Tesla CEO Elon Musk joined a Twitter space today to talk about recent moves in TSLA stock and defend his recent actions from Tesla investors who called on him to stop wasting time on Twitter, the social media site he recently purchased.
Musk has faced many questions about his recent behavior with Twitter, as most of his public time recently has involved fight with investors or trying to stop a running expense bill.
Today it’s finally gone in a public space Twitter to talk about these issues, including with Ross Gerber, the aforementioned investor he’s feuding with.
The main point of contention with Gerber concerns the source of TSLA’s recent price drop. Musk argues that the Fed’s interest rates are the main contributor, both because they cause capital to flow from stocks to safer bonds as bond yields rise, and because they remove the demand for consumer products often bought with debt, like automobiles (or, perhaps, Twitter itself, which Musk took out tens of billions in loans to buy).
But investment experts have denied the claim that fed rates drove TSLA stock down, saying Tesla’s performance has underperformed other automotive stocks even that bond yields remained stable. Surely they had an effect, but Musk may be exaggerating that effect.
Part of the difference could be related to recent massive sales of Tesla stock by Musk, having sold tens of billions over the past year to fund his acquisition of Twitter (aka disaster, aka dumpster fire). Typically, insider stock sales send a signal to the market that insiders, especially the CEO, may not have full confidence in the company’s performance and add negative pressure to the stock price. ‘stock.
Musk’s sales have taken place in a highly publicized fashion and for ill-timed reasons as well. Tesla investors don’t seem to see any benefit from these stock sales for Tesla’s future, even though Musk says it will help the electric vehicle company in the long run.
Today, Musk said he won’t be selling any more shares:
“I don’t sell any stocks for, I don’t know, a minimum of 18 to 24 months. Count on me, no stock sales until 2025 or something. I needed to sell stocks just to make sure there was still some dry powder to account for the worst case… I won’t be selling stocks for probably two years. Certainly not next year by any means. Probably not the year after either.
Tesla CEO Elon Musk, December 22, Twitter space
However, Musk has said so many times before and has always sold Tesla stock. Although he regularly says he would be the last person to sell TSLA stock Over the past decade, Musk has sold large volumes of stock several times over the past year. So investors may be happy to hear he’s finished selling, but they’ve heard it before.
Musk also said, “I’m somewhat paranoid after going through two very deep recessions,” suggesting his companies might want some cash to weather what he sees as an upcoming recession, or at least one. kind of “macro drama”. This belief is likely behind Tesla’s hiring and layoff freeze. Musk said, “If we have another situation in 2009, the stock price of everything is going to be lower.”
Given that Twitter is a private company 100% owned by him and that Musk’s wealth is largely concentrated in TSLA stocks, we don’t know what other major fundraising methods are available to Musk to release more “dry powder” other than selling more Tesla. stock or take on more debt.
On the contrary, Musk even mentioned the possibility of a stock redeem. Despite his concern about a recession, he also said the stock price is currently low and said his vote would be for a buyout. Although this statement was made in the event that we are not in another 2008-2009 recession situation, which Musk thinks we could enter.
While many noted Musk’s distractions with Twitter, he said that “there isn’t an important Tesla meeting that I’ve missed all the time. I’m not entirely absent from the action” and asked “is there anything I could have done in the past two months that would have helped Tesla’s execution? I literally can’t think of anything. But he also made a colorful reference to Twitter by stating “if you cross catnip with crack, that’s what Twitter is” – which isn’t exactly the kind of statement that a person would do about something they are not addicted.
Another question was posed by Earl Banning, known as 28delayslater on Twitter, a longtime investor and fan who spoke about how Musk’s recent political statements have tarnished Tesla for him and his family (including including his children, one of whom is trans, a group that Musk’s tweets have recently targeted negatively). It’s something we’ve seen in the data, with Tesla losing popular support due to these divisive statements.
Musk said he doesn’t hate trans people and “didn’t want to hate anyone”. Banning attempted to request a follow-up, but was interrupted.
Electrek’s Grasp
Well, that was quite a sight. It was nice to see Musk focusing on Tesla again for once, after so much Twitter-related nonsense for so long.
But it sounded like he was saying everything everyone wanted to hear. On the one hand, he thinks there will be a recession, and on the other, he thinks Tesla might do some takeovers. On the one hand, he wants companies to have dry powder ready, but on the other hand, he absolutely won’t sell stocks in order to free up some cash (as he said before, then again sold shares).
So with this recent history of conflicting claims, it’s hard to take any of them seriously. However, the market appears to have been comforted by Musk’s words as the stock rose around 2.5% after hours trading, mostly after his statement that he would not sell any more shares.
But regarding our response to a pointed question he asked on the call: “Is there anything I could have done in the last two months that would have helped with the execution of Tesla?”
Yes, there is something. As Gerber said, Tesla stock has been falling lately because it has operated without the attention of its CEO. For Tesla to run smoothly, it either needs a focused CEO who can help with execution (perhaps quitting Twitter, as Musk promised and then reversed that promise), or everyone else. minus a COO who can take the place of the CEO while the CEO is busy with their “catnip crossed with crack”.
SpaceX has that in COO Gwynne Shotwell, who has performed well for this venture. Maybe Tesla needs someone similar (potentially Tom Zhu, head of Tesla China?).
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