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Like a week or 2 ago saw a bunch of beautiful headlines like this: - Tesla's stock is getting crushed after TWO EXECUTIVES JUMP SHIP and CEO Elon Musk smokes w

Like a week or 2 ago saw a bunch of beautiful headlines like this: - Tesla's stock is getting crushed after TWO EXECUTIVES JUMP SHIP and CEO Elon Musk smokes weed [1] - Tesla ERUPTS IN CHAOS After Senior Execs Leave, Musk Tokes Up [2] Only to read internally it was a bit more tame than "JUMPING SHIP!!!!!": > "As many of you know, Tesla’s Chief People Officer Gaby Toledano has been on leave for a few months to spend more time with her family and has decided to continue doing so for personal reasons. She’s been amazing and I’m very grateful for everything she’s done for Tesla." [3] So the executive was on LOA for multiple months beforehand? Seems really disingenuous to craft headlines like that. Does anyone have more detail? But then again and to be fair, anything from Tesla would do serious controlled messaging. Point is, with all Tesla news, I'm not even sure what to believe anymore. I see headline like this, and my first thought is "Is this even true?". Maybe Tesla is really as in trouble as these headlines lead on, maybe they are not. Maybe Elon has "gone mad" and tanking the stock to go private. Maybe it's just trendy and fun to write negative news against Tesla's stock valuation right now. Who knows what's actually happening. It's all just a bit too much reading in between the lines anymore... Just SHOW ME THE NUMBERS next earnings report and I'll decide for myself. [1] https://nordic.businessinsider.com/tesla-stock-down-musk-filmed-smoking-pot-executives-leave-2018-9 https://nordic.businessinsider.com/tesla-stock-down-musk-fil... [2] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-09-07/tesla-chief-accounting-officer-leaves-citing-level-of-scrutiny https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-09-07/tesla-chi... [3] https://www.tesla.com/en_GB/blog/company-update https://www.tesla.com/en_GB/blog/company-update

jklinger410 8y ago
>Seems really disingenuous to craft headlines like that. LOL
hateful 8y ago
This kind of thing is one of my worst pet peeves.
almost_usual 8y ago
Elon has always marketed Tesla and himself with Hollywood like publicity. It's not surprising some of the headlines read like tabloids. Whether they're true or not who knows? As long as Elon is in the limelight they'll be around.
__blockcipher__ 8y ago
Wait, what? If someone takes a "leave of absence" that ends up lasting several months, and that becomes a permanent leave of absence (read: they quit), that does indicate problems. Not in a one-off scenario, but in Tesla's case where they've lost dozens of executives once they realized that [possible bias here] Tesla is clearly engaging in fraud, it's not just a one-off thing. The smart executives are jumping ship, leaving behind either a) the not so smart executives or b) the smart people like Straubel who are close enough to Elon that they wouldn't leave. see: bogus solarcity acquisition to avoid the dominos falling in Musk's highly coupled empire, clear intent to cause a short squeeze with the bullshit going private tweet [if you look at musk's actions/statements leading up to that, it's clear the shorts have been stressing him out], Musk having borrowed money to purchase even more Tesla shares, worker injury rate [this isn't fraud but I decided to throw it in there], etc etc etc
- jonathankoren 8y ago
  Having the new Chief Accounting Officer, quit after a month is rather unusual.[0] I don't know why he left, but that raised serious red flags for me. [0] https://www.theverge.com/2018/9/7/17831204/tesla-accounting-hr-executives-resign https://www.theverge.com/2018/9/7/17831204/tesla-accounting-...
- compcoffee 8y ago
  The Tesla fans are oblivious to all of this sort of news. It's all "minor" and they can't seem to see how problematic it is in aggregate. There is a huge gap between what these people think is happening (Tesla is taking over the world!) and reality. This company could go under and they wouldn't believe it. I've never seen anything like it.
GW150914 8y ago
Didn’t Dave Morton leave in under a month? That feels pretty “jumping ship” to me at least. It’s also worth remembering that “Musk smokes weed” was the tail end of something that really began with “Musk calls hero pedophile online, then doubles down on it,” and “Musk brings down SEC with bullshit ‘funding secured’ line.” There’s some hysterical headlines because they get clicks, but Musk has been doing the hard work of tanking his image and hurting Tesla without a bit of help.
bduerst 8y ago
>Just SHOW ME THE NUMBERS Tesla is: - Missing weekly production targets (currently at ~15%) - Burning through cash reserves (-34% YTD) - Increasing liabilities (+20% YTD) This is all while there are Model 3 quality issues, and refusing a cash injection from VW. The solarcity acquisition was questionable as well, considering Musk founded solarcity, and now there is a lawsuit by Tesla investors against him. Some investors are still cutting the CEO slack because of his previous success with Paypal, but automobile manufacturing is a different beast.
- jzoch 8y ago
  I believe he asked for numbers :)
  - bduerst 8y ago
    Added.
- HeadsUpHigh 8y ago
  Numbers, not FUD. Give me links to reputable publications that include sources and not some random nonsense.
  - bduerst 8y ago
    What I said is not FUD, please do not accuse me of spreading it unless I said something that wasn't factual. Production Tracker: https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2018-tesla-tracker/ https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2018-tesla-tracker/ Tesla Financials: https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/TSLA/financials https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/TSLA/financials Model 3 Quality Issues: https://www.forbes.com/sites/brookecrothers/2018/09/02/tesla-model-3-owner-review-quality-issues-consumer-reports-customer-satisfaction/#75e323e137a4 https://www.forbes.com/sites/brookecrothers/2018/09/02/tesla... Refusing VW Cash: https://www.wsj.com/articles/public-bravado-private-doubts-how-elon-musks-tesla-plan-unraveled-1535326249 https://www.wsj.com/articles/public-bravado-private-doubts-h... Shareholders suing over Solarcity Acquisition: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-tesla-shareholders/tesla-shareholder-lawsuit-against-solarcity-deal-set-to-proceed-idUSKBN1H43A3 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-tesla-shareholders/tesla-...
dforrestwilson 8y ago
Almost every executive tasked with showing you the financial numbers is leaving or has left what should be one of the hottest/sexiest startups of our time. Many of them have left with stock options still on the table. That should say more than the numbers do by themselves.
compcoffee 8y ago
They've shown the numbers for 15 years,and it's nothing but losses.
grecy 8y ago
Tesla is the most shorted stock in history and "News" has nothing to do with facts or events, it's purely entertainment and perception management. When someone wants you to believe a certain point of view, the "news" will make it so.
- gamblor956 8y ago
  Ah, yes the famous "news" conspiracy consisting of thousands of anonymous people who don't coordinate their activities with each other but are all somehow trying to bring down Tesla by independently reporting actual things that Musk or Tesla have said or done. Or, Occam's Razor: the news is reporting this stuff because Musk made it newsworthy by constantly hyping and over-promising in the past. As a consequence of this self-initiated publicity, negative events concerning Musk and Tesla are now considered newsworthy, even if they wouldn't be for other executives/companies. That being said, no matter what company you are, losing 5 C-suite executives in less than a year is extremely disturbing news and in almost all cases is usually followed by the company declaring bankruptcy in some form within a few months.
  - grecy 8y ago
    My comment wasn't even about Tesla or Musk, it's about the "news" in general. There is very little factual about it.
    - deleted 8y ago
      [deleted]
    - TarpitCarnivore 8y ago
      > it's about the "news" in general. There is very little factual about it Ah yes, the new 'fake news' spiel being thrown around for any media outlet.
phkahler 8y ago
>> Who knows what's actually happening. What's actually happening is executives are leaving. Many more of them than is normal in such a short time. That's what's actually happening. Why that's happening is certainly open for debate, but there are no answers to "why" that are good. The only reason that wouldn't suck is that it's just a coincidence that they don't want to be there. But keep in mind, one of the finance people was new to the company and quit. To me that says they walked in, saw what was happening and said "yeah, sorry, no." But that's speculation on my part. We should stick to the facts - an unusual number of executives have been leaving the company in a short time.
- AnthonyMouse 8y ago
  > Many more of them than is normal in such a short time. They have 37,000 employees. If 1% of them are "executives" and the average executive stays for five years, the mean time between executive departures would be five days. Are they actually averaging significantly more than one departure every five days?
  - mapmeld 8y ago
    But, how many of the "executive" 1% are at the level of Chief Accounting Officer or Director of Manufacturing Engineering? Probably less than 370?
    - AnthonyMouse 8y ago
      Probably less than 74 people a year "at that level" have left.
      - deleted 8y ago
        [deleted]
  - Spooky23 8y ago
    Look at the 8k filings, they are easy to find on Yahoo finance and show corporate officer departures/arrivals. There are a lot of them for a company like Tesla. People join for the big payout — when corporate big shots suddenly find reward in spending time with family, you need to ask questions.
jiveturkey 8y ago
> So the executive was on LOA for multiple months beforehand? Without the benefit of the internal memo, I would have assumed maternity leave and deciding not to come back. It's common. With the memo though, it sounds like she may have been caring for another family member, or some similar situation, and just decided it isn't worth it to come back.
village-idiot 8y ago
While I agree that the first two titles are clickbait, every single executive leaves to spend "time with their family". It's such a trope that you cannot take that sentence at face value.

jklinger410 8y ago

>Seems really disingenuous to craft headlines like that. LOL

hateful 8y ago

This kind of thing is one of my worst pet peeves.

almost_usual 8y ago

Elon has always marketed Tesla and himself with Hollywood like publicity. It's not surprising some of the headlines read like tabloids. Whether they're true or not who knows? As long as Elon is in the limelight they'll be around.

__blockcipher__ 8y ago

Wait, what? If someone takes a "leave of absence" that ends up lasting several months, and that becomes a permanent leave of absence (read: they quit), that does indicate problems. Not in a one-off scenario, but in Tesla's case where they've lost dozens of executives once they realized that [possible bias here] Tesla is clearly engaging in fraud, it's not just a one-off thing. The smart executives are jumping ship, leaving behind either a) the not so smart executives or b) the smart people like Straubel who are close enough to Elon that they wouldn't leave. see: bogus solarcity acquisition to avoid the dominos falling in Musk's highly coupled empire, clear intent to cause a short squeeze with the bullshit going private tweet [if you look at musk's actions/statements leading up to that, it's clear the shorts have been stressing him out], Musk having borrowed money to purchase even more Tesla shares, worker injury rate [this isn't fraud but I decided to throw it in there], etc etc etc

jonathankoren 8y ago
Having the new Chief Accounting Officer, quit after a month is rather unusual.[0] I don't know why he left, but that raised serious red flags for me. [0] https://www.theverge.com/2018/9/7/17831204/tesla-accounting-hr-executives-resign https://www.theverge.com/2018/9/7/17831204/tesla-accounting-...
compcoffee 8y ago
The Tesla fans are oblivious to all of this sort of news. It's all "minor" and they can't seem to see how problematic it is in aggregate. There is a huge gap between what these people think is happening (Tesla is taking over the world!) and reality. This company could go under and they wouldn't believe it. I've never seen anything like it.

GW150914 8y ago

Didn’t Dave Morton leave in under a month? That feels pretty “jumping ship” to me at least. It’s also worth remembering that “Musk smokes weed” was the tail end of something that really began with “Musk calls hero pedophile online, then doubles down on it,” and “Musk brings down SEC with bullshit ‘funding secured’ line.” There’s some hysterical headlines because they get clicks, but Musk has been doing the hard work of tanking his image and hurting Tesla without a bit of help.

bduerst 8y ago

>Just SHOW ME THE NUMBERS Tesla is: - Missing weekly production targets (currently at ~15%) - Burning through cash reserves (-34% YTD) - Increasing liabilities (+20% YTD) This is all while there are Model 3 quality issues, and refusing a cash injection from VW. The solarcity acquisition was questionable as well, considering Musk founded solarcity, and now there is a lawsuit by Tesla investors against him. Some investors are still cutting the CEO slack because of his previous success with Paypal, but automobile manufacturing is a different beast.

jzoch 8y ago
I believe he asked for numbers :)
- bduerst 8y ago
  Added.
HeadsUpHigh 8y ago
Numbers, not FUD. Give me links to reputable publications that include sources and not some random nonsense.
- bduerst 8y ago
  What I said is not FUD, please do not accuse me of spreading it unless I said something that wasn't factual. Production Tracker: https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2018-tesla-tracker/ https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2018-tesla-tracker/ Tesla Financials: https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/TSLA/financials https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/TSLA/financials Model 3 Quality Issues: https://www.forbes.com/sites/brookecrothers/2018/09/02/tesla-model-3-owner-review-quality-issues-consumer-reports-customer-satisfaction/#75e323e137a4 https://www.forbes.com/sites/brookecrothers/2018/09/02/tesla... Refusing VW Cash: https://www.wsj.com/articles/public-bravado-private-doubts-how-elon-musks-tesla-plan-unraveled-1535326249 https://www.wsj.com/articles/public-bravado-private-doubts-h... Shareholders suing over Solarcity Acquisition: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-tesla-shareholders/tesla-shareholder-lawsuit-against-solarcity-deal-set-to-proceed-idUSKBN1H43A3 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-tesla-shareholders/tesla-...

dforrestwilson 8y ago

Almost every executive tasked with showing you the financial numbers is leaving or has left what should be one of the hottest/sexiest startups of our time. Many of them have left with stock options still on the table. That should say more than the numbers do by themselves.

compcoffee 8y ago

They've shown the numbers for 15 years,and it's nothing but losses.

grecy 8y ago

Tesla is the most shorted stock in history and "News" has nothing to do with facts or events, it's purely entertainment and perception management. When someone wants you to believe a certain point of view, the "news" will make it so.

gamblor956 8y ago
Ah, yes the famous "news" conspiracy consisting of thousands of anonymous people who don't coordinate their activities with each other but are all somehow trying to bring down Tesla by independently reporting actual things that Musk or Tesla have said or done. Or, Occam's Razor: the news is reporting this stuff because Musk made it newsworthy by constantly hyping and over-promising in the past. As a consequence of this self-initiated publicity, negative events concerning Musk and Tesla are now considered newsworthy, even if they wouldn't be for other executives/companies. That being said, no matter what company you are, losing 5 C-suite executives in less than a year is extremely disturbing news and in almost all cases is usually followed by the company declaring bankruptcy in some form within a few months.
- grecy 8y ago
  My comment wasn't even about Tesla or Musk, it's about the "news" in general. There is very little factual about it.
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
  - TarpitCarnivore 8y ago
    > it's about the "news" in general. There is very little factual about it Ah yes, the new 'fake news' spiel being thrown around for any media outlet.

phkahler 8y ago

>> Who knows what's actually happening. What's actually happening is executives are leaving. Many more of them than is normal in such a short time. That's what's actually happening. Why that's happening is certainly open for debate, but there are no answers to "why" that are good. The only reason that wouldn't suck is that it's just a coincidence that they don't want to be there. But keep in mind, one of the finance people was new to the company and quit. To me that says they walked in, saw what was happening and said "yeah, sorry, no." But that's speculation on my part. We should stick to the facts - an unusual number of executives have been leaving the company in a short time.

AnthonyMouse 8y ago
> Many more of them than is normal in such a short time. They have 37,000 employees. If 1% of them are "executives" and the average executive stays for five years, the mean time between executive departures would be five days. Are they actually averaging significantly more than one departure every five days?
- mapmeld 8y ago
  But, how many of the "executive" 1% are at the level of Chief Accounting Officer or Director of Manufacturing Engineering? Probably less than 370?
  - AnthonyMouse 8y ago
    Probably less than 74 people a year "at that level" have left.
    - deleted 8y ago
      [deleted]
- Spooky23 8y ago
  Look at the 8k filings, they are easy to find on Yahoo finance and show corporate officer departures/arrivals. There are a lot of them for a company like Tesla. People join for the big payout — when corporate big shots suddenly find reward in spending time with family, you need to ask questions.

jiveturkey 8y ago

> So the executive was on LOA for multiple months beforehand? Without the benefit of the internal memo, I would have assumed maternity leave and deciding not to come back. It's common. With the memo though, it sounds like she may have been caring for another family member, or some similar situation, and just decided it isn't worth it to come back.

village-idiot 8y ago

While I agree that the first two titles are clickbait, every single executive leaves to spend "time with their family". It's such a trope that you cannot take that sentence at face value.