The Next Great Leg of the TSLA Trade VIEW IN BROWSER BY ANDY SWAN, FOUNDER, LIKEFOLIO When Steve Jobs took the stage in 2007 wearing his signature black turtleneck and jeans, he opened with a simple claim: “Today, Apple is going to reinvent the phone.” Even loyal Apple (AAPL) users were skeptical. Critics called it overpriced. Market analysts questioned whether consumers would abandon physical keyboards. Research in Motion executives laughed off the touchscreen, convinced that enterprise users needed email buttons. Former Microsoft (MSFT) CEO Steve Ballmer said it would never gain traction. They were all wrong. Amazon.com (AMZN) faced the same chorus of doubt a decade earlier. Analysts thought the idea of an online bookstore was cute but small. They said it wouldn’t scale. They said retail logistics would kill it. By the time Amazon proved them wrong, most of its competitors were out of business. Both companies were binary bets at launch time. Apple was making a bet that phones could become software platforms. Amazon was making a bet that e-commerce could replace the mall. A $1,000 investment in Amazon when Prime launched two decades ago would be worth upwards of $100,000 today. That same $1,000 in Apple when the iPhone launched would be worth more than $500,000 in 2025. Tesla’s (TSLA) setup today looks remarkably familiar. The Most Important Product Launch Since the iPhone Tesla initiated Robotaxi service in Austin earlier this month using Model Y vehicles already owned and operated by consumers. No new hardware, no special retrofit, and no structural upgrades required. 
The press covered the launch extensively, but most headlines missed the core development. Instead of focusing on the architecture of the rollout, the media defaulted to its usual framing, highlighting edge-case errors, moments of hesitation, and instances of environmental confusion. 
The media is falling into the same trap it fell into with Apple and Amazon: evaluating the current state instead of recognizing what that state unlocks. Tesla’s future ride-sharing platform improves with every trip its robotaxi takes and every drive a Tesla owner makes. There’s no need for additional infrastructure. The system is live and constantly learning. Robotaxis are obliterating how transportation works. That includes commuting patterns, freight dynamics, the value of parking infrastructure, vehicle ownership, and the need for human drivers. We have to ask ourselves: Will our kids even need to know how to drive a car? That is the binary bet at hand. We’re taking it. See, this is the exact setup that has already delivered a nearly 1,800% return to LikeFolio members since our initial TSLA call in 2018. Critics hated it then, and they hate it now. We don’t care. Here’s why we think TSLA could 19x from here… again… Recommended Link | | | | Jeff Clark has kept his Crossfire strategy close for years. But he’s no longer working with his Silicon Valley clients… So, he can reveal the whole thing in a new free strategy session. It’s a rare opportunity to learn his three-step process for potentially massive profits. Click here to watch now. |  | |
TSLA’s Next Binary Bet Tesla’s Robotaxi launch presents a clean, high-stakes setup: If the company succeeds in reaching near-perfect autonomy, the economic model for personal transportation changes completely. If it doesn’t, it remains a premium automaker with strong vertical integration and growing software revenue. A binary bet means there are only two meaningful outcomes: Either Tesla unlocks an entirely new category of margin-rich, recurring revenue based on miles driven, or it fails to reach the threshold needed to displace human-driven services. There is little middle ground. This is not Tesla’s first time at the edge of an industry reset. The Supercharger network, the Model 3 production ramp, and the initial Full Self-Driving (FSD) rollout were all met with skepticism. Each time, the company was told it couldn’t scale. Each time, it did. The Robotaxi bet carries higher stakes and larger upside. If autonomy reaches 99.9% reliability, Tesla will not sell cars in the traditional sense. It will monetize a live, global fleet as a software-first platform. Tesla’s Optimus robot is not even part of the Tesla calculus in this report. But if Tesla’s move into robotics also scales, it will only add leverage to a model that is already turning the corner with Robotaxi. The Transportation Transformation Has Begun Tesla’s Austin Robotaxi service is an operational deployment using vehicles already in customers’ driveways. That alone sets it apart. Most competitors rely on highly customized vehicles running in closed environments. Tesla did it with software. Each vehicle in the Austin fleet is running a version of Full Self-Driving that updates over the air. Every mile generates data. Every trip becomes part of the feedback loop. This rollout is not constrained by physical scale. It grows with every update and every local activation. Most media coverage focused on errors and edge cases. What they missed is that Tesla is enabling autonomous ride-hailing through vehicles it has already delivered. This isn’t a new fleet or a closed test. It’s a software rollout applied to production cars already in circulation. That creates a completely different growth curve. Tesla doesn’t need to build new infrastructure to expand. It already has what it needs: millions of compatible vehicles, a direct software channel, and a map-free approach to scaling autonomy. What remains is rollout speed, regulatory approvals, and software refinement. If Tesla can continue to improve performance with the pace it’s shown so far, the service can scale rapidly. Tesla’s Cost Advantage Annihilates the Competition Google’s (GOOGL) Waymo relies on vehicles that cost $180,000 each, using third-party systems with high-end lidar and radar configurations. Tesla achieves similar functional autonomy using a $37,000 Model Y running vision-based AI trained in-house. It requires no lidar, no radar, and no outsourced components. ARK Invest estimates Tesla’s cost per mile is already as much as 40% lower than Waymo’s. That disparity is glaring. Tesla owns its production pipeline, software stack, and data feedback loop. Other companies rent pieces of the puzzle while Tesla controls the entire board. This cost advantage allows Tesla to reach scale at a pace no competitor can match. Waymo needs deep capital investment for each city it enters. Tesla activates features through the cloud. Lower cost per unit means higher margins, faster rollout, and more pricing flexibility. Tesla’s advantage is not limited to performance. It extends into economics and manufacturing efficiency. Tesla’s Data Advantage Is Enormous Each additional mile a Tesla vehicle drives trains the system more effectively, a huge advantage over Google here. Waymo’s fleet of over 1,500 cars currently logs around 200,000 miles per day. Tesla logs around 10 million miles per day across real-world conditions. 
Source: ARK Invest Every user contributes to model refinement. Tesla’s system improves continuously through daily fleet-wide usage, which no simulation or test fleet can replicate as it stands. That scale feeds every layer of Tesla’s advantage. Better driving data creates faster training. Faster training improves autonomy. Improved autonomy expands revenue per vehicle. The feedback loop compounds daily. Scaling Requires No Added Buildout For Waymo, expansion requires new vehicles, new partnerships, and precision mapping. Each market presents friction. For Tesla, the equation is simpler. The vehicles are already sold. The network exists. Activation requires only a software deployment. Tesla can scale Robotaxi without touching its supply chain. The margin upside is built in. The infrastructure is already in place. Once reliability crosses the threshold in a city, Tesla can expand access immediately. No new contract. No new fleet. Just a switch in the software stack. That kind of scalability is fundamental to the model. The Next Great Leg of the TSLA Trade We’ve taken the upside on a TSLA binary bet before… LikeFolio’s original Tesla call in 2018 was not based on production milestones or profitability forecasts. It was based on consumer behavior. We saw early excitement around the brand and rising social momentum tied to Model 3 deliveries. See for yourself: This was the exact chart we sent to LikeFolio members on October 9, 2018, when we issued the original bullish opportunity alert (and TSLA was trading at just $17 per share): 
That shift in sentiment told us what the spreadsheets hadn’t yet priced in – demand was real, and it was growing. Since then, the call has paid off. Tesla shares have delivered a near-19x return for LikeFolio followers. That upside wasn’t found in analyst models. It was visible in the way consumers talked about the product and changed their habits. We believe that moment is happening again. And this time, you can play along. Tesla’s Robotaxi presents another binary bet. Tesla has the installed base, the data, the software pipeline, and the control over manufacturing that competitors still lack. It is turning cars that already exist into services that can scale without new infrastructure. And when we zoom in, LikeFolio data reveals a nice spike in Tesla demand at large following its Robotaxi rollout: 
The Austin launch is being viewed through the wrong lens. Critics are focused on where the system stumbles instead of how fast it can improve. But just as Apple improved the iPhone over time, taking over the world in the process, Tesla has that same opportunity now. And it’s taking it. The rollout is live, and the performance curve is steep. We made the call in 2018 because consumer behavior shifted before Wall Street noticed. We’re making it again now because the model is evolving in plain sight. We think this is the next great leg of the Tesla trade. The value going forward won’t come from how many cars Tesla sells -- it will come from how much revenue each car can generate once it becomes part of the network. And we expect that to be explosive. Until next time, 
Andy Swan
Founder, LikeFolio | 
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