저자: 해설자 · 외국인
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로봇·자율주행이 GDP에 편입되며 소비 구조를 바꿀 것이라는 주장. Uber 사례처럼 로보택시가 자동차 시장 용량 활용도를 높여 기존 자동차 시장을 파괴할 수 있다고 봄. 테슬라 로보택시는 비용 우위(차량가 약 3만달러 vs Waymo 10~15만달러)를 근거로 경쟁력이 있다고 하며, 옵티머스는 상용화 전 단계라 증명이 필요하다고 함. 후반부는 테슬라 밸류에이션(PER 약 375배)과 주가 고평가 리스크를 지적하는 해설.
다듬은 글
It it is, but there's there's another side to this. I'm not going to say it's equal and opposite. If you look at robotics and you look at the time we spend doing things for free. We're not paid to drive our children around. We're not paid to make dinner and clean up afterwards. We're going to unlock a lot of that and that will become paid in the form of we're going to be buying robots.
That will get into GDP and that never got into GDP before. It's a little bit like what happened to the farm economy here. The reason people at that time wanted to have lots and lots of children is they paid the room and board and and nothing else. Then the industrial revolution and of course their their work was not counted in GDP because there's GDP equals national income.
National income is easier to measure in these days because of the tax system and so forth and they have to equal. They have to equal and so we will through robot purchases see a lot of GDP coming back to us. That's a great point. So you take traditional things that aren't measured and you move them into the measured economy and that increases revenue.
So this this reminds me of a specific data point. I remember talking to VCs who all many missed investing in Uber and I actually interviewed one of them and said why and he said we totally messed up because the taxi market in San Francisco is about 500 million a year and we figured if Uber takes like 20% of that that's just not a venture investment because then they only get some chunk of that revenue.
What we missed was that the the ride-sharing market quadrupled and they took 80% market share from the taxis. So, you ended up all these people taking rides that you never would dream would take rides, drunk people, etc., etc. And that totally changed the game. What's interesting about that is today Uber uh accounts for 1% of all urban traveled.
This is in Big Ideas as well. Uh and we've done the analysis. Talk about puts and takes here about GDP and so forth. We've done the analysis that to accommodate that 1% of urban miles traveled, it would take only 140,000 cars. Uh to to accommodate all urban miles traveled in the United States, this is.
Um it would take 24 million cars. And when you put into context that uh the number of cars owned in the United States today is is somewhere around 400 million. And the number uh of autos sold every year in the United States is now roughly 15 million. That tells you the capacity utilization increase of the robo taxis is going to destroy the auto market as we know it.
Why Elon Musk's big bet on robotics comes with significant risk for Tesla shareholders. I mean, don't get me wrong. The potential for Tesla's Optimus robot is a massive growth opportunity, but its success is far from a sure thing. Tesla is an electric vehicle stock that trades like a high-powered tech stock.
And that's because CEO Elon Musk is able to sell investors on a growth story that goes beyond just EVs. Elon Musk does see the business as being more of an artificial intelligence and robotics company and investors have been valuing it as such because everyone likes Elon Musk or at least they used to for a very long period of time.
The company is in the middle of a significant shift in its operations as it looks to invest more heavily on AI but the greater the move away from its core operations, the greater the risk there can be for Tesla. While robotics, while robots and AI can make for compelling growth opportunities, they can also add a ton of more risk for the stock and also and also take away potentially more focus away from its EV company.
How do you though value or or how you even thinking right now about A the prospects for the robotaxi and what you think that business ultimately looks like on one end, we can start there and then after that we should probably get into the Optimus robot story because that is the next real leg of this story.
Yeah, so right now the focus on robotaxi is going to be on making sure that they can have scaled commercialization. Really, that's the focus this year. They pulled the driver from Austin and so we want to see A, you know, how much more widely they can expand ODD, the number of cars and really start to take share and see whether this is a service that can really compete against uh a a Waymo.
Can they do this in other locations, right? That's going to be the focus this year and you can start to sketch out, you know, if they can get this done and they have a cost advantage, how this is going to unlock revenue. The humanoid robot is much more difficult because that's still really in an R&D and prototype phase as Elon said.
They're going to start production of the Gen 3 version later this year but we still have to see, you know, really how they unlock that. That one is much more of a show-me story, uh but you can see where the TAM is quite large on that. [snorts] In terms of the taxi piece, obviously we've seen the success of Waymo.
They've gotten uh to some scale. How's How scaled up do you think the robot taxi will ultimately be? You know, there's always been this question about lidar and the like and sort of the the the idea that they don't You I mean, the Tesla doesn't use lidar. Does it matter? Has he proved his point? Meaning, has Elon proved the point that you don't need lidar?
Well, I think that's still getting proven, right? The reality is is that you know, yes, we've seen Tesla pull the driver. It's on a limited basis, though. If you compare this to where where Waymo is right now in uh one of the many any of the many cities where they are operating and they're now fully driverless in I believe it's it's three or four cities, right?
Waymo clearly has proven they can pull the driver. So, Tesla still has to prove that more widely, but the opportunity for Tesla is going to be on the cost side because, remember, each Waymo costs something along the lines of $100 to $150,000 per vehicle. The beauty of a Cybertruck is that could be $30,000 or less.
And so, once you unlock uh that driverless capabilities, and I think we're still seeing that, you know, lidar versus no lidar debate play out, but if Elon can fully prove that this can be done on vision only, you know, and he can get some of the other commercialization pieces, there is a significant cost advantage.
And that's why I think the market is treating Tesla as probably the only other competitor to Waymo here. And then And then finally, Dan, when you think about the robot piece of it, you know, what is the What is the timeline and what is the honeymoon? Uh when I say honeymoon, how much extra time the the sort of Elon Musk advantage, the Elon Musk honeymoon, which is to say, you know, he can give us a he can give us a timeline, and but the market is also typically willing to give him extra time.
And so, what what's what's your timeline look like, and what how does that matter? Well, that that honeymoon phase right now, at least as as to what the market is saying is quite quite long. But the reality is is that, you know, we're only going to see initial production of what's more of a a closer to production version later this this year, right?
As opposed to the prototype version that that we've had. So, this is still very much in uh proving the concept phase. I think what the market really is focused on though is is the TAM capabilities. We just pointed out, he went to CES a few weeks ago. There were any number of other Chinese players that have humanoid robots.
You have Boston Dynamics. Tesla obviously does have an AI advantage. He's talking about some of the the opportunities or the advantages on supply chain, hand design. Hand is actually a really tricky part of this. They've got the battery piece, right? That's why I think Tesla is being given a significant benefit here from from the market's perspective.
Tesla's business is constantly evolving, and one of the big opportunities Elon Musk sees for the company is in robotics. Its Optimus robot is a cornerstone of its long-term growth strategy with with its potential being able to perform repetitive and unsafe tasks for humans. The company is planning to stop making Model S and X vehicles, and instead will begin producing robots at a factory in California in the clearest sign yet of how our shift towards Optimus is affecting the business.
This year, Tesla plans to spend $20 on capital expenditure, which is up from 8.5 billion just a year ago, focusing on AI, robotics, and driverless technology, in which in which is part of a broad transformation of the business. Now, I see some risk here. Elon Musk has previously stated that by the end of 2027, the company plans to sell its Optimus robots to the public, believing that by then, you can basically ask it to do anything that you would like.
So, here's why focusing on robots can be risky for Tesla. Optimus robots are an intriguing growth opportunity for Tesla, but they are not without any risk. If the company shifts away from EVs, where margins are already being squeezed, and [snorts] into an uncertain opportunity such as robotics, that could result in business becoming unprofitable again.
Investors are already paying a significant premium for the stock, with it trading at nearly 400 times its trailing earnings. That's going to come with some extremely high expectations. Investors may already be pricing in the success of Elon Musk's growth story and pivot to robotics. The problem is that if it falls short of those expectations, the stock could be due for a significant sell-off.
And what's actually stopping Tesla stock from crashing? Even Even as its car business struggles to maintain sales volume, Tesla stock has been doing very well. Investors have long disagreed about what is the right valuation for Tesla. Despite inconsistent business results, Tesla stock has done well over the past year.
It stands 42% higher now than 12 months ago, but that means it sells for 375 times its earnings. Now, that that makes it look far costlier even than the pricey textures like Palantir, which is selling for 229 times earnings, or Nvidia, 37 times earnings, let alone a car company like GM, which sells at 24 times its earnings.
So, what is propping the stock, and can it really last in the long term? As well as cars, Tesla has a power generation and storage business that has been performing strongly. It put in a record revenue performance last year, growing 27% to $13 billion. It also benefits from substantial ongoing ongoing growth opportunities, and I think that could be the case for years to come.
When discussing whether Tesla's valuation might be justified, investors sometimes put out that it is more than just a car company, and the power business is well-established proof of that. Still, at around 13% of company's total revenue, it is a relatively small part of the operation for now, and I do not think it is central to the main to maintaining Tesla's stock price.
Now, what might be maintaining the stock price despite its apparently hefty value overvaluation compared to its peers, or even explain its rise over the past year despite falling car sales volume? Perhaps it is the perception of Tesla as a physical AI company. Who has that perception of Tesla? Tesla does.
I have borrowed its own language in describing what it sees itself as becoming. Tesla reckons it is in transition from being a hardware-centric business. Now, as one might say yet, the investment pitch can help explain the current stock price, and may even properly it higher with its Optimus robot ambitions and production lines being installed for self-driving taxis.
Tesla's pitch about using its proven software capabilities to melt AI and physical products like vehicle benefit from credibility many new AI rivals may lack. Now, that along with the history of rapid growth despite significant challenges from competition may explain why the price has continued to do well.
It's just because people believe in Elon Musk and his past trajectory. Now, the problem one might see though is that an investment case can only carry a share for so long. Sooner or later, investors will want to see the results, and with $1.3 trillion market cap, Tesla's priced for action, not just talk, and it remains to be seen whether that will materialize. Till then, keep on .
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