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Elon Musk’s Boring Co. Las Vegas Loop gets approved expansion to new Strip location
The Boring Company, Elon Musk’s tunneling venture, is expanding its Las Vegas Convention Center (LVCC) transportation Loop to include a station stop at the city’s new Resorts World hotel. The local county approved the application on Wednesday, checking off the final step needed to move forward with the project.
The people-moving “Loop” comprises two tunnels underneath the LVCC and ferries visitors autonomously from one end to the other in an all-electric Tesla Model S, X, or 3. The Wynn Las Vegas and the Resorts World Las Vegas applied early on in the Boring Company construction process to be included in the Loop. “The connector is an important step for Wynn as the resort continues its investments in the future of eco-friendly meetings and conventions in Las Vegas,” Wynn officials claimed in a prior statement.
With the Resorts World approval, it looks as though the Boring Company’s larger proposal for a transportation system in Sin City is in sight.
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- The Resorts World Las Vegas announces plan approval for a Boring Company Loop Station under the Las Vegas Convention Center. (Image: Resorts World)
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- The Resorts World Las Vegas announces plan approval for a Boring Company Loop Station under the Las Vegas Convention Center. (Image: Resorts World)
“We are thrilled to receive approval from the County Commission to move forward with our proposed passenger station and tunnel and are eager to take the next steps in creating an innovative transportation solution for our convention guests and visitors,” Resorts World Las Vegas president Scott Sibella said in today’s press release.
Sibella previously stated the possibility for a partnership with The Boring Company is exciting because his resort destination is designed to be “at the forefront of progressive technology,” much like the Musk-led company’s mission to increase traveling efficiency. Resorts World itself is still under construction – it’s scheduled to be opened in Summer 2021.
Originally, the Boring Company hoped to have the Center’s tunnels in full operation for the 2021 Consumer Electronics Show in January; however, that event has been moved online due to the Coronavirus pandemic. Initial Loop tunnel construction was completed in May this year, and Boring is expected to continue with its building timeline even without the specific deadline overhead. The system is designed to ferry passengers to any of the in-town destinations within two minutes. The Boring Company is also aiming to connect its LVCC loop to the first and third terminals of nearby McCarran International Airport as well as downtown Las Vegas.
While both the Wynn and Resorts World buildings are located at the north end of the Vegas Strip, McCarran Airport, and other popular Vegas destinations, such as the Mandalay Bay Hotel, The Luxor, and the MGM Grand are located at the Strip’s southern portion. Notably, that portion of the company’s Loop expansion plans also notes a future tunneling direction towards Los Angeles. Boring machine activity was recently spotted between the two cities in Adelanto, California, indicating that perhaps Resorts’ recent approval vote is a harbinger of many more to come.
Tesla stock (NASDAQ: TSLA) closed at an all-time high on Tuesday, jumping over 3 percent during the day and finishing at $489.88.
The price beats the previous record close, which was $479.86.
Shares have had a crazy year, dipping more than 40 percent from the start of the year. The stock then started to recover once again around late April, when its price started to climb back up from the low $200 level.
This week, Tesla started to climb toward its highest levels ever, as it was revealed on Sunday that the company was testing driverless Robotaxis in Austin. The spike in value pushed the company’s valuation to $1.63 trillion.
Tesla Robotaxi goes driverless as Musk confirms Safety Monitor removal testing
It is the seventh-most valuable company on the market currently, trailing Nvidia, Apple, Alphabet (Google), Microsoft, Amazon, and Meta.
Shares closed up $14.57 today, up over 3 percent.
The stock has gone through a lot this year, as previously mentioned. Shares tumbled in Q1 due to CEO Elon Musk’s involvement with the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), which pulled his attention away from his companies and left a major overhang on their valuations.
However, things started to rebound halfway through the year, and as the government started to phase out the $7,500 tax credit, demand spiked as consumers tried to take advantage of it.
Q3 deliveries were the highest in company history, and Tesla responded to the loss of the tax credit with the launch of the Model 3 and Model Y Standard.
Additionally, analysts have announced high expectations this week for the company on Wall Street as Robotaxi continues to be the focus. With autonomy within Tesla’s sights, things are moving in the direction of Robotaxi being a major catalyst for growth on the Street in the coming year.
Elon Musk
Tesla needs to come through on this one Robotaxi metric, analyst says
“We think the key focus from here will be how fast Tesla can scale driverless operations (including if Tesla’s approach to software/hardware allows it to scale significantly faster than competitors, as the company has argued), and on profitability.”
Tesla needs to come through on this one Robotaxi metric, Mark Delaney of Goldman Sachs says.
Tesla is in the process of rolling out its Robotaxi platform to areas outside of Austin and the California Bay Area. It has plans to launch in five additional cities, including Houston, Dallas, Miami, Las Vegas, and Phoenix.
However, the company’s expansion is not what the focus needs to be, according to Delaney. It’s the speed of deployment.
The analyst said:
“We think the key focus from here will be how fast Tesla can scale driverless operations (including if Tesla’s approach to software/hardware allows it to scale significantly faster than competitors, as the company has argued), and on profitability.”
Profitability will come as the Robotaxi fleet expands. Making that money will be dependent on when Tesla can initiate rides in more areas, giving more customers access to the program.
There are some additional things that the company needs to make happen ahead of the major Robotaxi expansion, one of those things is launching driverless rides in Austin, the first city in which it launched the program.
This week, Tesla started testing driverless Robotaxi rides in Austin, as two different Model Y units were spotted with no occupants, a huge step in the company’s plans for the ride-sharing platform.
Tesla Robotaxi goes driverless as Musk confirms Safety Monitor removal testing
CEO Elon Musk has been hoping to remove Safety Monitors from Robotaxis in Austin for several months, first mentioning the plan to have them out by the end of 2025 in September. He confirmed on Sunday that Tesla had officially removed vehicle occupants and started testing truly unsupervised rides.
Although Safety Monitors in Austin have been sitting in the passenger’s seat, they have still had the ability to override things in case of an emergency. After all, the ultimate goal was safety and avoiding any accidents or injuries.
Goldman Sachs reiterated its ‘Neutral’ rating and its $400 price target. Delaney said, “Tesla is making progress with its autonomous technology,” and recent developments make it evident that this is true.
Investor's Corner
Tesla gets bold Robotaxi prediction from Wall Street firm
Last week, Andrew Percoco took over Tesla analysis for Morgan Stanley from Adam Jonas, who covered the stock for years. Percoco seems to be less optimistic and bullish on Tesla shares, while still being fair and balanced in his analysis.
Tesla (NASDAQ: TSLA) received a bold Robotaxi prediction from Morgan Stanley, which anticipates a dramatic increase in the size of the company’s autonomous ride-hailing suite in the coming years.
Last week, Andrew Percoco took over Tesla analysis for Morgan Stanley from Adam Jonas, who covered the stock for years. Percoco seems to be less optimistic and bullish on Tesla shares, while still being fair and balanced in his analysis.
Percoco dug into the Robotaxi fleet and its expansion in the coming years in his latest note, released on Tuesday. The firm expects Tesla to increase the Robotaxi fleet size to 1,000 vehicles in 2026. However, that’s small-scale compared to what they expect from Tesla in a decade.
Tesla expands Robotaxi app access once again, this time on a global scale
By 2035, Morgan Stanley believes there will be one million Robotaxis on the road across multiple cities, a major jump and a considerable fleet size. We assume this means the fleet of vehicles Tesla will operate internally, and not including passenger-owned vehicles that could be added through software updates.
He also listed three specific catalysts that investors should pay attention to, as these will represent the company being on track to achieve its Robotaxi dreams:
- Opening Robotaxi to the public without a Safety Monitor. Timing is unclear, but it appears that Tesla is getting closer by the day.
- Improvement in safety metrics without the Safety Monitor. Tesla’s ability to improve its safety metrics as it scales miles driven without the Safety Monitor is imperative as it looks to scale in new states and cities in 2026.
- Cybercab start of production, targeted for April 2026. Tesla’s Cybercab is a purpose-built vehicle (no steering wheel or pedals, only two seats) that is expected to be produced through its state-of-the-art unboxed manufacturing process, offering further cost reductions and thus accelerating adoption over time.
Robotaxi stands to be one of Tesla’s most significant revenue contributors, especially as the company plans to continue expanding its ride-hailing service across the world in the coming years.
Its current deployment strategy is controlled and conservative to avoid any drastic and potentially program-ruining incidents.
So far, the program, which is active in Austin and the California Bay Area, has been widely successful.
Tesla stock closes at all-time high on heels of Robotaxi progress
Tesla needs to come through on this one Robotaxi metric, analyst says
