Capital Expenditures are what a company spends on land, buildings, equipment -- all of those sort of long term assets. Depreciation is how much the value of those assets decline over time with usage and would eventually require maintenance or repair costs.

Usually, when depreciation exceeds CapEx, it means the company isn't spending enough to maintain their current assets, and this will eventually catch up to them. For growing companies investing in the future, CapEx is usually a great deal more than depreciation, since there will be a large amount spent on future assets.

> But more to the point, what exactly do you think Tesla should have been spending its money on that it didn't?

> And let add to my original comment that Tesla also has the Semi going into production later this year, and recently brought out a greatly improved version of its solar roof, and is working like crazy on self-driving.

> But back to my question: what should it have been spending its money on that it didn't?

My point is that the PR statements that Tesla releases don't match the financials. It's easy to announce that a factory is being built or a new car is going into production, but we should be extremely skeptical of these statements when they aren't backed up by audited financial information.

Generally when investing in a company you should look at their financials first, as they are going to be the most honest, and PR statements/rumors last, as they will be the least honest.