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Comment by maxander | Hacker News Reader

Tesla is a long-term bet, but a virtue of the stock market is that the market's horizon for payouts is potentially much longer than any individual's. If I'm holding a bunch of TSLA stock and want a payout in 2018, it doesn't matter to me what Tesla's profits are in 2018, it only matters how optimistic the market is about Tesla's long-term future- since that dictates how much I can sell my shares for in 2018. If Elon Musk shuts down sales altogether in 2018 but somehow convinces everyone that 2019 (or later) will be a complete blockbuster year, it still works out in my favor, since the market has superhuman patience I lack.

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>If I'm holding a bunch of TSLA stock and want a payout in 2018, it doesn't matter to me what Tesla's profits are in 2018

This has nothing to do with a 2018 payout.

Do you know what you are buying when you buy a share of TSLA? You are buying a claim to future profits. You expect to be paid in the future: when and how much? If you can't answer those questions, why are you buying stocks ?

Sure, but the value of a stock isn't tied to what I will be paid from it through dividends or whatever- its the value of what I and all future holders of the stock can expect to be paid. How long I hold the stock, and how much of those dividends I personally receive, is not an important factor.

I'm not expert but the value of a stock is not only tied to profit, it's also tied to how optimistic people are about a company and where it will go in the future. That drives up the price of a stock and thus how much you can sell it for. This is what Elon Musk is a master at - whether his strategy is feasible or not. I personally believe Musk will not give up.

>I'm not expert but the value of a stock is not only tied to profit, it's also tied to how optimistic people are about a company and where it will go in the future.

Those people are optimistic because they expect their share of profits to rise in the future.

If you came up with a definitive way to value stocks it would mean a) you are probably the richest man in the world b) You at the very least deserve a Nobel prize in economics.

>If you came up with a definitive way to value stocks it would mean a) you are probably the richest man in the world b) You at the very least deserve a Nobel prize in economics.

I'm not looking for a "definitive way", I'm looking for a rational way to assist in pricing a stock. When something can't be forecast perfectly, we should cease forecasting it at all?

I'm just asking a simple question about what you'd pay for the stock, and why.

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