Elon Musk can blow. The Tesla boss was found not guilty on Friday, February 2, by a California jury in the case of messages sent in August 2018 on Twitter – now owned by the multi-billionaire. In his post, he then announced the withdrawal of the car manufacturer from Wall Street at a price of 420 dollars per share (+ 23% than the quotation of the day before), ensuring that he had ” secure ” the financing of the operation. The action had played yo-yo and investors had taken the broth. It was the time when nothing was going well for Tesla, unable to meet the production targets for its Model 3. When the “boss”, who camped day and night at the factory, spoke openly of bankruptcy…
Just before the deliberation of the nine jurors, Musk attended the final hearing. He was risking a lot: billions in damages to the “short sellers” who had bet on a drop in Tesla stock. “Thank God the wisdom of the people prevailed!he reacted on Twitter. I am deeply grateful to the jury for unanimously finding my innocence. » Musk has acknowledged errors in the wording of his tweets, but he does not budge. He has not ” Never ” wanted to deceive investors, and the Saudi Public Investment Fund was at his side to supplement the stock market.
Huge profits in 2022
The most interesting thing about the case is the role he assigns to the social network, bought for 44 billion dollars (41 billion euros) at the end of 2022. “It’s the most democratic way to communicate”he pleaded in January before the San Francisco court, because “it gives the same access to information to all investors, big and small”. The small “people” of shareholders also love his outings. Will the San Francisco lawsuit curb his compulsive use of Twitter or encourage him to abuse it, at the risk of penalizing his companies, including Space X?
Tesla made huge profits in 2022 ($12.6 billion) and increased production to 1.3 million vehicles. But Musk admits the past few months have been “extremely difficult” and the markets are worried about the risk of excessive focus by the boss on the recovery of the social network. You have to see the consistency of my investments, he replies. With its 240 million daily users, isn’t Twitter “an incredibly effective tool” to advertise… Tesla?