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As indirectly explained by others, 420 is a drug reference about getting high on cannabis. The thinking here is Musk deliberately lied in public and/or was joki

As indirectly explained by others, 420 is a drug reference about getting high on cannabis. The thinking here is Musk deliberately lied in public and/or was joking in public about the financials of his publicly listed company - potentially out of malice to disrupt the day traders that he frequently criticises on twitter and in quarterly report conference calls. Unless he has evidence that some kind of deal existed that could be construed of as "secured", then he broke the law and there will be lots of short sellers with standing to sue for compensation.

wand3r 8y ago
Reid Hasting lawsuit did hold that you can make announcements via socials (facebook in his case) and while you’re correct im not sure what the burden of proof for “secured” is. He could take Solar City private or potentially a piece of the company private. An IOI/LOI the Saudis or SoftBank could suffice but im not a lawyer of course. I suspect this wont count as a crime and given Musks position in the company he holds the cards. If he stepped down those investors would take a beating atleast for the foreseeable future.
- chibg10 8y ago
  This misses the point I think. The issue is less that he used Twitter, and more that it's illegal for a CEO to manipulate the stock price by (potentially in this case) making misleading and/or false claims. If Musk e.g. didn't actually have funding secured (may or may not be true), it seems to me like a lawsuit might be appropriate.
  - guiambros 8y ago
    For all the doubters here thinking that there's nothing wrong with Musk making some jokes on twitter, go read Matt Levine's Money Stuff column on Bloomberg this week. Not only it explains in detail what's wrong, but it's also high entertainment value (as all his columns. Also the follow-up yesterday [2] is a good summary of the possible solutions for Musk. TL;DR: > If I were Musk’s lawyer, and if he doesn’t actually have $80 billion of financing locked up, I’d be working on a termsheet for the board that (1) offers Tesla shareholders the choice between (A) $420 in cash or (B) shares in a new special-purpose-vehicle that will hold shares in a private Tesla (or whatever your plan is to let people hold on to their shares); (2) limits the cash consideration to, like, $5 billion, or whatever Musk can actually raise; and (3) has some sort of proration mechanism in case more people choose the cash than he can afford. > Does this fit with the spirit of the going-private transaction that Musk tweeted about? No, absolutely not, not even a little bit. But it is … something. And then let the special committee reject it, and then quietly walk away and say “well no we were serious about the buyout proposal but it just didn’t work out.” Which is a much better position to be in than walking away saying “oh yeah sorry we were kidding about that.” [1] https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2018-08-08/elon-musk-has-some-fun-with-tesla https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2018-08-08/elon-musk... [2] https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2018-08-10/tesla-does-some-going-private-stuff https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2018-08-10/tesla-doe...

wand3r 8y ago

Reid Hasting lawsuit did hold that you can make announcements via socials (facebook in his case) and while you’re correct im not sure what the burden of proof for “secured” is. He could take Solar City private or potentially a piece of the company private. An IOI/LOI the Saudis or SoftBank could suffice but im not a lawyer of course. I suspect this wont count as a crime and given Musks position in the company he holds the cards. If he stepped down those investors would take a beating atleast for the foreseeable future.

chibg10 8y ago
This misses the point I think. The issue is less that he used Twitter, and more that it's illegal for a CEO to manipulate the stock price by (potentially in this case) making misleading and/or false claims. If Musk e.g. didn't actually have funding secured (may or may not be true), it seems to me like a lawsuit might be appropriate.
- guiambros 8y ago
  For all the doubters here thinking that there's nothing wrong with Musk making some jokes on twitter, go read Matt Levine's Money Stuff column on Bloomberg this week. Not only it explains in detail what's wrong, but it's also high entertainment value (as all his columns. Also the follow-up yesterday [2] is a good summary of the possible solutions for Musk. TL;DR: > If I were Musk’s lawyer, and if he doesn’t actually have $80 billion of financing locked up, I’d be working on a termsheet for the board that (1) offers Tesla shareholders the choice between (A) $420 in cash or (B) shares in a new special-purpose-vehicle that will hold shares in a private Tesla (or whatever your plan is to let people hold on to their shares); (2) limits the cash consideration to, like, $5 billion, or whatever Musk can actually raise; and (3) has some sort of proration mechanism in case more people choose the cash than he can afford. > Does this fit with the spirit of the going-private transaction that Musk tweeted about? No, absolutely not, not even a little bit. But it is … something. And then let the special committee reject it, and then quietly walk away and say “well no we were serious about the buyout proposal but it just didn’t work out.” Which is a much better position to be in than walking away saying “oh yeah sorry we were kidding about that.” [1] https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2018-08-08/elon-musk-has-some-fun-with-tesla https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2018-08-08/elon-musk... [2] https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2018-08-10/tesla-does-some-going-private-stuff https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2018-08-10/tesla-doe...