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This comes just weeks after the CEO sold billions in TSLA stock to "pay taxes" when the market is in the middle of the largest bull run of all time..? Highly s

This comes just weeks after the CEO sold billions in TSLA stock to "pay taxes" when the market is in the middle of the largest bull run of all time..? Highly suspicious imho. (There's a very good chance that the ROI on any TSLA stock today will exceed the interest owed on 1 years worth of unpaid taxes... assuming you were not about to recall almost every car you've sold in the past year, that is.) I am shocked at how bold this was. Between Dec 21st (the date of TSLA filing this recall) and today, he's sold almost $3 Billion worth. Wow. That's insane.

cududa 5y ago
Stock options have an expiration date. A package of grants are expiring. When you exercise the options (buying the shares reserved for you at $x/ price of the stock when you were granted the options) you have to pay taxes on the delta between grant price and current market price. To cover the taxes you need cash, which requires selling shares. Net worth doesn’t mean liquid cash. He lives off loans against stock, of which loans on unrealized gains generally come due when options expire. The IRS would not look kindly on selling shares to pay loans but not taxes. Plus, if the stock tanked between exercise and a year from now, like you suggest, he’d be royally screwed. I don’t see the IRS giving him a year+ to get the cash to pay the bill. I’m far from an Elon apologist but conspiracy theories that have purely legal explanations are weird
- johnnyApplePRNG 5y ago
  >The IRS would not look kindly on selling shares to pay loans but not taxes. They would not look at it unkindly, either. They would simply charge interest on it like everybody else on this planet who has large loans and does not pay their taxes in full and on time every single year. >I’m far from an Elon apologist but conspiracy theories that have purely legal explanations are weird It's not a conspiracy theory that he sold $3 billion worth of TSLA between filing the recall and notifying the public. It's a public fact, and it's otherwise known as insider trading.
InTheArena 5y ago
not really. He had a ton of stock options that he either had to exercise, or he would loose. He also had tax implications, not to mention people like AOC making him public enemy number one for not paying taxes that are actually not legal taxes.
- johnnyApplePRNG 5y ago
  >He had a ton of stock options that he either had to exercise, or he would loose. That's completely irrelevant. Purchasing stock options for pennies on the dollar and selling billions of dollars worth of stock when you know the company is recalling 500k vehicles in the next few days are two totally different things. And oh... he's also done selling now. If this is not prosecuted by the SEC I would be very surprised.

cududa 5y ago

Stock options have an expiration date. A package of grants are expiring. When you exercise the options (buying the shares reserved for you at $x/ price of the stock when you were granted the options) you have to pay taxes on the delta between grant price and current market price. To cover the taxes you need cash, which requires selling shares. Net worth doesn’t mean liquid cash. He lives off loans against stock, of which loans on unrealized gains generally come due when options expire. The IRS would not look kindly on selling shares to pay loans but not taxes. Plus, if the stock tanked between exercise and a year from now, like you suggest, he’d be royally screwed. I don’t see the IRS giving him a year+ to get the cash to pay the bill. I’m far from an Elon apologist but conspiracy theories that have purely legal explanations are weird

johnnyApplePRNG 5y ago
>The IRS would not look kindly on selling shares to pay loans but not taxes. They would not look at it unkindly, either. They would simply charge interest on it like everybody else on this planet who has large loans and does not pay their taxes in full and on time every single year. >I’m far from an Elon apologist but conspiracy theories that have purely legal explanations are weird It's not a conspiracy theory that he sold $3 billion worth of TSLA between filing the recall and notifying the public. It's a public fact, and it's otherwise known as insider trading.

InTheArena 5y ago

not really. He had a ton of stock options that he either had to exercise, or he would loose. He also had tax implications, not to mention people like AOC making him public enemy number one for not paying taxes that are actually not legal taxes.

johnnyApplePRNG 5y ago
>He had a ton of stock options that he either had to exercise, or he would loose. That's completely irrelevant. Purchasing stock options for pennies on the dollar and selling billions of dollars worth of stock when you know the company is recalling 500k vehicles in the next few days are two totally different things. And oh... he's also done selling now. If this is not prosecuted by the SEC I would be very surprised.