Tesla shares fell 9% Thursday, to their lowest point since October 2020, on the heels of Tesla increasing discounts for its electric vehicles. Investors have grown increasingly skeptical about Tesla’s growth story, particularly as its CEO, Elon Musk, is perceived to be spending most of his Time on Twitter. The world’s richest man denies this, saying that the problems at Twitter are comparatively easy. The stock is down nearly 70% year-to-date.
“Elon abandoned Tesla and Tesla has no working CEO,” KoGuan Leo, the third Largest individual shareholder of Tesla, who describes himself as s Musk “fanboy,” tweeted on Wednesday.
“Are we merely Elon’s foolish bag holders?” he said. “An executioner, Tim Cook-like is needed, not Elon.”
Tesla Inc’s shares rose and then fell on speculation that Elon Musk might resign from Twitter. Musk tweeted a poll asking Twitter users if he should stay or go as Twitter CEO. The majority said he should go. Musk said he would as soon as he found someone “foolish enough” to take the job, whereafter he would lead the software and server teams.
Tesla’s shares began Tuesday 52 percent lower than they were last year, their slide having picked up speed in the two months since Musk paid $44 million to buy Twitter. Musk has sold almost $40 billion in Tesla stock since the end of last year, including a $3.6 billion sale just last week. Tesla began offering $7,500 discounts on certain high-priced electric vehicles.
Tesla is far and away the biggest source of Musk’s massive net worth. Investors have said Musk’s involvement with Twitter is bad for Tesla, pointing to the company’s share price. Musk spent some $27 billion of his own money, taking out debt payments that would amount to a large portion of the profits that Twitter would have made in a good year. Investors also point out Musk’s views are hurting business.
”Elon is a brilliant business leader. He will realize soon (if not already) that his polarizing political views are hurting customer perceptions of $TSLA EVs,” Gary Black, a Tesla bull, tweeted on Wednesday.
“Customers don’t want their cars to be controversial. They want to be proud as hell to drive them – not embarrassed.”
Tesla investors say the car company needs leadership on the cusp of recession.
“Musk is viewed as ‘asleep at the wheel’ from a leadership perspective for Tesla at the time investors need a CEO to navigate this Category 5 storm,” Dan Ives, a longtime Tesla bull and managing director of equity research at Wedbush, said in a research note on Thursday.
Ives added: “Instead Musk is laser focused on Twitter which has been an ongoing nightmare that never ends for investors, with hopes a new CEO is picked in the coming weeks as a first step forward,” Ives added.
