Thread by @Polixenes13

1/ A thread on the $TSLA analyst who is in the news today: Robert W. Baird & Co.'s Ben Kallo. Let's start with his marriage to @MelissaLeeCNBC:

2/ Ben & Melissa wed in 2017. I wish them a long, happy marriage. But, I also wish Melissa would stop pumping $TSLA so earnestly on @cnbc or, at least, reveal that she has a huge conflict of interest given her husband's endless & idiotically optimistic Tesla research notes.

3/ How endless? Sometimes three in one month. How idiotically optimistic? Let's explore, starting with the earliest one I have, from January 4, 2018. Here, Ben is very excited about $TSLA Energy:

4/ See the link in Ben's note? It was to this genius call:

5/ Ben was still pretending $TSLA's acquisition of SolarCity was a legitimate synergistic business acquisition instead of a shameful, self-interested, Musk-Rive family bailout:

6/ What else was Ben excited about in Jan '18? $TSLA's semi reveal. The semi reservations, he wrote, "validate Tesla's entry into the commercial shipping market." That claim silently disappears in later notes, with no explanation or comment about why. Happens a lot of with Ben.

7/ Ben also anticipated extraordinary Model 3 demand: "Tesla should have enough demand to sell >500k Model 3 per year annually." (Yes, he wrote "per year annually.")

8/ "We conservatively estimate $TSLA could earn ≈$2B in EBITDA in 2018." Does it make sense to deduct interest in evaluating a debt-laden company? To deduct depreciation & amortization in a ferociously capital intensive industry? No, it does not...

9/ And Ben's "conservative" estimate wasn't so conservative after all. $TSLA's 2018 EBITDA was only $1.67B.

10/ Oh, well, nothing but blue skies ahead: sustainable positive free cash flow and consistent profitability as far as the eye can see:

11/ What about Ben's $TSLA EPS forecasts? How did he see 2019 stacking up in January of 2018? With (non-GAAP, no doubt) earnings of $5.32 per share.

12/ All of which gets us to our price target. Ready?

13/ Got that? Ben's price target of $411 is based on 2020 earnings. Ben uses a P/E multiple four times higher than typical in the auto industry because $TSLA is a "category creator." (Sorry, Nissan LEAF, Ben says Tesla created the category.)

14/ Now, let's fast-forward a year, to January 2019.

Does $TSLA have 500k/year demand for the Model 3? No. Instead, it's slashing prices to move metal & won't sell half that many.

The semi business? It appears stillborn.

The SolarCity cross-selling? Fuhgeddaboudit...

15/ The $TSLA energy storage business that made the company a "top pick" in 2017? Going nowhere.

Sustained free cash flow? Nope.

Sustained profitability? Not a chance. Losses as far as the eye can see.

16/ Does Ben own up to any of this? Of course not. No mention of it in his notes which, by the way, have skimpier financial modeling detail than any other analyst covering $TSLA.

17/ What we get instead is an EPS forecast that already has proven to be laughably horrific:

18/ And, a new price target, with new metrics:

19/ Now Ben's price target is $465 instead of $411. And, instead of using the projected 2020 earnings as the basis for the target, he's jumped to 2022.

20/ The $702 million loss in Q1 this year shook Ben up a bit. He lowered his price target to $340. But, today, he raised it to $365.

21/ What we see is an analyst with no insight, no talent, no writing flair, hideously bad judgment, chameleonic metrics, a terribly flawed track record, and no ethics, doing all he can to pump up the scammy $TSLA enterprise. While his wife plays willing accomplice.

22/ Shame on them both. But, they are simply two more people in a long list of analysts, journalists, doxxers, pumpers, & investment managers who have allowed themselves to be terribly compromised & corrupted by the religion of $TSLA and the cult of Elon Musk. $TSLAQ