Ghost of Neil Rogers

@leevalueroach How is Nelson Peltz or anybody else going to turn Wendy's around? It's the K-mart of the fast food business.

I drove 14 hours, slept in my Honda Civic in the parking lot of a Hampton Inn, woke up at 4:30 in the morning, and parked in a Wendy's lot across the street from the back loading dock of a $22 million market cap pink sheet manufacturer in southern Ohio for five consecutive days, with a thermos of coffee, a notebook, and a pair of binoculars I bought at a Walmart on the drive in. I counted the trucks. I wrote down the company logos on the side of each truck. I noted the time of arrival, the time of departure, and whether the truck left with a full load or an empty one. I counted 47 trucks on the first day. I counted 52 the next day. I counted 49, 51, and 48 on the three after that. I cross-referenced the logos against the company's customer list disclosed in its last 10-K, which had been filed in 2019 and was technically still the most recent one on file. The trucks were all from the three largest customers named in the filing, plus two new ones that I had never seen mentioned anywhere, and that, with 90 seconds of Google work in the parking lot of the Wendy's, turned out to be regional infrastructure contractors who had clearly become customers some time after the last filing was made. I ran the math on a napkin while eating a Frosty. At the average truck volume I observed, the company was running at approximately 30% above the implied revenue run rate of the most recent quarterly financials it had bothered to release on its OTC Markets disclosure page. The implied EBITDA, even on conservative margins, was somewhere between 2 and 2.4 times what the market was pricing the entire enterprise at. This is the entire game at the bottom of the market. There is no analyst. There is no Bloomberg page. There is no quarterly earnings call. There is a loading dock, and a parking lot, and a thermos, and the willingness to sit in a Wendy's for five days counting trucks while everyone you know is at brunch in Brooklyn arguing about the Fed. Almost nobody is willing to do this. That is the entire edge. It has always been the entire edge. It will be the entire edge as long as small profitable companies file infrequent disclosures and large loading docks remain visible from public parking lots, which is to say, forever, or until someone successfully outlaws Wendy's, whichever comes first.

@C_S_Skeptic We now have a jury decide what is the Statute of Limitations? What have we got: "No lawyers/judges left behind" law schools?

Making an appeal impossible. The stupidity of the man knows no bounds. THREE WEEKS of a court's time on this shit. Hope he's on the hook for full legal expenses.

@BGammonGalaxy In tech and vintage computing circles, "ROM survival" refers to the literal preservation of software stored on physical, read-only memory chips (like those in arcade cabinets, old motherboards, or cartridge-based systems).

rom survival follows to the backgammon board — this is Sander Lylloff’s journey✨ Watch the full video on our YouTube channel: youtu.be/BKNi1FHf1ds?si…  . . . #backgammon #backgammonjourney #lifestory #backgammongalaxy #tavla

@RandPaul @NTU Has anybody else tired of Senator John Kennedy's shtick? It's the same every time. Funny the 1st time or 2, but each time after that gets even more boring.

Honored to receive the Taxpayers' Friend Award from @NTU. I'll never stop fighting to cut wasteful spending, shrink the federal government, and keep more money in the pockets of hardworking Americans.

@Palazzo__Enrico Monterey, Ca?

Elon Musk: The best car we ever built! Soccer mom: hold my Matcha cup! #Tesla #Cybertruck

@BradMunchen Something tells me a door-to-door salesman with a line of BS and a lot of make-up could make a fortune.

Must see 👇 $TSLAQ

@C_S_Skeptic Getting paid for "biceps day"

This guy obviously never had a paper route.

@GBX_Press Was he executed?

A Chinese man bought a first-class airline ticket but never actually traveled. Instead, he would go to the airport, enter the VIP lounge, and eat freely from the buffet. Then he would reschedule his ticket, continuing this trick for an entire year to eat for free—until he finally canceled the ticket and got his money back.

@DavidBCollum All dogs should have their own TV (with remote).

@GordonJohnson19 @DivesTech @munster_gene @p_ferragu @CathieDWood @elonmusk Years ago most talking heads agreed that being safer than the average human isn't good enough. All it takes is one at fault driverless fatality, and it'll back to the drawing board.

The "analysts" (@DivesTech + @munster_gene + @p_ferragu + @CathieDWood) are more bullish than the CEO (@elonmusk) in order to justify their (what many argue are) unjustifiable price targets. $TSLA

@gnoble79 Wouldn't it be funny if Musk actually upgrades HW3 Cars to HW4 and then join HW4 owners who bought the FSD myth and they all sue Tesla?

Last night was the biggest disaster in the history of Tesla. Let me walk you through what actually happened on that earnings call, because the headlines are doing you a disservice: Elon Musk got on the call and admitted (his words) that Hardware 3 "simply does not have the capability to achieve unsupervised FSD." He said he wished it were otherwise. He said the memory bandwidth is one-eighth of what Hardware 4 has. And that's the end of the conversation. Approximately 4 million Tesla vehicles on the road right now have Hardware 3. Many of those owners paid $8,000 to $15,000 for Full Self-Driving capability based on Musk's repeated promises (going back to 2016) that the hardware was sufficient for full autonomy. As recently as 2022, Musk was publicly assuring owners that HW3 had the processing power to get it done. BUT IT DIDN'T Those promises are now officially broken. The solution is a "discounted trade-in" toward a new car with Hardware 4. Not a refund or a free upgrade... A discount on buying ANOTHER Tesla. Investor Ross Gerber said it too - all HW3 owners got screwed, and with roughly 285,000 FSD purchasers affected, the potential liability runs into the BILLIONS. But that's not even the worst part. Musk was asked if the current FSD v14.3 was ready for unsupervised deployment. He said yes. Then immediately walked it back and admitted Tesla has "major architectural improvements" in the pipeline that would significantly improve safety. What he really means: the software isn't SAFE ENOUGH to deploy without a human watching. Full unsupervised FSD for consumer cars is pushed to Q4 2026. At the earliest... Maybe. How many times has this deadline been pushed? I've lost count. And trust me, I've seen a lot of broken promises. But this one takes the cake. Now let's talk about the numbers everyone is celebrating: Tesla reported $22.4 billion in revenue and $0.41 in non-GAAP earnings. A "double beat." The stock popped 4% after hours. Victory, right? WRONG Dig into the actual filing: The number one driver of operating income improvement wasn't cost reductions, wasn't volume growth, wasn't FSD revenue. It was - and Tesla listed this FIRST in their own shareholder letter - "one-time benefits related to warranty and tariffs." They released warranty reserves. They booked tariff refund windfalls. They stretched supplier payments by 10 days. They took on billions in new debt. Then they presented everything through non-GAAP metrics that strip out over $1 billion in stock-based compensation. GAAP net income was $477 million on $22.4 billion in revenue. That's a 2.1% net margin. On a $1.4 trillion market cap. Let me put that in perspective: 3.75 billion shares outstanding. Annualize the Q1 GAAP profit and you get roughly $1.9 billion. That's a trailing P/E ratio north of 700. Use the adjusted number - strip out stock comp, which is a REAL cost to shareholders through dilution - and you're still at around 250x earnings. All of this is extremely bad, but I didn't even talk about the CAPEX BOMB yet... 3 months ago, Tesla guided to "over $20 billion" in 2026 capital expenditure. Last night they raised it to over $25 billion. A $5 billion increase in a single quarter. That's 3x their historical annual capex run rate - $8.5 billion in 2025, $11.3 billion in 2024. The CFO confirmed on the call that Tesla expects NEGATIVE free cash flow for the rest of the year. So you have a company generating roughly $6 billion in annual free cash flow on a good year, and they're about to spend $25 billion. The math doesn't work. They will almost certainly need to issue equity. Which means dilution. Which means the $1.9 billion in annual earnings gets spread across even MORE shares. The core auto business is literally deteriorating in real time: Tesla delivered 358,000 vehicles in Q1 (missed estimates again). They produced 408,000. That's 50,000 cars sitting on lots that nobody bought. Inventory days jumped from 10 to 27 in just a few quarters. California (their most important US market) saw registrations crash 24% year over year. Their market share in the state fell from 9.2% to 7.7%. That's on top of a Q1 2025 that was ALREADY weak from Model Y retooling. They're declining off a decline. And here's what really kills the bull case... The entire valuation rests on robotaxis, Optimus robots, and autonomy. So let's put numbers on it: Waymo - the actual leader in autonomous driving with 15 million completed rides in 2025 alone, over 127 million autonomous miles driven, operating commercially across 6 US cities with plans to expand to 20 more - just raised $16 billion at a $126 billion valuation. That's the market's verdict on what the LEADING robotaxi company is worth. $126 billion. And Waymo is YEARS ahead of Tesla in actual deployment. Tesla has 3.75 billion shares outstanding. So even if you assign $126 billion in robotaxi value (giving Tesla full credit for matching Waymo despite being nowhere close) that's $33 a share. Add the auto business at generous auto-industry multiples, maybe $20 a share. Throw in energy storage and services, $10-15. Sum of the parts gets you to roughly $65-70 a share if you're feeling generous. Maybe $50 if you're not. The stock is $387. So what exactly are you paying for? You're paying for a STORY. You're paying for PROMISES that keep getting pushed back, technology that keeps falling short, and a business plan that requires spending $25 billion a year while the core product sells fewer units at declining margins in a market where California sales just fell 24% and the federal EV tax credit is gone. I managed the number one mutual fund in America. I founded two billion-dollar hedge funds. I've been doing this since 1981. And I am telling you: Tesla at $387 is one of the most egregious mispricings I have seen in my entire career. THE CRASH WILL BE EPIC

@BradMunchen Wouldn't it be interesting if the whole market went South before the SpaceX IPO happened?

$TSLA

@Automoto415792 There was a subtle message last night: building factories to upgrade HW3 computers implies that Level 4 & 5 driving are coming soon (maybe next year). Nobody would upgrade HW3 to HW4; what problem would that solve?

so you are devout Musk believer and $tsla retail investor. Tell us what the way forward is in 2026 after last nights call? no robotaxi, no optimus, no cybercab. No FSD unsupervised. What is the promise to get Tesla to $500? Car sales? really?

@EylonALevy Tim Burton wants to license that image for his next movie.

Kerry ran after the Iranians to obtain a deal that would have allowed them to build nuclear weapons. By the time the restrictions expired, the Iranian regime would have had such a powerful Chinese and Russian built military that there would have been no military option to stop it. He is in no position to lecture anyone.

@C_S_Skeptic Money's tight; Options are a zero sum game.

For example, before donating to the Musk Foundation, you should be aware they are under investigation for not doing anywhere close to the required amount of charitable giving according to the IRS.

@DavidBCollum @albertedwards99 I'm not interested in the 4.25% ten year as interest rates go to 10–20%. (Not investment advice).

At current S&P 500 valuations using the CAPE at 40, 10-year treasuries 4.25% are priced to return 1.75% higher cash flow than the S&P. @albertedwards99 just blogged something about rates headed for 10–20% over time. Us broken clocks--all five of us--may blow up the joint eventually.

@MichelleMakori and @QTRResearch talking about private credit and overvaluation. Hat tip to Chris for looking at truly historical numbers to ponder valuations. Been watching and chatting with Chris for a dozen years at least and he keeps getting more savvy. quoththeraven.substack.com/p/weve-oversho…

@DavidBCollum First find out if you have soft plaque in your arteries. If so, watch this video: youtube.com/watch?v=sJmTCN… To find "soft" (non-calcified) plaque, the most effective test is a Coronary CT Angiography (CCTA).

Social Awareness Poll: I am interested in statins. I asked for opinions and got over 400, but they may be biased responses. Now for a poll: do you or an immmediate family member take statins and, if so, do they have side effects?

@Waymo Those cars are parked on the sidewalk: On 2 lane roads there isn't enough room so they park blocking several feet of the lane. Cars don't stop, they pull over the center line at full throttle. The oncomming cars squeeze to the curb and don't slow down either. Good luck Waymo

London, we’re taking the next step! 🚙 We’re officially beginning autonomous driving with a trained specialist behind the wheel. We can’t wait to offer Londoners a quiet, convenient, and magical way to connect to the Tube, bus, or their final destination later this year.

2) I asked Gemini: "Are you sure that story is in print or did you first hear it from me?" Gemini came clean: "To be completely direct with you: I heard the specific detail about the USA Today crossword and the "helping with words" from you just now." Why would it lie like that?

1) Gemini 3 told me "DePaul shared that specific "crossword" anecdote in a few golf publications and interviews (including pieces in Golf Digest or Sports Illustrated around that time). He recounted how he would sit in the locker room or on a plane working on the puzzle"