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Elon Musk has always had a disdain for the responsibility of running a public company, it seems perfectly reasonable that he tweet, in exasperation, that he wis

Elon Musk has always had a disdain for the responsibility of running a public company, it seems perfectly reasonable that he tweet, in exasperation, that he wishes to make the company private. Why do so many people in this thread want the only guy making (rockets && green cars && batteries && solar && ...) to fail so badly? The guy smokes weed once on camera, now he's a witch and needs to be hunted down? We care about the wrong things.

dnadler 8y ago
Because taking a company private is material to investors and he screwed overa lot of people by lieing.
- simplecomplex 8y ago
  He didn’t screw anyone over. Wall street gamblers lost money, and our culture coddles Wall Street bros like helpless babies. Traders who lost money wouldn’t have had the stock to trade without Elon in the first place!
rpedela 8y ago
I certainly don't want Tesla or SpaceX to fail. Nor do I want Elon to fail however he screwed up big time as the CEO of a major, public corporation and should be held accountable like everyone else. Celebrities, even ones trying to make the world a better place, shouldn't get a pass. My personal opinion is Elon should find someone to run Tesla. He proved good electric cars can be built, but now we need someone to turn Tesla into Toyota to spread good electric cars to the masses. Given his behavior, missed manufacturing targets, etc I don't think he is the right person to do that. If the SEC wins, Elon being forced out may be a blessing in disguise.
- Mirioron 8y ago
  Will Tesla (their share price) even survive Elon not being in charge?
  - rpedela 8y ago
    Share price will almost certainly take a major hit. It already has based on this news. But I don't think it is the end of Tesla.
dabockster 8y ago
In the US, you're not supposed to say anything publicly that can manipulate the stock price. For a person in Elon Musk's position, it is incredibly easy to drum up hype about a stock from a public media source (in this case, Twitter) then secretly sell off stock at the higher price causing it to dip further than it was at before. This is called pump and dumping and is very illegal in the United States (read up on The Great Depression and the stock crash of 1929 for more information).
- anonytrary 8y ago
  > In the US, you're not supposed to say anything publicly that can manipulate the stock price Not quite. You can't intentionally say things for the purpose of manipulating the price, you can still say things if they affect the price -- it is impossible not to, since every little thing a CEO does affects the price to some extent (econophysics?). The lawsuit would have to prove that Musk tweeted with the intention of manipulating the price. Seeing as Musk has always been wary of being public, it seems unlikely he engineered the tweet to do this. Occam's Razor would suggest that he's getting sick and tired of being public (ironically, for this exact reason) and tweeted that he would rather just take it private to avoid this sort of drama.
  - chibg10 8y ago
    Of course a CEO "manipulates" the stock with every other word. But the words, especially ones expected to greatly affect the stock price, have to be accurate. Investors would lose confidence in the market (and thus not invest, hurting the economy) if CEOs can do things like troll about buyouts. The SEC exists to protect against these shenanigans and is right to take action if Musk trolling is indeed the case.
  - brisance 8y ago
    Did you forget that this is only the SEC action and that the DOJ is also investigating? The DOJ has subpoena power… they can easily build a case by gathering witnesses, starting with the board of directors.
  - village-idiot 8y ago
village-idiot 8y ago
I care because he’s wrecking Tesla with dumb decisions that a bit of good advice would have fixed. Now he’s dragged his own company into unnecessary legal risk to soothe his own ego. If you want Tesla to live, you would cheer about his immature ass being kicked out to the curb.
_Microft 8y ago
Why they want him to fail badly? They're maliciously envious - which is the product of an overly good self-image colliding with reality. They wish him harm because if he fails, he'll no longer remind them that that's how it looks like to actually achieve something.
- _Microft 8y ago
  Thinking about it this posting might seriously harm my karma... ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
- Cthulhu_ 8y ago
  Who are "they"? Anyway I can think of two parties: short sellers, who actively bet on Tesla shares losing value - and who are very likely behind all the negative press about Tesla, including making sure every accident a Tesla ends up in (especially if it's down to autopilot or involves fire or a death) stays in the news for weeks if possible. The other would be competing car makers, who only now are starting to realize that electric cars are the future, except they're 5-10 years behind Tesla. I'm sure they'll catch up soon enough, given how they're much better at mass production than Tesla is atm, but they're way behind. Tesla will probably pivot to focus on their other endeavours - batteries (building the largest battery factory in the world), charging stations (building the largest charging station network in the world), green energy (solar panels and large scale battery storage), etc.
  - _Microft 8y ago
    Short sellers and competitors have a financial reason to not like Musks success. Average Joe does not and still there are enough of them hating him and/or begruding his success. It's "them" that I was talking about.
TangoTrotFox 8y ago
I think there are three groups of people: 1) Short sellers. Short selling, as opposed to simply investing in a stock, is something that requires significant resources to begin with. Take these people with resources and acumen, and now given them a multi billion dollar incentive to see Tesla fail. You create a major motivator for people to not only speak negatively but to do all they can to try to foster and drive negative sentiment towards the company and Musk. This group of people are the main reason Musk has a problem with short sellers. Shorting is not bad, but the twisted incentive structure created by substantial shorting is. This group is made doubly effective by the fact that Tesla has chosen to keep with the strategy of a $0 marketing budget. 2) Useful idiots or trolls who simply enjoy attacking people without much of any consideration for facts or data. These individuals are already ubiquitous on the internet and unknowingly work as tools for #1. 3) People who genuinely feel Tesla is not headed in the right direction and would do better with different leadership. --- In my opinion, the largest group by far is #2 followed by #1, distantly followed by #3. The problem is that #2 is a really really big group. They almost certainly already outnumber, by far, the entire population of people that go out of their way to speak positively of Tesla. So you end up with a perceived mass negative sentiment, even when in reality it's not really supported at all. E.g. - recently there was a motion to find a different CEO and it was voted down by an 83.5% margin. Another issue here is that Musk has decided to point out the awful behavior the media, which has also turned them against him. For instance on that vote I mentioned, reuters instead of reporting the result chose to run an article, "BlackRock voted to replace Tesla's Musk with independent chairman" with the numbers given, without percentages, in the article body. [1] [1] - https://www.reuters.com/article/us-tesla-musk-blackrock/blackrock-voted-to-replace-teslas-musk-with-independent-chairman-idUSKCN1LG01R https://www.reuters.com/article/us-tesla-musk-blackrock/blac...
Cthulhu_ 8y ago
> The guy smokes weed once on camera, now he's a witch and needs to be hunted down? He sent out a tweet that had a major effect on the shares of a major company, representing billions of dollars to be lost and gained by a lot of people. That's a serious offense and there are laws about that. It's not about weed, it's about stock price manipulation at the highest levels.
_fizz_buzz_ 8y ago
Honestly, I don't care if Musk succeeds or fails. However, I want Tesla to succeed and I think at this point Musk might not be the best candidate to figure out Tesla's problems.
AlexandrB 8y ago
> it seems perfectly reasonable that he tweet, in exasperation, that he wishes to make the company private. He's the CEO. That doesn't just mean he gets paid a lot and can do whatever he wants. He also has responsibilities to his investors and potential investors such as accurately reporting on the financial situation of the company. If he doesn't want this responsibility and prefers the freedom to vent on Twitter he should step down. After all, one of the reasons CEOs are so well compensated is the additional responsibilities the job (supposedly) entails. You can't have it both ways. Edit: It's not a witch hunt to hold someone accountable for their actions in a position of power. No one forced Elon Musk to tweet misleading information that could affect the stock price. Given how intelligent he is, he should know better.

dnadler 8y ago

Because taking a company private is material to investors and he screwed overa lot of people by lieing.

simplecomplex 8y ago
He didn’t screw anyone over. Wall street gamblers lost money, and our culture coddles Wall Street bros like helpless babies. Traders who lost money wouldn’t have had the stock to trade without Elon in the first place!

rpedela 8y ago

I certainly don't want Tesla or SpaceX to fail. Nor do I want Elon to fail however he screwed up big time as the CEO of a major, public corporation and should be held accountable like everyone else. Celebrities, even ones trying to make the world a better place, shouldn't get a pass. My personal opinion is Elon should find someone to run Tesla. He proved good electric cars can be built, but now we need someone to turn Tesla into Toyota to spread good electric cars to the masses. Given his behavior, missed manufacturing targets, etc I don't think he is the right person to do that. If the SEC wins, Elon being forced out may be a blessing in disguise.

Mirioron 8y ago
Will Tesla (their share price) even survive Elon not being in charge?
- rpedela 8y ago
  Share price will almost certainly take a major hit. It already has based on this news. But I don't think it is the end of Tesla.

dabockster 8y ago

In the US, you're not supposed to say anything publicly that can manipulate the stock price. For a person in Elon Musk's position, it is incredibly easy to drum up hype about a stock from a public media source (in this case, Twitter) then secretly sell off stock at the higher price causing it to dip further than it was at before. This is called pump and dumping and is very illegal in the United States (read up on The Great Depression and the stock crash of 1929 for more information).

anonytrary 8y ago
> In the US, you're not supposed to say anything publicly that can manipulate the stock price Not quite. You can't intentionally say things for the purpose of manipulating the price, you can still say things if they affect the price -- it is impossible not to, since every little thing a CEO does affects the price to some extent (econophysics?). The lawsuit would have to prove that Musk tweeted with the intention of manipulating the price. Seeing as Musk has always been wary of being public, it seems unlikely he engineered the tweet to do this. Occam's Razor would suggest that he's getting sick and tired of being public (ironically, for this exact reason) and tweeted that he would rather just take it private to avoid this sort of drama.
- chibg10 8y ago
  Of course a CEO "manipulates" the stock with every other word. But the words, especially ones expected to greatly affect the stock price, have to be accurate. Investors would lose confidence in the market (and thus not invest, hurting the economy) if CEOs can do things like troll about buyouts. The SEC exists to protect against these shenanigans and is right to take action if Musk trolling is indeed the case.
- brisance 8y ago
  Did you forget that this is only the SEC action and that the DOJ is also investigating? The DOJ has subpoena power… they can easily build a case by gathering witnesses, starting with the board of directors.
- village-idiot 8y ago

village-idiot 8y ago

I care because he’s wrecking Tesla with dumb decisions that a bit of good advice would have fixed. Now he’s dragged his own company into unnecessary legal risk to soothe his own ego. If you want Tesla to live, you would cheer about his immature ass being kicked out to the curb.

_Microft 8y ago

Why they want him to fail badly? They're maliciously envious - which is the product of an overly good self-image colliding with reality. They wish him harm because if he fails, he'll no longer remind them that that's how it looks like to actually achieve something.

_Microft 8y ago
Thinking about it this posting might seriously harm my karma... ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Cthulhu_ 8y ago
Who are "they"? Anyway I can think of two parties: short sellers, who actively bet on Tesla shares losing value - and who are very likely behind all the negative press about Tesla, including making sure every accident a Tesla ends up in (especially if it's down to autopilot or involves fire or a death) stays in the news for weeks if possible. The other would be competing car makers, who only now are starting to realize that electric cars are the future, except they're 5-10 years behind Tesla. I'm sure they'll catch up soon enough, given how they're much better at mass production than Tesla is atm, but they're way behind. Tesla will probably pivot to focus on their other endeavours - batteries (building the largest battery factory in the world), charging stations (building the largest charging station network in the world), green energy (solar panels and large scale battery storage), etc.
- _Microft 8y ago
  Short sellers and competitors have a financial reason to not like Musks success. Average Joe does not and still there are enough of them hating him and/or begruding his success. It's "them" that I was talking about.

TangoTrotFox 8y ago

I think there are three groups of people: 1) Short sellers. Short selling, as opposed to simply investing in a stock, is something that requires significant resources to begin with. Take these people with resources and acumen, and now given them a multi billion dollar incentive to see Tesla fail. You create a major motivator for people to not only speak negatively but to do all they can to try to foster and drive negative sentiment towards the company and Musk. This group of people are the main reason Musk has a problem with short sellers. Shorting is not bad, but the twisted incentive structure created by substantial shorting is. This group is made doubly effective by the fact that Tesla has chosen to keep with the strategy of a $0 marketing budget. 2) Useful idiots or trolls who simply enjoy attacking people without much of any consideration for facts or data. These individuals are already ubiquitous on the internet and unknowingly work as tools for #1. 3) People who genuinely feel Tesla is not headed in the right direction and would do better with different leadership. --- In my opinion, the largest group by far is #2 followed by #1, distantly followed by #3. The problem is that #2 is a really really big group. They almost certainly already outnumber, by far, the entire population of people that go out of their way to speak positively of Tesla. So you end up with a perceived mass negative sentiment, even when in reality it's not really supported at all. E.g. - recently there was a motion to find a different CEO and it was voted down by an 83.5% margin. Another issue here is that Musk has decided to point out the awful behavior the media, which has also turned them against him. For instance on that vote I mentioned, reuters instead of reporting the result chose to run an article, "BlackRock voted to replace Tesla's Musk with independent chairman" with the numbers given, without percentages, in the article body. [1] [1] - https://www.reuters.com/article/us-tesla-musk-blackrock/blackrock-voted-to-replace-teslas-musk-with-independent-chairman-idUSKCN1LG01R https://www.reuters.com/article/us-tesla-musk-blackrock/blac...

Cthulhu_ 8y ago

> The guy smokes weed once on camera, now he's a witch and needs to be hunted down? He sent out a tweet that had a major effect on the shares of a major company, representing billions of dollars to be lost and gained by a lot of people. That's a serious offense and there are laws about that. It's not about weed, it's about stock price manipulation at the highest levels.

_fizz_buzz_ 8y ago

Honestly, I don't care if Musk succeeds or fails. However, I want Tesla to succeed and I think at this point Musk might not be the best candidate to figure out Tesla's problems.

AlexandrB 8y ago

> it seems perfectly reasonable that he tweet, in exasperation, that he wishes to make the company private. He's the CEO. That doesn't just mean he gets paid a lot and can do whatever he wants. He also has responsibilities to his investors and potential investors such as accurately reporting on the financial situation of the company. If he doesn't want this responsibility and prefers the freedom to vent on Twitter he should step down. After all, one of the reasons CEOs are so well compensated is the additional responsibilities the job (supposedly) entails. You can't have it both ways. Edit: It's not a witch hunt to hold someone accountable for their actions in a position of power. No one forced Elon Musk to tweet misleading information that could affect the stock price. Given how intelligent he is, he should know better.