confiscate

as an extreme example

if Remdemsivir cures 100% of all Covid-19 cases, halfway through the trial, they would have enough data to show a net positive benefit. They don't need to finish the whole trial to declare Remdemsivir useful

the fact that they are running the whole trial to finish, most likely means the effect of Remdemsivir is not too noticeable. They need more data to get to statistical significance. Hence, they want the trial to run to original planned finish date.

my guess is

Remdemsivir probably has some positive effect. Say, 10% lower death rate if used during 1st few days of infection. Still great, much much better than our current situation of nothing. It would not cure Covid completely, but it would help substantially, especially in large populations of infected

yes but, if in a trial, if one arm performs substantially different than the control arm (e.g. 50% or even 100% lower death rate), the large difference between arms can lead to investigators ending the trial early

ironically, this happened in a previous 2019 trial of Remdemsivir, for a different virus, Ebola

in that trial, 4 drugs for Ebola were tested, including Remdemsivir. 2 non-Remdemsivir drugs succeeded substantially--the large difference between those drugs and Remdemsivir, was enough to cause the investigator to end the trial early and drop Remdemsivir

ironically, the investigator for that trial was none-other-than Dr. Fauci. Maybe that's why he hasn't mentioned Remdemsivir much on TV these days, based on his past professional disappointing experience with Remdemsivir

also, double ironically, Remdemsivir was initially designed to treat Ebola virus, not for flu or coronavirus type viruses. The fact that after the Ebola trial, Remdemsivir was declared not that effective for Ebola (the very virus Remdemsivir was created for), means there is even less of a chance Remdemsivir will prove to be effective for Covid-19 in the current trials

https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2019/08/finally-some-good-ne...

can't laugh when you are breathing with your mouth, my friend :)

care to give some examples? Because I am a curious reader who does not live in Iceland and don't have the context to be able to identify the embellishments

consumers vote with their wallet, at the of the day.

by and large consumers don't care if the company is for social change or not.

it's difficult for a company to succeed in getting customers to pay based purely on social change intentions. That's how a market works

that makes no sense

like you said in 2008 there wasn't anything there. They lose millions the whole company dies

now Tesla operates in billions of dollars. They lose billions it's still only 10%

by that logic, the 1st email was "leaked" intentionally?

The 1st leaked email about burning cash over 10 months, causing the stock to crash even more

"where there's a will there's a way". So by your logic he wants the stock to go down

Maybe the 1st email was leaked intentionally, according to your logic?

The 1st leaked email about burning cash over 10 months

How convenient that email leaked when the stock price is getting clobbered, adding insult to injury.

How convenient

is this true?

in reality he is getting paid minimum wage. He only gets stock if he hits milestones that are set impossibly high

First of his name. Protector of the realm (of the valley) :)

Congrats Geoff! Much deserved. Looking forward to seeing great things at YC

Agree. Do you think price is the limiting factor for lackluster demand? Maybe if they can make model 3 cheaper than 35k demand will rise

Wait where are the links to these analysts?

The original post and every article online is citing Elon's email

Sensational headlines declaring Elon says Tesla will die, are headlines that generate clicks and views

I thought they had 2B in the bank before the raise.

Granted, I am sure Elon exaggerates numbers, but shouldn't that be factored in?

sounds like a misleading headline

The original letter says the 2.4 billion raised a few weeks ago, would be used up in 10 months at current burn rate.

It's for the money recently raised, not the entire company's bank account. Headline is misleading

I disagree. That would feel like going back to the year 1999

No the graphic was posted to make an argument. That was the purpose of why that graphic was posted:

"I found this simple graphic a great distillation of why Lyft and Uber may be considered overvalued"

What you said actually proves my point.

If Lyft becomes the next Pets.com and goes bust, its stock would be worth $0. If that happened, it would be laughable to say that Lyft is under-valued, simply because Ford is valued in the billions.

Ford's valuation has nothing to do with how Lyft is valued. To say that Lyft is over/under valued because Ford has X valuation, like what your graphic is saying, makes no sense at all.

Yes, either case is possible. Lyft could become Pets.com or Amazon.

You can argue that Lyft will become Pets.com, due to other reasons, such as growth potential etc. That would make sense.

BUT, the argument in your graphic, that a company is overvalued simply because its valuation is higher than traditional well-known brands, that ARGUMENT is flawed.

Lyft's valuation is totally independent of Ford's valuation. These are separate companies with separate paths. Amazon's valuation was not tied to Sears--the 60-minutes journalist made the mistake of connecting the 2 together. The argument behind your graphic is wrong.

that graphic is simple and naive

Here is an 60-minute interview, in 1999. The journalist/expert made the same argument as in your graphic, that a software company is overvalued because its market cap is higher than traditional companies

https://youtu.be/VuI-ss5aQU8?t=629

the interviewer literally laughed at how Amazon is overvalued, because its stock price was worth 20% MORE than a real company like Sears. Your graphic uses the same logic as that interviewer did in 1999.

agreed

ya, but testing for product-market fit is much more uncertain than buying/providing labor. It's still harder

That makes no sense.

Even now you are saying above, that it's extremely hard to build and sell Model 3 for 35k. Even now you are listing many reasons why Tesla can't do it based on unit economics.

But when Tesla actually does it? What if they actually deliver? Then suddenly the 35k Model 3 is not important to you anymore.

Suddenly it's all-important to focus on "missed deadlines" of a few months.

It seems to me, critics only focus on the 35k Model 3, when it can be used as a talking point to attack Tesla. When Tesla actually delivers on the 35k Model 3, critics then focus on "missed deadlines". Critics never really cared about the 35k Model 3, they only care about attacking Tesla.

While we are on the subject, what proof do you have that a missed deadline is "intended to induce investors"? How do you know it's not just that technical difficulties?

While we are on the subject, which former SV darling are you talking about, that you are comparing Tesla to? I want to know why you think a company like Tesla, who delivered on successful projects many times and sold many cars, is somehow being compared to the company you mentioned.

Agree Nissan Leaf is a good car. It's a shame Nissan didn't sell more varieties of electric cars after the success of the Leaf. Would have been nice if they expanded on the success of the Leaf

Ya but in the end they always delivered. The 35k model 3, scaling up manufacturing to over 5k cars a week, not going bankrupt. They missed the deadlines but eventually they delivered as promised.

Why is missing their self-imposed deadlines such a big deal to you, but the fact that they delivered later on, something that you gloss over entirely? Those were huge goals that they delivered on, that most critics said was near-impossible to do.

It wasn't that long ago that critics were calling Elon a fraud for offering an electric car for 35k, that it can never be done because the cost to build one cannot be under 35k, and that Elon was a car salesman scamming people for pre-order money. And now it's done, the 35k model 3 is delivered, and people are focused on what, missed deadlines they self-imposed in the past? Is that really the most important issue here?

I disagree. California's green car incentive drove most companies to invest in green car tech as a toy, but it was always a hobby. A side project for R&D.

Car manufacturers never took green cars seriously and never felt the need to transition large amounts of their cars from gas to green. It was only when Tesla started making a splash that car companies took electric cars seriously.

ya but neither of those 2 things (Toyota's Prius 2, and California's green car incentives) were successful in making car manufacturers wake up and go electric. It was only when Tesla started making money that every car manufacturer is being serious about competing in this space, and even then they are behind.

Curious to see why you think credit goes to Toyota, instead of Tesla?

what was your experience with public defenders? Just curious because you said it was a pro-tip to never take one

yes, but the key part of your statement is "if there are people offering to buy". Everything else about spread/bid/ask/etc is just mathematic sugar.

"People offering to buy" is key.

It's very easy for a founder to tell employees "hey I met with a VC yesterday, and they were interested in investing at $x a share!". It's easy to say that, but making it actually happen is the real deal. When someone sign on the dotted line and hand over real $. It's a much more accurate test of value.

No. I see what you mean, but in practice that's not what happens.

Numeric value is determined at time of sale. Without a sale, the object has no "value". It might be useful to you in some way, but it's value is 0 unless you can sell it. There is no such thing as "underlying value"

example: I have a normal orange that I bought for $5 at the supermarket. The orange's underlying value is $5. If I sell it to my friend for $10, the value of the orange is now $10. If no one is willing to buy it, its value is $0.

The same thing happens when you raise a new round. When you raise a new round, you've made a "sale": someone paid money for it. That exchange of money/shares is what determines value.