It seems that Vicki Bryan was right in her predictions about how Twitter can damage Tesla. The Bond Angle founder wrote that Elon Musk has a pattern of milking his profitable endeavors to fund others, and we have more evidence that this is the case: the Tesla CEO sold $3.58 billion in shares. According to U.S Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) filings, Musk has sold enough stock to raise more than $39 billion since November 2021, Tesla’s highest valuation point.
On November 6, 2021, Tesla was worth $1.23 trillion. Here are the calculations: the Tesla CEO sold around $16.4 billion until December 2021, $8.4 billion in April, $6.9 billion in August, and $3.95 billion in November. Musk said he would not sell more other Tesla shares in April and reiterated that in August. Tesla’s current market cap is below $500 billion: $491.33 billion, to be precise, but it is still dropping.
Ironically, pocketing all this money helped revoke the Tesla CEO’s title as the world’s richest man. The EV maker shares have been losing value at a fast pace due to a broad set of reasons, ranging from dropping interest in Tesla’s aging car lineup to serious lawsuits challenging the company’s strategies with its Full Self-Driving beta software. Musk’s focus on Twitter and stock sales also do not help.
Not long ago, the Tesla CEO said the company was “worth basically zero” if it didn’t solve autonomous driving. In fact, he mentioned Full Self-Driving as what needed to be sorted out. That reinforces the accusations that the software’s name is not just that, but rather a promise – already deemed as “misleading and irresponsible” by Jennifer Homendy, the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) chair.
It is not clear if Musk decided to sell to put more money into the Twitter deal or if he just wanted to ensure a better price after the Federal Reserve raised its benchmark interest rate to values between 4.25% and 4.5%. That makes buying Treasury Bonds more attractive and safer than the stock market, which usually hurts share prices. In other words, Musk may have sold now to avoid having to sell later for less money.
Ironically, pocketing all this money helped revoke the Tesla CEO’s title as the world’s richest man. The EV maker shares have been losing value at a fast pace due to a broad set of reasons, ranging from dropping interest in Tesla’s aging car lineup to serious lawsuits challenging the company’s strategies with its Full Self-Driving beta software. Musk’s focus on Twitter and stock sales also do not help.
Not long ago, the Tesla CEO said the company was “worth basically zero” if it didn’t solve autonomous driving. In fact, he mentioned Full Self-Driving as what needed to be sorted out. That reinforces the accusations that the software’s name is not just that, but rather a promise – already deemed as “misleading and irresponsible” by Jennifer Homendy, the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) chair.
It is not clear if Musk decided to sell to put more money into the Twitter deal or if he just wanted to ensure a better price after the Federal Reserve raised its benchmark interest rate to values between 4.25% and 4.5%. That makes buying Treasury Bonds more attractive and safer than the stock market, which usually hurts share prices. In other words, Musk may have sold now to avoid having to sell later for less money.
No further TSLA sales planned after today
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) April 29, 2022
Yes.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) August 10, 2022
In the (hopefully unlikely) event that Twitter forces this deal to close *and* some equity partners don’t come through, it is important to avoid an emergency sale of Tesla stock.