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He still has his hooks into a wildly corrupt administration with all sorts of opportunities for graft, but he's going about it in a surprisingly incompetent and

by rurp 2y ago

He still has his hooks into a wildly corrupt administration with all sorts of opportunities for graft, but he's going about it in a surprisingly incompetent and spiteful way. At least that's my best read of the recent stock movements. If/when he falls out with Trump there won't be much keeping the stock this overvalued given his recently shredded reputation. Of course the reverse could be true and if he quiets down and focuses on looting in the background Tesla might make out pretty well.

acdha 2y ago
I don’t think he can afford to fall out with Trump. Every company he has is exposed to multiple serious regulatory questions, he has personally made serious false claims to investors (e.g. FSD), the DOGE stuff exceeds his authority as a SGE so he’s dependent on Trump saying he had approval, and if they wanted to give him the same treatment Trump has promised activists they could even try to revoke his citizenship on the grounds that he’d violated his earlier student visa by working. I don’t know that Musk fully recognizes this. Trump was addicted to X but he doesn’t need it to get elected any more and has been boosting Truth Social enough that I don’t think it has the same hold it once did. Similarly, while he has put a lot of money into elections it’s not clear that this will work for crossing Trump if the FEC, SEC, and DOJ are a lot less concerned with scrupulously appearing non-partisan, and nobody else in Republican politics is going to thank him for making them less powerful.
- rurp 2y ago
  I agree with all of that, Elon's downside risk is massive. Putting himself at Trump's mercy might turn out to be one of the biggest blunders ever. Trump seems happy with using Elon for now but he's the ultimate bully who loves to make powerful people grovel, and Elon won't like it if that focus turns to him. Elon has been masterful at evading consequences for years so I won't be surprised to see him worm his way through this situation, although he does seem to be losing a step to say the least.

by rurp 2y ago

acdha 2y ago

I don’t think he can afford to fall out with Trump. Every company he has is exposed to multiple serious regulatory questions, he has personally made serious false claims to investors (e.g. FSD), the DOGE stuff exceeds his authority as a SGE so he’s dependent on Trump saying he had approval, and if they wanted to give him the same treatment Trump has promised activists they could even try to revoke his citizenship on the grounds that he’d violated his earlier student visa by working. I don’t know that Musk fully recognizes this. Trump was addicted to X but he doesn’t need it to get elected any more and has been boosting Truth Social enough that I don’t think it has the same hold it once did. Similarly, while he has put a lot of money into elections it’s not clear that this will work for crossing Trump if the FEC, SEC, and DOJ are a lot less concerned with scrupulously appearing non-partisan, and nobody else in Republican politics is going to thank him for making them less powerful.

rurp 2y ago
I agree with all of that, Elon's downside risk is massive. Putting himself at Trump's mercy might turn out to be one of the biggest blunders ever. Trump seems happy with using Elon for now but he's the ultimate bully who loves to make powerful people grovel, and Elon won't like it if that focus turns to him. Elon has been masterful at evading consequences for years so I won't be surprised to see him worm his way through this situation, although he does seem to be losing a step to say the least.