"1152573638","pubTimestamp":1622732138,"share":"https://ttm.financial/m/news/1152573638?lang=&edition=fundamental","pubTime":"2021-06-03 22:55","market":"us","language":"en","title":"Tesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors","url":"https://stock-news.laohu8.com/highlight/detail?id=1152573638","media":"seekingalpha","summary":"Summary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very hi","content":"Summary\n<ul>\n <li>As long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.</li>\n <li>Shareholders assuming Tesla's Price/Book multiple deflates from around 25 to 5 over the next 10 years need book value per share to grow 5x just to break even.</li>\n <li>So far, Tesla's growth in book value is mostly from \"Additional Paid-In Capital\" (issuing new shares at high prices), rather than retained earnings.</li>\n <li>Long-term earnings estimates imply book value per share sums up to 150-250 by the end of 2030, meaning a breakeven Price/Book of 2.5-4x, which is well above most mature autos.</li>\n <li>I present a 1x2 put spread as an attractive trade both for long investors concerned about overvaluation, as well as those seeking to bet on a Price/Book multiple contraction.</li>\n</ul>\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/c329e23b2762c47b11d11d95ec584959\" tg-width=\"768\" tg-height=\"512\">Photo by Jag_cz/iStock Editorial via Getty Images\nBook value per share is likely not the first metric that comes to mind when you think of a \"growth company of the future\" like Tesla (TSLA), but in this article, I will explain why book value per share is the most important bottom line number long-term investors in this company should watch. As long as zero dividends are expected, a TSLA shareholder's total return will, by definition, be defined by the growth of Tesla's book value per share crossed against the change in the Price/Book (P/B) multiple of those shares. After looking at some numbers underlying TSLA's book value per share, and how much it will have to grow for current TSLA shareholders to make money, I conclude with three actionable option strategies based on expectations for how these numbers may change in the medium term. This article also can be seen as a follow up to the&nbsp;2041 breakeven projection of Tesla I published last year.\nTesla Share Price Rise Follows Book Value\nThe first chart here shows how the rise in Tesla's share price has moved remarkably in line with TSLA's growth in book value per share. TSLA has so far never paid a dividend.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/c1f994d62f1ec67c3b95ae15c3791fa8\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"458\">Data by YCharts\nMultiple Expansion and Contraction\nThe above chart, which is on a log scale, is far smoother than that of the (P/B) ratio between these two numbers. The multiple seemed to have stabilized between 2017 and late 2019, but its rise from below 7 in mid-2019 to over 40 in late 2020 and back to around 26 today explains much of TSLA's recent surge and volatility. Another way of thinking about it: TSLA's book value per share is up roughly 4-fold in the past two years, and its P/B is up about 4-fold over the past two years, which together explain why TSLA's shares are up about 16-fold over the past two years. The big question for investors at these levels is: What future combination of book value growth and P/B expansion or contraction can be expected to produce a satisfactory rate of return?\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/b8eb71b806f59aaabd5d09a6eb4b1606\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\nUnderstanding Tesla's Book Value Growth\nAlthough the title of my Marketplace serviceLong Run Incomeimplies a preference for dividends, we believe high-quality book value growth is the best kind of \"dividend alternative\" for companies who can reinvest cash profits internally at far higher rates of return than I can externally. I would challenge any investor to explain why else to buy a low-dividend or no-dividend stock except for the expectation of higher returns from book value growth. For that reason, I have come to focus my analysis of growth companies on how well they seem able to grow book value per share.\nI break down Tesla's book value trajectory into two main parts: Retained Earnings, and Additional Paid In Capital. Although Tesla seems to have \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability, having reported&nbsp;7 consecutive quarters of positive earnings since September 2019, accumulated profits still fall short of accumulated losses by over $4 billion.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/08701c599a8c6fa7a66efde3c0a12cac\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\nThe other \"half\" (actually over 100%) of Tesla's book value comes from the money paid in by investors. TSLA has continuously raised capital over the past several years by issuing new shares, and the higher the valuation multiple at which TSLA can issue new shares, the more it can accumulate in Additional Paid In Capital. These share issuances also raise the number of shares outstanding, which has the dual effect of raising Tesla's overall market value (since the price per share is now multiplied by more shares), and diluting each share's per-share book value. This increase in book value per share and decline in Price/Book in every recent new share issuance effectively reflects a \"profit\" earlier shareholders enjoy for having later investors pay a higher valuation to get into the company.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/971bf86f3d08fe938af2845121be8d4c\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"441\">Data by YCharts\nPutting these above two charts together, we see that so far Tesla has \"made\" over $27 billion selling shares of its stock to investors, vs. losing over $4 billion in trying to sell cars and batteries to customers, and of course the latter eventually needs to overtake the former for investors to start making their money back.\nHow Tesla's Earnings Projections Add Up\nIf we assume that Tesla stops issuing new shares (a big assumption, but necessary to keep the math simple), then we can add up projected earnings per share to the book value per share to accumulate a projection of future book value per share. Projections of Tesla's future earnings deserve their own article or research report, so for the purposes of this update, I'll use the low vs high analyst forecasts on Tesla'sSeeking Alphaearnings page:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/f36166f6653fb8e11941e3c58b313ccb\" tg-width=\"640\" tg-height=\"312\">Source:SeekingAlpha Earnings Page For TSLA\nNote that between 2025 and 2025, the low and median EPS estimates jump as the number of analysts covering the stock that far out falls from 11 to two, implying that the two analysts projecting TSLA's earnings out to 2030 are on the more optimistic end of the street. If we add up the low and high EPS estimates to today's starting book value per share of $23.90, we get a forecast of TSLA's book value of between $160 and $235 per share for the end of 2030. From today's price of around $623.90 per share, that means if TSLA's book value grows to around $200 (the middle of that optimistic range), then a contraction in TSLA's P/B from today's level of 26 to a still \"high for hardware\" multiple of 3 would mean shareholders would earn a 0% return between now and 2030. In other words, someone buying TSLA today would have to believe that either:\n<ol>\n <li>Tesla will grow its earnings and book value even faster than the most optimistic analyst estimates, or</li>\n <li>That investors will continue paying P/B multiples well above 3 for the stock.</li>\n</ol>\nOn forecasting what TSLA's P/B might be by 2030, there are three ways I can see expecting a multiple of 3 or higher:\n<ol>\n <li>Another valuation bubble: The P/B of Toyota Motor Corp. (TM), charted below, reached highs around 3 in Japan's late 1980s bubble, and again in the late 1990s \"echo bubble,\" and that was its high. If TSLA becomes like TM by 2030, this sort of broader stock valuation bubble may be needed to provide an attractive return on the exit price.</li>\n <li>Business transformation: The biggest TSLA bulls I speak to are those who believe TSLA may either remain a premium hardware maker with services on top like Apple Inc. (AAPL), or as a more asset-light, high return software platform like Microsoft (MSFT), whose P/B ratios are charted below Toyota's.</li>\n <li>Financial engineering: One other driver of Apple's&nbsp;P/B expansion is buybacks, as I explained in this example with McDonald's. Buybacks at high P/B multiples reduce book value per share and raise the P/B multiple, all else equal, in ways exactly opposite to how Tesla has been only issuing (not buying back) shares so far.</li>\n</ol>\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/59e353b1112fb465bf275bfd2e2f5c38\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/7432d2c24afe124c70d139e0320f2d0c\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"441\">Data by YCharts\nAnother way of comparing Tesla's $36 billion in annual sales vs. Toyota's $257 billion is on a revenue per capital basis. In other words, Tesla currently grosses around $5/year per person on the planet, vs. Toyota's roughly $37/year per human on earth. The growth question for 2030 is whether Tesla can still reach Toyota's number, especially given that:\n<ol>\n <li>Demand for transportation, in terms of global population times the percentage of the global population that can afford a car, is likely to grow at a slower pace than historically, especially after 2030, and</li>\n <li>Self-driving cars that aren't owned by one person, and so don't need to be parked idle most of the time, might actually decrease demand for new cars.</li>\n</ol>\nWithout continued high growth past 2030, even 3x book might be on the high end for a car or battery company.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/ed6900c059b599cc5885a2184ad6db05\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"537\">Data byYCharts\nTrading a TSLA P/B Contraction\nMy favorite actionable strategies on a stock like TSLA, which I don't expect to fundamentally collapse, but do expect to experience a significant multiple contraction, generally involve some form of option put spread. The option strategy described below works both for bears wanting to profit from an outright 20%-30% decline, or long-term bulls wanting to protect their shares' value against such a decline.\nOne challenge with simply buying put spreads on TSLA is that its option prices imply a significant \"positive skew,\" which makes put spreads relatively expensive to call spreads. In other words, the market is implying an expectation that TSLA shares are more likely than not to fall a little, offset by a smaller chance of a much larger upside move. Most of the near-the-money put spreads on TSLA cost more than 50% of the maximum payoff, even with longer-dated options or lower strike prices.\nFor the time horizon, I'm choosing the June 17, 2022, expiry date, which as of this writing is a little more than one year out. The main reasons I find first the expiry after one year to be a \"sweet spot\" for this type of strategy include:\n<ol>\n <li>As opposed to outright short selling, buying a put spread to profit from a decline in a share price may qualify for long-term capital gains tax treatment, as we would be holding a long position in a put spread longer than one year.</li>\n <li>As opposed to even longer-dated options (say the two-year options expiring June 2023), rolling one-year options forces us to reevaluate our valuation and strike prices and decide if and in what form to roll the strategy after four more quarterly book value updates.</li>\n</ol>\nIn this strategy, we buy 1x 650 strike put around 150 and then sell 2x 500 puts around 75 each, for roughly zero net up-front premium. Payoff scenarios based on TSLA's closing price at expiry include:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/d8d415689c4d898bc75eba42b9f79152\" tg-width=\"640\" tg-height=\"452\">Source: My Own Excel Calculation and Chart\nThe maximum payout ($150/share) divided by the maximum loss ($350/share) presents a \"maximum rate of return\" on this strategy is +42.8%, though getting that exact maximum payout is nearly impossible (as it requires TSLA to close at exactly $500/share on the expiry date). More likely, this option strategy would deliver a rate of return of more than 14.2% on the maximum loss if TSLA closes between 400-600 at expiry. If we follow the earlier earnings estimates and project TSLA's book value per share to be around $30/share by then, that means we expect a contract in P/B to between 13-20 by next summer.\nConclusion\nFor high-growth, non-dividend paying stocks like Tesla, return expectations break down into expectations of book value growth times expectation of P/B multiple expansion or contraction. Now that it's \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability and reached a respectable level of sales, I believe Tesla is less likely to be the next&nbsp;DeLorean Motor Company, and at best like Microsoft in 2000. To summarize an example I often reference inLong Run Income, from 2000 to 2010, Microsoft's business continued to grow, but investors who bought at the beginning of 2000 were still down over 36% 10 years later because Microsoft's P/B multiple declined by that much more than the business grew. Here is one chart showing that \"lost decade\" for MSFT shareholders.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/faaf554d7a7744d36d27ea7f92e9a9e2\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"475\">Data by YCharts\nFor investors who want to hedge a decline in TSLA shares from here to $500, or those who believe TSLA may be a good company that is just wildly overvalued at these levels and may be worth buying below $500, the 1x2 put spread strategy described above may be worth considering.","collect":0,"html":"<!DOCTYPE html>\n<html>\n<head>\n<meta http-equiv=\"Content-Type\" content=\"text/html; charset=utf-8\" />\n<meta name=\"viewport\" content=\"width=device-width,initial-scale=1.0,minimum-scale=1.0,maximum-scale=1.0,user-scalable=no\"/>\n<meta name=\"format-detection\" content=\"telephone=no,email=no,address=no\" />\n<title>Tesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors</title>\n<style type=\"text/css\">\na,abbr,acronym,address,applet,article,aside,audio,b,big,blockquote,body,canvas,caption,center,cite,code,dd,del,details,dfn,div,dl,dt,\nem,embed,fieldset,figcaption,figure,footer,form,h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6,header,hgroup,html,i,iframe,img,ins,kbd,label,legend,li,mark,menu,nav,\nobject,ol,output,p,pre,q,ruby,s,samp,section,small,span,strike,strong,sub,summary,sup,table,tbody,td,tfoot,th,thead,time,tr,tt,u,ul,var,video{ font:inherit;margin:0;padding:0;vertical-align:baseline;border:0 }\nbody{ font-size:16px; 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}\n.meta {color:#5e5c6d;font-size:13px;margin:0 0 .5em; }\na{text-decoration:none; color:#2a4b87;}\n.meta .head { display: inline-block; overflow: hidden}\n.head .h-thumb { width: 30px; height: 30px; margin: 0; padding: 0; border-radius: 50%; float: left;}\n.head .h-content { margin: 0; padding: 0 0 0 9px; float: left;}\n.head .h-name {font-size: 13px; color: #eee; margin: 0;}\n.head .h-time {font-size: 11px; color: #7E829C; margin: 0;line-height: 11px;}\n.small {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.9); -webkit-transform: scale(0.9); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.smaller {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.8); -webkit-transform: scale(0.8); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.bt-text {font-size: 12px;margin: 1.5em 0 0 0}\n.bt-text p {margin: 0}\n</style>\n</head>\n<body>\n<div class=\"wrapper\">\n<header>\n<h2 class=\"title\">\nTesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors\n</h2>\n\n<h4 class=\"meta\">\n\n\n2021-06-03 22:55 GMT+8&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<a href=https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors>seekingalpha</a>\n\n\n</h4>\n\n</header>\n<article>\n<div>\nSummary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.\nShareholders assuming Tesla's ...\n\n<a href=\"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors\">Web Link</a>\n\n</div>\n\n\n</article>\n</div>\n</body>\n</html>\n","type":0,"thumbnail":"","relate_stocks":{"TSLA":"特斯拉"},"source_url":"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors","is_english":true,"share_image_url":"https://static.laohu8.com/e9f99090a1c2ed51c021029395664489","article_id":"1152573638","content_text":"Summary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.\nShareholders assuming Tesla's Price/Book multiple deflates from around 25 to 5 over the next 10 years need book value per share to grow 5x just to break even.\nSo far, Tesla's growth in book value is mostly from \"Additional Paid-In Capital\" (issuing new shares at high prices), rather than retained earnings.\nLong-term earnings estimates imply book value per share sums up to 150-250 by the end of 2030, meaning a breakeven Price/Book of 2.5-4x, which is well above most mature autos.\nI present a 1x2 put spread as an attractive trade both for long investors concerned about overvaluation, as well as those seeking to bet on a Price/Book multiple contraction.\n\nPhoto by Jag_cz/iStock Editorial via Getty Images\nBook value per share is likely not the first metric that comes to mind when you think of a \"growth company of the future\" like Tesla (TSLA), but in this article, I will explain why book value per share is the most important bottom line number long-term investors in this company should watch. As long as zero dividends are expected, a TSLA shareholder's total return will, by definition, be defined by the growth of Tesla's book value per share crossed against the change in the Price/Book (P/B) multiple of those shares. After looking at some numbers underlying TSLA's book value per share, and how much it will have to grow for current TSLA shareholders to make money, I conclude with three actionable option strategies based on expectations for how these numbers may change in the medium term. This article also can be seen as a follow up to the 2041 breakeven projection of Tesla I published last year.\nTesla Share Price Rise Follows Book Value\nThe first chart here shows how the rise in Tesla's share price has moved remarkably in line with TSLA's growth in book value per share. TSLA has so far never paid a dividend.\nData by YCharts\nMultiple Expansion and Contraction\nThe above chart, which is on a log scale, is far smoother than that of the (P/B) ratio between these two numbers. The multiple seemed to have stabilized between 2017 and late 2019, but its rise from below 7 in mid-2019 to over 40 in late 2020 and back to around 26 today explains much of TSLA's recent surge and volatility. Another way of thinking about it: TSLA's book value per share is up roughly 4-fold in the past two years, and its P/B is up about 4-fold over the past two years, which together explain why TSLA's shares are up about 16-fold over the past two years. The big question for investors at these levels is: What future combination of book value growth and P/B expansion or contraction can be expected to produce a satisfactory rate of return?\nData by YCharts\nUnderstanding Tesla's Book Value Growth\nAlthough the title of my Marketplace serviceLong Run Incomeimplies a preference for dividends, we believe high-quality book value growth is the best kind of \"dividend alternative\" for companies who can reinvest cash profits internally at far higher rates of return than I can externally. I would challenge any investor to explain why else to buy a low-dividend or no-dividend stock except for the expectation of higher returns from book value growth. For that reason, I have come to focus my analysis of growth companies on how well they seem able to grow book value per share.\nI break down Tesla's book value trajectory into two main parts: Retained Earnings, and Additional Paid In Capital. Although Tesla seems to have \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability, having reported 7 consecutive quarters of positive earnings since September 2019, accumulated profits still fall short of accumulated losses by over $4 billion.\nData by YCharts\nThe other \"half\" (actually over 100%) of Tesla's book value comes from the money paid in by investors. TSLA has continuously raised capital over the past several years by issuing new shares, and the higher the valuation multiple at which TSLA can issue new shares, the more it can accumulate in Additional Paid In Capital. These share issuances also raise the number of shares outstanding, which has the dual effect of raising Tesla's overall market value (since the price per share is now multiplied by more shares), and diluting each share's per-share book value. This increase in book value per share and decline in Price/Book in every recent new share issuance effectively reflects a \"profit\" earlier shareholders enjoy for having later investors pay a higher valuation to get into the company.\nData by YCharts\nPutting these above two charts together, we see that so far Tesla has \"made\" over $27 billion selling shares of its stock to investors, vs. losing over $4 billion in trying to sell cars and batteries to customers, and of course the latter eventually needs to overtake the former for investors to start making their money back.\nHow Tesla's Earnings Projections Add Up\nIf we assume that Tesla stops issuing new shares (a big assumption, but necessary to keep the math simple), then we can add up projected earnings per share to the book value per share to accumulate a projection of future book value per share. Projections of Tesla's future earnings deserve their own article or research report, so for the purposes of this update, I'll use the low vs high analyst forecasts on Tesla'sSeeking Alphaearnings page:\nSource:SeekingAlpha Earnings Page For TSLA\nNote that between 2025 and 2025, the low and median EPS estimates jump as the number of analysts covering the stock that far out falls from 11 to two, implying that the two analysts projecting TSLA's earnings out to 2030 are on the more optimistic end of the street. If we add up the low and high EPS estimates to today's starting book value per share of $23.90, we get a forecast of TSLA's book value of between $160 and $235 per share for the end of 2030. From today's price of around $623.90 per share, that means if TSLA's book value grows to around $200 (the middle of that optimistic range), then a contraction in TSLA's P/B from today's level of 26 to a still \"high for hardware\" multiple of 3 would mean shareholders would earn a 0% return between now and 2030. In other words, someone buying TSLA today would have to believe that either:\n\nTesla will grow its earnings and book value even faster than the most optimistic analyst estimates, or\nThat investors will continue paying P/B multiples well above 3 for the stock.\n\nOn forecasting what TSLA's P/B might be by 2030, there are three ways I can see expecting a multiple of 3 or higher:\n\nAnother valuation bubble: The P/B of Toyota Motor Corp. (TM), charted below, reached highs around 3 in Japan's late 1980s bubble, and again in the late 1990s \"echo bubble,\" and that was its high. If TSLA becomes like TM by 2030, this sort of broader stock valuation bubble may be needed to provide an attractive return on the exit price.\nBusiness transformation: The biggest TSLA bulls I speak to are those who believe TSLA may either remain a premium hardware maker with services on top like Apple Inc. (AAPL), or as a more asset-light, high return software platform like Microsoft (MSFT), whose P/B ratios are charted below Toyota's.\nFinancial engineering: One other driver of Apple's P/B expansion is buybacks, as I explained in this example with McDonald's. Buybacks at high P/B multiples reduce book value per share and raise the P/B multiple, all else equal, in ways exactly opposite to how Tesla has been only issuing (not buying back) shares so far.\n\nData by YCharts\nData by YCharts\nAnother way of comparing Tesla's $36 billion in annual sales vs. Toyota's $257 billion is on a revenue per capital basis. In other words, Tesla currently grosses around $5/year per person on the planet, vs. Toyota's roughly $37/year per human on earth. The growth question for 2030 is whether Tesla can still reach Toyota's number, especially given that:\n\nDemand for transportation, in terms of global population times the percentage of the global population that can afford a car, is likely to grow at a slower pace than historically, especially after 2030, and\nSelf-driving cars that aren't owned by one person, and so don't need to be parked idle most of the time, might actually decrease demand for new cars.\n\nWithout continued high growth past 2030, even 3x book might be on the high end for a car or battery company.\nData byYCharts\nTrading a TSLA P/B Contraction\nMy favorite actionable strategies on a stock like TSLA, which I don't expect to fundamentally collapse, but do expect to experience a significant multiple contraction, generally involve some form of option put spread. The option strategy described below works both for bears wanting to profit from an outright 20%-30% decline, or long-term bulls wanting to protect their shares' value against such a decline.\nOne challenge with simply buying put spreads on TSLA is that its option prices imply a significant \"positive skew,\" which makes put spreads relatively expensive to call spreads. In other words, the market is implying an expectation that TSLA shares are more likely than not to fall a little, offset by a smaller chance of a much larger upside move. Most of the near-the-money put spreads on TSLA cost more than 50% of the maximum payoff, even with longer-dated options or lower strike prices.\nFor the time horizon, I'm choosing the June 17, 2022, expiry date, which as of this writing is a little more than one year out. The main reasons I find first the expiry after one year to be a \"sweet spot\" for this type of strategy include:\n\nAs opposed to outright short selling, buying a put spread to profit from a decline in a share price may qualify for long-term capital gains tax treatment, as we would be holding a long position in a put spread longer than one year.\nAs opposed to even longer-dated options (say the two-year options expiring June 2023), rolling one-year options forces us to reevaluate our valuation and strike prices and decide if and in what form to roll the strategy after four more quarterly book value updates.\n\nIn this strategy, we buy 1x 650 strike put around 150 and then sell 2x 500 puts around 75 each, for roughly zero net up-front premium. Payoff scenarios based on TSLA's closing price at expiry include:\nSource: My Own Excel Calculation and Chart\nThe maximum payout ($150/share) divided by the maximum loss ($350/share) presents a \"maximum rate of return\" on this strategy is +42.8%, though getting that exact maximum payout is nearly impossible (as it requires TSLA to close at exactly $500/share on the expiry date). More likely, this option strategy would deliver a rate of return of more than 14.2% on the maximum loss if TSLA closes between 400-600 at expiry. If we follow the earlier earnings estimates and project TSLA's book value per share to be around $30/share by then, that means we expect a contract in P/B to between 13-20 by next summer.\nConclusion\nFor high-growth, non-dividend paying stocks like Tesla, return expectations break down into expectations of book value growth times expectation of P/B multiple expansion or contraction. Now that it's \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability and reached a respectable level of sales, I believe Tesla is less likely to be the next DeLorean Motor Company, and at best like Microsoft in 2000. To summarize an example I often reference inLong Run Income, from 2000 to 2010, Microsoft's business continued to grow, but investors who bought at the beginning of 2000 were still down over 36% 10 years later because Microsoft's P/B multiple declined by that much more than the business grew. Here is one chart showing that \"lost decade\" for MSFT shareholders.\nData by YCharts\nFor investors who want to hedge a decline in TSLA shares from here to $500, or those who believe TSLA may be a good company that is just wildly overvalued at these levels and may be worth buying below $500, the 1x2 put spread strategy described above may be worth considering.","news_type":1},"isVote":1,"likeStatus":false,"favoriteStatus":false,"reportStatus":false,"tweetType":1,"comments":[{"id":4574933,"gmtCreate":1622780352648,"gmtModify":1663227933326,"authorId":3569293221505716,"author":{"id":3569293221505716,"authorId":3569293221505716,"name":"joleenng","avatar":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/fffae1d9280e9c7e5f8752243abd8f69","vip":1,"crmLevel":2,"crmLevelSwitch":0,"individualDisplayBadges":[]},"repliedAuthorId":0,"objectId":118510024,"type":1,"supId":0,"prevId":0,"content":"[Happy]","text":"[Happy]","html":"[Happy]"},{"id":4566965,"gmtCreate":1622737877165,"gmtModify":1663227898946,"authorId":3574851147748176,"author":{"id":3574851147748176,"authorId":3574851147748176,"name":"Kingggg","avatar":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/8716b86786dd9e45f4b5f86ee41b3d47","vip":1,"currentWearingBadge":{"badgeId":"1026c425416b44e0aac28c11a0848493-2","templateUuid":"1026c425416b44e0aac28c11a0848493","name":"Senior Tiger","description":"Join the tiger community for 1000 days","bigImgUrl":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/0063fb68ea29c9ae6858c58630e182d5","smallImgUrl":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/96c699a93be4214d4b49aea6a5a5d1a4","grayImgUrl":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/35b0e542a9ff77046ed69ef602bc105d","redirectLinkEnabled":0,"hasAllocated":1,"isWearing":1,"stampPosition":0,"hasStamp":0,"allocationCount":1,"allocatedDate":"2023.10.25","individualDisplayEnabled":0,"individualDisplaySort":0,"categoryType":1001},"crmLevel":2,"crmLevelSwitch":1,"individualDisplayBadges":[]},"repliedAuthorId":0,"objectId":118510024,"type":1,"supId":0,"prevId":0,"content":"?","text":"?","html":"?"}],"langContent":"EN"},{"id":118244457,"gmtCreate":1622735536679,"gmtModify":1704190202020,"author":{"id":"3574937628906498","authorId":"3574937628906498","authorIdStr":"3574937628906498","name":"Andrisgho","avatar":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/7539e4ff907d9ce6ccbeff64499fc763","vip":1,"crmLevel":3,"crmLevelSwitch":0,"idStr":"3574937628906498"},"htmlText":"Please help to like and comment&nbsp;","listText":"Please help to like and comment&nbsp;","text":"Please help to like and comment","images":[],"top":1,"highlighted":1,"essential":1,"paper":1,"likeSize":2,"commentSize":2,"repostSize":0,"link":"https://ttm.financial/post/118244457","repostId":1152573638,"repostType":4,"repost":{"id":"1152573638","pubTimestamp":1622732138,"share":"https://ttm.financial/m/news/1152573638?lang=&edition=fundamental","pubTime":"2021-06-03 22:55","market":"us","language":"en","title":"Tesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors","url":"https://stock-news.laohu8.com/highlight/detail?id=1152573638","media":"seekingalpha","summary":"Summary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very hi","content":"Summary\n<ul>\n <li>As long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.</li>\n <li>Shareholders assuming Tesla's Price/Book multiple deflates from around 25 to 5 over the next 10 years need book value per share to grow 5x just to break even.</li>\n <li>So far, Tesla's growth in book value is mostly from \"Additional Paid-In Capital\" (issuing new shares at high prices), rather than retained earnings.</li>\n <li>Long-term earnings estimates imply book value per share sums up to 150-250 by the end of 2030, meaning a breakeven Price/Book of 2.5-4x, which is well above most mature autos.</li>\n <li>I present a 1x2 put spread as an attractive trade both for long investors concerned about overvaluation, as well as those seeking to bet on a Price/Book multiple contraction.</li>\n</ul>\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/c329e23b2762c47b11d11d95ec584959\" tg-width=\"768\" tg-height=\"512\">Photo by Jag_cz/iStock Editorial via Getty Images\nBook value per share is likely not the first metric that comes to mind when you think of a \"growth company of the future\" like Tesla (TSLA), but in this article, I will explain why book value per share is the most important bottom line number long-term investors in this company should watch. As long as zero dividends are expected, a TSLA shareholder's total return will, by definition, be defined by the growth of Tesla's book value per share crossed against the change in the Price/Book (P/B) multiple of those shares. After looking at some numbers underlying TSLA's book value per share, and how much it will have to grow for current TSLA shareholders to make money, I conclude with three actionable option strategies based on expectations for how these numbers may change in the medium term. This article also can be seen as a follow up to the&nbsp;2041 breakeven projection of Tesla I published last year.\nTesla Share Price Rise Follows Book Value\nThe first chart here shows how the rise in Tesla's share price has moved remarkably in line with TSLA's growth in book value per share. TSLA has so far never paid a dividend.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/c1f994d62f1ec67c3b95ae15c3791fa8\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"458\">Data by YCharts\nMultiple Expansion and Contraction\nThe above chart, which is on a log scale, is far smoother than that of the (P/B) ratio between these two numbers. The multiple seemed to have stabilized between 2017 and late 2019, but its rise from below 7 in mid-2019 to over 40 in late 2020 and back to around 26 today explains much of TSLA's recent surge and volatility. Another way of thinking about it: TSLA's book value per share is up roughly 4-fold in the past two years, and its P/B is up about 4-fold over the past two years, which together explain why TSLA's shares are up about 16-fold over the past two years. The big question for investors at these levels is: What future combination of book value growth and P/B expansion or contraction can be expected to produce a satisfactory rate of return?\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/b8eb71b806f59aaabd5d09a6eb4b1606\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\nUnderstanding Tesla's Book Value Growth\nAlthough the title of my Marketplace serviceLong Run Incomeimplies a preference for dividends, we believe high-quality book value growth is the best kind of \"dividend alternative\" for companies who can reinvest cash profits internally at far higher rates of return than I can externally. I would challenge any investor to explain why else to buy a low-dividend or no-dividend stock except for the expectation of higher returns from book value growth. For that reason, I have come to focus my analysis of growth companies on how well they seem able to grow book value per share.\nI break down Tesla's book value trajectory into two main parts: Retained Earnings, and Additional Paid In Capital. Although Tesla seems to have \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability, having reported&nbsp;7 consecutive quarters of positive earnings since September 2019, accumulated profits still fall short of accumulated losses by over $4 billion.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/08701c599a8c6fa7a66efde3c0a12cac\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\nThe other \"half\" (actually over 100%) of Tesla's book value comes from the money paid in by investors. TSLA has continuously raised capital over the past several years by issuing new shares, and the higher the valuation multiple at which TSLA can issue new shares, the more it can accumulate in Additional Paid In Capital. These share issuances also raise the number of shares outstanding, which has the dual effect of raising Tesla's overall market value (since the price per share is now multiplied by more shares), and diluting each share's per-share book value. This increase in book value per share and decline in Price/Book in every recent new share issuance effectively reflects a \"profit\" earlier shareholders enjoy for having later investors pay a higher valuation to get into the company.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/971bf86f3d08fe938af2845121be8d4c\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"441\">Data by YCharts\nPutting these above two charts together, we see that so far Tesla has \"made\" over $27 billion selling shares of its stock to investors, vs. losing over $4 billion in trying to sell cars and batteries to customers, and of course the latter eventually needs to overtake the former for investors to start making their money back.\nHow Tesla's Earnings Projections Add Up\nIf we assume that Tesla stops issuing new shares (a big assumption, but necessary to keep the math simple), then we can add up projected earnings per share to the book value per share to accumulate a projection of future book value per share. Projections of Tesla's future earnings deserve their own article or research report, so for the purposes of this update, I'll use the low vs high analyst forecasts on Tesla'sSeeking Alphaearnings page:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/f36166f6653fb8e11941e3c58b313ccb\" tg-width=\"640\" tg-height=\"312\">Source:SeekingAlpha Earnings Page For TSLA\nNote that between 2025 and 2025, the low and median EPS estimates jump as the number of analysts covering the stock that far out falls from 11 to two, implying that the two analysts projecting TSLA's earnings out to 2030 are on the more optimistic end of the street. If we add up the low and high EPS estimates to today's starting book value per share of $23.90, we get a forecast of TSLA's book value of between $160 and $235 per share for the end of 2030. From today's price of around $623.90 per share, that means if TSLA's book value grows to around $200 (the middle of that optimistic range), then a contraction in TSLA's P/B from today's level of 26 to a still \"high for hardware\" multiple of 3 would mean shareholders would earn a 0% return between now and 2030. In other words, someone buying TSLA today would have to believe that either:\n<ol>\n <li>Tesla will grow its earnings and book value even faster than the most optimistic analyst estimates, or</li>\n <li>That investors will continue paying P/B multiples well above 3 for the stock.</li>\n</ol>\nOn forecasting what TSLA's P/B might be by 2030, there are three ways I can see expecting a multiple of 3 or higher:\n<ol>\n <li>Another valuation bubble: The P/B of Toyota Motor Corp. (TM), charted below, reached highs around 3 in Japan's late 1980s bubble, and again in the late 1990s \"echo bubble,\" and that was its high. If TSLA becomes like TM by 2030, this sort of broader stock valuation bubble may be needed to provide an attractive return on the exit price.</li>\n <li>Business transformation: The biggest TSLA bulls I speak to are those who believe TSLA may either remain a premium hardware maker with services on top like Apple Inc. (AAPL), or as a more asset-light, high return software platform like Microsoft (MSFT), whose P/B ratios are charted below Toyota's.</li>\n <li>Financial engineering: One other driver of Apple's&nbsp;P/B expansion is buybacks, as I explained in this example with McDonald's. Buybacks at high P/B multiples reduce book value per share and raise the P/B multiple, all else equal, in ways exactly opposite to how Tesla has been only issuing (not buying back) shares so far.</li>\n</ol>\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/59e353b1112fb465bf275bfd2e2f5c38\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"425\">Data by YCharts\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/7432d2c24afe124c70d139e0320f2d0c\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"441\">Data by YCharts\nAnother way of comparing Tesla's $36 billion in annual sales vs. Toyota's $257 billion is on a revenue per capital basis. In other words, Tesla currently grosses around $5/year per person on the planet, vs. Toyota's roughly $37/year per human on earth. The growth question for 2030 is whether Tesla can still reach Toyota's number, especially given that:\n<ol>\n <li>Demand for transportation, in terms of global population times the percentage of the global population that can afford a car, is likely to grow at a slower pace than historically, especially after 2030, and</li>\n <li>Self-driving cars that aren't owned by one person, and so don't need to be parked idle most of the time, might actually decrease demand for new cars.</li>\n</ol>\nWithout continued high growth past 2030, even 3x book might be on the high end for a car or battery company.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/ed6900c059b599cc5885a2184ad6db05\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"537\">Data byYCharts\nTrading a TSLA P/B Contraction\nMy favorite actionable strategies on a stock like TSLA, which I don't expect to fundamentally collapse, but do expect to experience a significant multiple contraction, generally involve some form of option put spread. The option strategy described below works both for bears wanting to profit from an outright 20%-30% decline, or long-term bulls wanting to protect their shares' value against such a decline.\nOne challenge with simply buying put spreads on TSLA is that its option prices imply a significant \"positive skew,\" which makes put spreads relatively expensive to call spreads. In other words, the market is implying an expectation that TSLA shares are more likely than not to fall a little, offset by a smaller chance of a much larger upside move. Most of the near-the-money put spreads on TSLA cost more than 50% of the maximum payoff, even with longer-dated options or lower strike prices.\nFor the time horizon, I'm choosing the June 17, 2022, expiry date, which as of this writing is a little more than one year out. The main reasons I find first the expiry after one year to be a \"sweet spot\" for this type of strategy include:\n<ol>\n <li>As opposed to outright short selling, buying a put spread to profit from a decline in a share price may qualify for long-term capital gains tax treatment, as we would be holding a long position in a put spread longer than one year.</li>\n <li>As opposed to even longer-dated options (say the two-year options expiring June 2023), rolling one-year options forces us to reevaluate our valuation and strike prices and decide if and in what form to roll the strategy after four more quarterly book value updates.</li>\n</ol>\nIn this strategy, we buy 1x 650 strike put around 150 and then sell 2x 500 puts around 75 each, for roughly zero net up-front premium. Payoff scenarios based on TSLA's closing price at expiry include:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/d8d415689c4d898bc75eba42b9f79152\" tg-width=\"640\" tg-height=\"452\">Source: My Own Excel Calculation and Chart\nThe maximum payout ($150/share) divided by the maximum loss ($350/share) presents a \"maximum rate of return\" on this strategy is +42.8%, though getting that exact maximum payout is nearly impossible (as it requires TSLA to close at exactly $500/share on the expiry date). More likely, this option strategy would deliver a rate of return of more than 14.2% on the maximum loss if TSLA closes between 400-600 at expiry. If we follow the earlier earnings estimates and project TSLA's book value per share to be around $30/share by then, that means we expect a contract in P/B to between 13-20 by next summer.\nConclusion\nFor high-growth, non-dividend paying stocks like Tesla, return expectations break down into expectations of book value growth times expectation of P/B multiple expansion or contraction. Now that it's \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability and reached a respectable level of sales, I believe Tesla is less likely to be the next&nbsp;DeLorean Motor Company, and at best like Microsoft in 2000. To summarize an example I often reference inLong Run Income, from 2000 to 2010, Microsoft's business continued to grow, but investors who bought at the beginning of 2000 were still down over 36% 10 years later because Microsoft's P/B multiple declined by that much more than the business grew. Here is one chart showing that \"lost decade\" for MSFT shareholders.\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/faaf554d7a7744d36d27ea7f92e9a9e2\" tg-width=\"635\" tg-height=\"475\">Data by YCharts\nFor investors who want to hedge a decline in TSLA shares from here to $500, or those who believe TSLA may be a good company that is just wildly overvalued at these levels and may be worth buying below $500, the 1x2 put spread strategy described above may be worth considering.","collect":0,"html":"<!DOCTYPE html>\n<html>\n<head>\n<meta http-equiv=\"Content-Type\" content=\"text/html; charset=utf-8\" />\n<meta name=\"viewport\" content=\"width=device-width,initial-scale=1.0,minimum-scale=1.0,maximum-scale=1.0,user-scalable=no\"/>\n<meta name=\"format-detection\" content=\"telephone=no,email=no,address=no\" />\n<title>Tesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors</title>\n<style type=\"text/css\">\na,abbr,acronym,address,applet,article,aside,audio,b,big,blockquote,body,canvas,caption,center,cite,code,dd,del,details,dfn,div,dl,dt,\nem,embed,fieldset,figcaption,figure,footer,form,h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6,header,hgroup,html,i,iframe,img,ins,kbd,label,legend,li,mark,menu,nav,\nobject,ol,output,p,pre,q,ruby,s,samp,section,small,span,strike,strong,sub,summary,sup,table,tbody,td,tfoot,th,thead,time,tr,tt,u,ul,var,video{ font:inherit;margin:0;padding:0;vertical-align:baseline;border:0 }\nbody{ font-size:16px; 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}\n.meta {color:#5e5c6d;font-size:13px;margin:0 0 .5em; }\na{text-decoration:none; color:#2a4b87;}\n.meta .head { display: inline-block; overflow: hidden}\n.head .h-thumb { width: 30px; height: 30px; margin: 0; padding: 0; border-radius: 50%; float: left;}\n.head .h-content { margin: 0; padding: 0 0 0 9px; float: left;}\n.head .h-name {font-size: 13px; color: #eee; margin: 0;}\n.head .h-time {font-size: 11px; color: #7E829C; margin: 0;line-height: 11px;}\n.small {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.9); -webkit-transform: scale(0.9); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.smaller {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.8); -webkit-transform: scale(0.8); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.bt-text {font-size: 12px;margin: 1.5em 0 0 0}\n.bt-text p {margin: 0}\n</style>\n</head>\n<body>\n<div class=\"wrapper\">\n<header>\n<h2 class=\"title\">\nTesla: The Only 2 Numbers That Matter To Investors\n</h2>\n\n<h4 class=\"meta\">\n\n\n2021-06-03 22:55 GMT+8&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<a href=https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors>seekingalpha</a>\n\n\n</h4>\n\n</header>\n<article>\n<div>\nSummary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.\nShareholders assuming Tesla's ...\n\n<a href=\"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors\">Web Link</a>\n\n</div>\n\n\n</article>\n</div>\n</body>\n</html>\n","type":0,"thumbnail":"","relate_stocks":{"TSLA":"特斯拉"},"source_url":"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4432862-tesla-the-only-2-numbers-that-matter-to-investors","is_english":true,"share_image_url":"https://static.laohu8.com/e9f99090a1c2ed51c021029395664489","article_id":"1152573638","content_text":"Summary\n\nAs long as there's zero dividend, Tesla investors are betting on one of two things: Very high book value growth, or continued Price/Book multiple expansion.\nShareholders assuming Tesla's Price/Book multiple deflates from around 25 to 5 over the next 10 years need book value per share to grow 5x just to break even.\nSo far, Tesla's growth in book value is mostly from \"Additional Paid-In Capital\" (issuing new shares at high prices), rather than retained earnings.\nLong-term earnings estimates imply book value per share sums up to 150-250 by the end of 2030, meaning a breakeven Price/Book of 2.5-4x, which is well above most mature autos.\nI present a 1x2 put spread as an attractive trade both for long investors concerned about overvaluation, as well as those seeking to bet on a Price/Book multiple contraction.\n\nPhoto by Jag_cz/iStock Editorial via Getty Images\nBook value per share is likely not the first metric that comes to mind when you think of a \"growth company of the future\" like Tesla (TSLA), but in this article, I will explain why book value per share is the most important bottom line number long-term investors in this company should watch. As long as zero dividends are expected, a TSLA shareholder's total return will, by definition, be defined by the growth of Tesla's book value per share crossed against the change in the Price/Book (P/B) multiple of those shares. After looking at some numbers underlying TSLA's book value per share, and how much it will have to grow for current TSLA shareholders to make money, I conclude with three actionable option strategies based on expectations for how these numbers may change in the medium term. This article also can be seen as a follow up to the 2041 breakeven projection of Tesla I published last year.\nTesla Share Price Rise Follows Book Value\nThe first chart here shows how the rise in Tesla's share price has moved remarkably in line with TSLA's growth in book value per share. TSLA has so far never paid a dividend.\nData by YCharts\nMultiple Expansion and Contraction\nThe above chart, which is on a log scale, is far smoother than that of the (P/B) ratio between these two numbers. The multiple seemed to have stabilized between 2017 and late 2019, but its rise from below 7 in mid-2019 to over 40 in late 2020 and back to around 26 today explains much of TSLA's recent surge and volatility. Another way of thinking about it: TSLA's book value per share is up roughly 4-fold in the past two years, and its P/B is up about 4-fold over the past two years, which together explain why TSLA's shares are up about 16-fold over the past two years. The big question for investors at these levels is: What future combination of book value growth and P/B expansion or contraction can be expected to produce a satisfactory rate of return?\nData by YCharts\nUnderstanding Tesla's Book Value Growth\nAlthough the title of my Marketplace serviceLong Run Incomeimplies a preference for dividends, we believe high-quality book value growth is the best kind of \"dividend alternative\" for companies who can reinvest cash profits internally at far higher rates of return than I can externally. I would challenge any investor to explain why else to buy a low-dividend or no-dividend stock except for the expectation of higher returns from book value growth. For that reason, I have come to focus my analysis of growth companies on how well they seem able to grow book value per share.\nI break down Tesla's book value trajectory into two main parts: Retained Earnings, and Additional Paid In Capital. Although Tesla seems to have \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability, having reported 7 consecutive quarters of positive earnings since September 2019, accumulated profits still fall short of accumulated losses by over $4 billion.\nData by YCharts\nThe other \"half\" (actually over 100%) of Tesla's book value comes from the money paid in by investors. TSLA has continuously raised capital over the past several years by issuing new shares, and the higher the valuation multiple at which TSLA can issue new shares, the more it can accumulate in Additional Paid In Capital. These share issuances also raise the number of shares outstanding, which has the dual effect of raising Tesla's overall market value (since the price per share is now multiplied by more shares), and diluting each share's per-share book value. This increase in book value per share and decline in Price/Book in every recent new share issuance effectively reflects a \"profit\" earlier shareholders enjoy for having later investors pay a higher valuation to get into the company.\nData by YCharts\nPutting these above two charts together, we see that so far Tesla has \"made\" over $27 billion selling shares of its stock to investors, vs. losing over $4 billion in trying to sell cars and batteries to customers, and of course the latter eventually needs to overtake the former for investors to start making their money back.\nHow Tesla's Earnings Projections Add Up\nIf we assume that Tesla stops issuing new shares (a big assumption, but necessary to keep the math simple), then we can add up projected earnings per share to the book value per share to accumulate a projection of future book value per share. Projections of Tesla's future earnings deserve their own article or research report, so for the purposes of this update, I'll use the low vs high analyst forecasts on Tesla'sSeeking Alphaearnings page:\nSource:SeekingAlpha Earnings Page For TSLA\nNote that between 2025 and 2025, the low and median EPS estimates jump as the number of analysts covering the stock that far out falls from 11 to two, implying that the two analysts projecting TSLA's earnings out to 2030 are on the more optimistic end of the street. If we add up the low and high EPS estimates to today's starting book value per share of $23.90, we get a forecast of TSLA's book value of between $160 and $235 per share for the end of 2030. From today's price of around $623.90 per share, that means if TSLA's book value grows to around $200 (the middle of that optimistic range), then a contraction in TSLA's P/B from today's level of 26 to a still \"high for hardware\" multiple of 3 would mean shareholders would earn a 0% return between now and 2030. In other words, someone buying TSLA today would have to believe that either:\n\nTesla will grow its earnings and book value even faster than the most optimistic analyst estimates, or\nThat investors will continue paying P/B multiples well above 3 for the stock.\n\nOn forecasting what TSLA's P/B might be by 2030, there are three ways I can see expecting a multiple of 3 or higher:\n\nAnother valuation bubble: The P/B of Toyota Motor Corp. (TM), charted below, reached highs around 3 in Japan's late 1980s bubble, and again in the late 1990s \"echo bubble,\" and that was its high. If TSLA becomes like TM by 2030, this sort of broader stock valuation bubble may be needed to provide an attractive return on the exit price.\nBusiness transformation: The biggest TSLA bulls I speak to are those who believe TSLA may either remain a premium hardware maker with services on top like Apple Inc. (AAPL), or as a more asset-light, high return software platform like Microsoft (MSFT), whose P/B ratios are charted below Toyota's.\nFinancial engineering: One other driver of Apple's P/B expansion is buybacks, as I explained in this example with McDonald's. Buybacks at high P/B multiples reduce book value per share and raise the P/B multiple, all else equal, in ways exactly opposite to how Tesla has been only issuing (not buying back) shares so far.\n\nData by YCharts\nData by YCharts\nAnother way of comparing Tesla's $36 billion in annual sales vs. Toyota's $257 billion is on a revenue per capital basis. In other words, Tesla currently grosses around $5/year per person on the planet, vs. Toyota's roughly $37/year per human on earth. The growth question for 2030 is whether Tesla can still reach Toyota's number, especially given that:\n\nDemand for transportation, in terms of global population times the percentage of the global population that can afford a car, is likely to grow at a slower pace than historically, especially after 2030, and\nSelf-driving cars that aren't owned by one person, and so don't need to be parked idle most of the time, might actually decrease demand for new cars.\n\nWithout continued high growth past 2030, even 3x book might be on the high end for a car or battery company.\nData byYCharts\nTrading a TSLA P/B Contraction\nMy favorite actionable strategies on a stock like TSLA, which I don't expect to fundamentally collapse, but do expect to experience a significant multiple contraction, generally involve some form of option put spread. The option strategy described below works both for bears wanting to profit from an outright 20%-30% decline, or long-term bulls wanting to protect their shares' value against such a decline.\nOne challenge with simply buying put spreads on TSLA is that its option prices imply a significant \"positive skew,\" which makes put spreads relatively expensive to call spreads. In other words, the market is implying an expectation that TSLA shares are more likely than not to fall a little, offset by a smaller chance of a much larger upside move. Most of the near-the-money put spreads on TSLA cost more than 50% of the maximum payoff, even with longer-dated options or lower strike prices.\nFor the time horizon, I'm choosing the June 17, 2022, expiry date, which as of this writing is a little more than one year out. The main reasons I find first the expiry after one year to be a \"sweet spot\" for this type of strategy include:\n\nAs opposed to outright short selling, buying a put spread to profit from a decline in a share price may qualify for long-term capital gains tax treatment, as we would be holding a long position in a put spread longer than one year.\nAs opposed to even longer-dated options (say the two-year options expiring June 2023), rolling one-year options forces us to reevaluate our valuation and strike prices and decide if and in what form to roll the strategy after four more quarterly book value updates.\n\nIn this strategy, we buy 1x 650 strike put around 150 and then sell 2x 500 puts around 75 each, for roughly zero net up-front premium. Payoff scenarios based on TSLA's closing price at expiry include:\nSource: My Own Excel Calculation and Chart\nThe maximum payout ($150/share) divided by the maximum loss ($350/share) presents a \"maximum rate of return\" on this strategy is +42.8%, though getting that exact maximum payout is nearly impossible (as it requires TSLA to close at exactly $500/share on the expiry date). More likely, this option strategy would deliver a rate of return of more than 14.2% on the maximum loss if TSLA closes between 400-600 at expiry. If we follow the earlier earnings estimates and project TSLA's book value per share to be around $30/share by then, that means we expect a contract in P/B to between 13-20 by next summer.\nConclusion\nFor high-growth, non-dividend paying stocks like Tesla, return expectations break down into expectations of book value growth times expectation of P/B multiple expansion or contraction. Now that it's \"rounded the J-curve\" of profitability and reached a respectable level of sales, I believe Tesla is less likely to be the next DeLorean Motor Company, and at best like Microsoft in 2000. To summarize an example I often reference inLong Run Income, from 2000 to 2010, Microsoft's business continued to grow, but investors who bought at the beginning of 2000 were still down over 36% 10 years later because Microsoft's P/B multiple declined by that much more than the business grew. Here is one chart showing that \"lost decade\" for MSFT shareholders.\nData by YCharts\nFor investors who want to hedge a decline in TSLA shares from here to $500, or those who believe TSLA may be a good company that is just wildly overvalued at these levels and may be worth buying below $500, the 1x2 put spread strategy described above may be worth considering.","news_type":1},"isVote":1,"likeStatus":false,"favoriteStatus":false,"reportStatus":false,"tweetType":1,"comments":[{"id":4610110,"gmtCreate":1623032544556,"gmtModify":1663228093146,"authorId":3574937628906498,"author":{"id":3574937628906498,"authorId":3574937628906498,"name":"Andrisgho","avatar":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/7539e4ff907d9ce6ccbeff64499fc763","vip":1,"crmLevel":3,"crmLevelSwitch":0,"individualDisplayBadges":[]},"repliedAuthorId":0,"objectId":118244457,"type":1,"supId":4568177,"prevId":0,"content":"Replied","text":"Replied","html":"Replied"},{"id":4568177,"gmtCreate":1622756229622,"gmtModify":1635338219111,"authorId":3565819252889467,"author":{"id":3565819252889467,"authorId":3565819252889467,"name":"e13v3n","avatar":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/387ab24895655e32d7ddaf87ded7da37","vip":1,"currentWearingBadge":{"badgeId":"29815c1501c442c58b708482689df577-1","templateUuid":"29815c1501c442c58b708482689df577","name":"Emerging Contributor","description":"Contributors who received Editor's Pick for the 1st time","bigImgUrl":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/4ce9180a952c61a51c39f70d533b81a7","smallImgUrl":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/f98cf16cf4b858114f7ab9a779f9e6f1","redirectLinkEnabled":1,"redirectLink":"https://ttm.financial/TW/9000980585","hasAllocated":1,"isWearing":1,"stampPosition":0,"hasStamp":0,"allocationCount":1,"allocatedDate":"2023.06.12","individualDisplayEnabled":0,"individualDisplaySort":0,"categoryType":2005},"crmLevel":2,"crmLevelSwitch":0,"individualDisplayBadges":[]},"repliedAuthorId":0,"objectId":118244457,"type":1,"supId":0,"prevId":0,"content":"pls like n comment ","text":"pls like n comment ","html":"pls like n comment "}],"langContent":"EN"}],"hasMoreComments":true,"newsSizeData":{"likeSize":66,"commentSize":23,"repostSize":0,"favoriteSize":0,"likeStatus":false,"favoriteStatus":false}}