[rz2k]

Shorting is great because it helps minimize how out of control bubbles get. Yet, it isn't free money, because you actually have to be right about a stock being overvalued, as the case seems not to have been here.

Being an underinformed naysayer isn't any worse than being an underinformed cheerleader. The only difference is that the naysayers appear to have been wrong in this case for this earnings period. I wouldn't be surprised if many were over influenced by skepticism about a company run by a large personality. It is easy to err in the other direction, too.

[JPKab]

I'm not thrilled to bring politics into it, but I have to. A ton of the naysaying on Tesla is influenced by the conservative media's hate affair with anything viewed as environmentally friendly. There are a lot of older Americans with tons of money in the market who watch nothing but Fox News, combined with the relatively politically conservative CNBC (not saying they are partisan, but they are hostile to "green" companies, and take a look at their Keystone XL coverage....). These older Americans who probably never would have bought Tesla stock when ahead and shorted it, waiting for the next Solyndra to unfold.

Solyndra sold a highly fungible commodity in a saturated market. Tesla is selling a machine that, when any skeptic sees it in a showroom, starts to impress in a way that is visceral. My conservative, rural father got in one at a showroom I took him to. He was blown away by the build quality. He knows cars, he knows metal, and he knows engineering. He told me that, mechanically, it is the best built car he has ever seen. He is a car guy, and used to drag me to car shows constantly as a kid.

His only objection was that he couldn't use one where he lives because of the two miles of dirt road he has to traverse to get to his home. I told him they were coming out with an SUV. He now owns stock.