Wednesday Mar.23, 2022

🏎️ Tesla speeds into Europe

The Technoking and Germany’s chancellor christen Tesla’s first European factory [Patrick Pleul/Getty Images]
The Technoking and Germany’s chancellor christen Tesla’s first European factory [Patrick Pleul/Getty Images]

Hey Snackers,

Move over, Addison Rae in a Lamborghini: Nonna Pia is here with the fettuccine. An Italian grandma has taken TikTok by storm with her homemade recipes for 2.7M followers.

Stocks jumped as investors got more comfortable with the Fed’s increasingly aggressive stance on rate hikes. President Biden is flying to Europe today, where he’s expected to announce new sanctions against Russia and a plan to help the EU wean itself off Russian energy.

Giga

Tesla opens a Gigafactory in Germany to win back Europe’s EV market

Schnitzel in the Model S... crispy luxury. Tesla just cut the ribbon at its new Gigafactory outside Berlin. Elon Musk and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz attended the opening of Tesla's first European plant — Elon danced, Olaf didn't,. Tesla snagged approval to produce up to 500K cars/year at Giga Berlin, but ramping up production will take time. It’s hoping for 30K cars by June.

Fake German heiress... real Model X. By expanding manufacturing, Tesla delivered almost 1M cars last year — nearly double 2020 deliveries. Giga Berlin will play a key role as Tesla's European production hub (currently it ships cars to Europe from its China plant, and pays hefty import duties for the privilege). Tesla’s footprint:

  • Fremont, CA: Tesla's OG factory is the most productive car plant in the US (8.5K cars/week). The bulk of Teslas come from here.
  • Reno, NV, and Buffalo, NY: These Giga plants produce electric motors, batteries, and solar-energy-storage products instead of EVs.
  • Shanghai: The second Giga after Fremont to actually assemble Teslas. Since starting production in 2019, it’s nearly doubled in size.
  • Next up: Giga Texas is under construction in Austin, TX, and will become Tesla’s new HQ (#TaxReasons). It’ll also crank out Cybertrucks… if they ever materialize.

A global footprint is fuel… for global EV domination. Last year 85% of the world’s EVs were sold to customers in Europe and China. With oil prices gone haywire, EV demand could soar. Thanks to its continent-spanning factories, Tesla can produce at a much higher volume than other EV-first companies. But it’s losing ground in Europe to OGs like Volkswagen, which has eclipsed Tesla in EV sales there. The Berlin Gigafactory should help Tesla compete on VW’s home turf.

Moo

Ranchers are minting NFTs for cows as agriculture embraces blockchain tech

DecentraCow… Non-fungible tokens could be coming to a farm near you. A Wyoming cattleman recently started a four-person shop called CattleProof to help fellow ranchers create NFTs for their cows (the same guy also founded BeefChain, which aims to help ranchers sell blockchain-validated meat — call him a crypto bull). Here’s how CattleProof makes it easier to track and sell cattle:

  • Connected cows: Ranchers attach sensors to their cows and upload their bovines’ data (like: weight, birthplace, birthday). Then they mint NFTs with that info on the ethereum blockchain.
  • Digital records: Many ranchers still use paper records, which can be lost or altered. But CattleProof NFTs can’t be edited: when cows are sold, they’ll have “driver’s licenses” with accurate digital info about their origins and medical histories.

Bored Cow Graze Club… Big Agriculture has been embracing blockchain technology to make supply chains safer and more efficient. More than half of fruits and veggies are lost along the supply chain, leading to $100B+ in annual food waste. Blockchain systems could create more transparency from farm to store:

  • Weeding out bad veggies: After a deadly 2018 E. coli outbreak caused a nationwide romaine recall, Walmart started using IBM’s blockchain tech to track its fruits and veggies — and to avoid future recalls.
  • Fighting food fraud: Tomato farmers in Italy work with a blockchain biz to protect the value of their “Made in Italy” label from counterfeiters.

NFTs are becoming more practical… Early NFT hype centered on digital art, but these tokens can be applied to more than ape collectibles. NFTs are already being used to verify ownership of physical assets, from a plot of real estate to, now, a herd of cows. The latest use case has companies adopting blockchain tech to fix broken supply chains and improve out-of-date systems.

What else we’re Snackin’

  • Walkout: Some Disney workers walked off the job to protest CEO Bob Chapek’s failure to take a public stance against Florida’s “Don’t Say Gay” bill, which bars K-3 schoolteachers from discussing sexual orientation.
  • Float: Carnival lost nearly $2B last quarter as Omicron and higher fuel costs weighed on the cruise biz. Now it's hiking prices above pre-pandemic levels and expects to be at full capacity by summer.
  • Dirt: Russia’s war on Ukraine has sent fertilizer prices up 40%. Russia is a crucial supplier of the world’s fertilizer, and that’s threatening a global food crisis ahead of spring planting season.
  • Sesame: Shares of Alibaba (the “Amazon of China”) popped 11% after the company announced a record $25B buyback over the next two years. Baba lost nearly half its value last year as China cracked down on tech.
  • AI: Google parent Alphabet is spinning off its quantum-computing unit, Sandbox AQ. Quant software has become increasingly popular in data-heavy industries like banking because it can process info millions of times faster than supercomputers.

Wednesday

  • Earnings expected from Cintas, General Mills, Trip.com, KB Home, Jefferies Financial, HB Fuller, and Winnebago

Authors of this Snacks own: shares of Tesla, Google, Walmart, and Disney

ID: 2092273

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