Tesla is "no longer investable" due to Elon Musk

You know, an analogy I heard some time ago made real sense about this:

Everyone knows Sony, right? Incredibly innovative company, first to do so many things and make the impossible possible. But if Sony made planes, would anyone want to fly in them?

Same goes for Elon and Tesla, many many great things happening, but I wouldn’t risk it.

Success in the tech sector relies on bringing people along with your vision about the future (…) hence the need to inspire faith among one’s followers.

“Larger-than-life chief executives are a mixed blessing. They inspire and supercharge the PR for the product, the employees and the stock. But if overconfidence and hubris is added to the cocktail, they can become a liability.”

I think, one way or another, someone on the board or the marketing team needs to reign in Elon Musk. Just as the CNBC article says, Tesla’s brand value is in danger of being harmed by his behaviour and this is one thing that crucially differentiates Tesla from its competitors in the electric car space. Damage the brand and you damage the narrative, which doesn’t bode well when Wall Street expects Tesla to need to raise new capital from either the stock or bond markets sooner than the company thinks. Ultimately, Tesla would do well to look at how their tech contemporaries handle business.

I personally continue investing in Tesla, with him in charge, and I think the media focus on his erratic behaviour is partially the product of how journalism works today.

I don’t know any other high-profile CEOs that care about the really important things. This part of the interview especially resonated with me, and it’s been barely discussed:

We must have a sustainable energy transport and infrastructure in the long term, so why run this crazy experiment where we take trillions of tons of carbon from underground and put it in the atmosphere and the oceans? This is an insane experiment. It’s the dumbest experiment in human history.

I bought a few more stocks a few days ago - funnily enough, while sitting in a restaurant, listening to the Joe Rogan podcast. (Not in the :freetrade: app yet, but US stocks are coming!)

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https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2018-09-10/elon-musk-s-quirks-are-worth-the-trouble-for-tesla

This article is fascinating and has changed my view in favour of Elon.

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Well, maybe a bit yes. We should also blame Twitter for forcing him to waste lots of time picking fights with people, unfairly accusing them of crimes etc.

You are brave and I hope it works.

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Thanks. I don’t think I’m brave though, I just have really high conviction about Tesla and Elon Musk - and it goes beyond looking for a gain.

For what it’s worth, I’m up 5% - not that such a short-term gain is much of an indication if you’re an investor.

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My concerns about Tesla aren’t so much Elon’s loony tweets, I’m more concerned about poor build quality reports, missed production targets, new CFO quitting after 1 month and stuff like that.

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I view these things as pretty normal for the kind of company Tesla is. I know, Tesla is not labelled as a startup, but it kind of is one - if you consider it from the perspective of the sector it’s in.

The Chief Accounting Officer’s statement:

Since I joined Tesla on August 6th, the level of public attention placed on the company, as well as the pace within the company, have exceeded my expectations. As a result, this caused me to reconsider my future.

Especially the pace part sounds familiar. :slight_smile:

So, I take a long-term view on Tesla. It’s not getting everything right today. But that’s fine for me. I think it will do better. And I categorically support the renewables-based future it’s working on - even if that means short-term losses.

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I can now make an assumption about who will be the main Freetrader to speed up the US stocks provision :wink:

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Agreed. 100%.

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A billionaire is paying Musk/SpaceX lots of money to go on a round-the moon-trip - taking artists sounds like a great idea. Elon Musk to Fly Japanese Billionaire Collector and Eight Artists to the Moon

Well this doesn’t look good :grimacing:

https://twitter.com/kadhimshubber/status/1045405094743875586

https://twitter.com/kadhimshubber/status/1045406246084505602

https://twitter.com/kadhimshubber/status/1045407240998588417

https://twitter.com/kadhimshubber/status/1045407900259295233

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A post was split to a new topic: Removed posts 28.09.2018

Unfortunately that last post didn’t meet our guidelines for this site which asks users not to -

so I’ve removed it.

Please do bear that in mind, even if you might be joking :raised_hands:

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It was of course a joke… apologies

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Hopefully Musk will ride out the storm as it would be a big loss. I will be investing via Freetrade once my account is active :grinning:

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They haven’t got American stocks yet so you might need to wait a little longer

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Thanks, I missed that American stocks bit… any ideas on timescale for them?

We’re hoping to have any update for you on our plans within the next couple of weeks :hourglass:

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I expect to be trading them next week :sunglasses:

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