I’m old enough to remember when taking a short position on Tesla could be justified until, increasingly, it couldn’t, as Tesla’s stock soared and soared and soared. Tesla will be formally added to the S&P 500 on Monday. Expect its stock to soar some more.
Tesla’s stock is up more than 60 per cent since the middle of November alone, according to Reuters. Tesla’s stock is up 700 per cent for the full year. Tesla’s stock is up two per cent so far today, ahead of the S&P inclusion, largely on the strength of funds that track the S&P 500 buying in, so that their funds still mirror the companies in the index come Monday.
Some people on Wall Street are concerned that Tesla is in the S&P 500, per Reuters, because of the volatility of Tesla’s stock; other people with fewer concerns, per Bloomberg, have gotten really fuckin’ rich thanks to Tesla, part of a class of retail investors that bought Tesla stock relatively early on and are now “Teslanaires.”
But in late June 2017, [Brandon Smith] poured $US10,000 ($13,117) of savings into Tesla’s stock. He said it was the first time he’d ever invested in a company. That was just the start. Each paycheck, Smith, a video producer, would pay his bills and then buy additional shares with the rest.
“I don’t make six figures, and I don’t know anything about puts and options,” Smith, 32, said in a phone interview. “I’ve just bought and held the entire time. I’ve never sold a single share.”
Now Smith has joined the ranks of the “Teslanaires,” as some of the company’s investors call themselves, with a holding that he says has ballooned to over $1 million, fuelled by a rally of nearly 684% this year as of Thursday’s close.
[…]
Basel Termanini, 60, took delivery of his first Tesla — a Model S — on Christmas Eve 2012. He’s owned seven and currently drives a Model Y in Pittsburgh, where he is a doctor. “Driving a Tesla is like the difference between a black-and-white TV and colour,” Termanini said in a phone interview. “Once you drive a Tesla, you can’t go back.”
Termanini invested in the company a few months after the June 2010 IPO and says his investment has grown to over $US2.5 ($3) million, between options and stock.
Will Tesla stock ever return to earth? When will the Teslanaires luck run out? When will the Elon stans finally be owned? If you think you know the answer to that, Wall Street will happily accommodate your short position if you want to also put your money where your mouth is. Just in the course of writing this blog Tesla’s stock fell from $US674 ($884) per share to $US636 ($834) per share and now is back up to $US669 ($878) per share.
Seriously what did we just watch?
— Charley Grant (@CGrantWSJ) December 18, 2020
Be careful out there!