Tesla CEO Elon Musk had previously been warned about making market-altering statements
Elon Musk once issued a seven-word complaint about Tesla’s share price, leading to a jaw-dropping $14 billion being wiped off the company’s stock market value.
After initially joining as Tesla’s largest shareholder in February 2004, 53-year-old Musk was named as chief executive officer in October 2008.
Since succeeding Ze’ev Drori, the businessman has gone on to launch a Tesla Roadster in space, released the long-delayed Cybertruck and earned himself the title of the world’s richest person.
But the Technoking’s rise has not been without its controversies.
In 2018, Musk made an incorrect claim that he was close to a buyout of Tesla, leading to a complaint from the US Department of Justice.
The settlement involved the billionaire agreeing not to issue market-moving statements in the future without first clearing them with his company’s legal department.
The pre-approval was related to communications ‘made in any format, including, but not limited to, posts on social media (eg Twitter)’.
Two years later, Musk ran into trouble again on Twitter, now known as X, after making a complaint about the automotive company’s stock price.
“Tesla stock price too high imo,” he typed to his 33 million followers at the time.
Following the candid outburst, it is reported that Tesla share prices started to dramatically sink.
At the time, CNBC reported that Tesla shares dropped as much as 12 percent before closing down to 10.3 after the tweet.
Elon Musk is required to seek advice from his team before posting some remarks on social media (Gotham/GC Images)
Meanwhile the BBC reported at the time that a whopping $14bn was knocked off the carmaker’s value, while the outburst also wiped $3bn of Musk’s own stake in Tesla.
Musk later admitted to the Wall Street Journal that his damaging post had not been looked over by the company before he posted it.
Following the message, Daniel Ives, an analyst at Wedbush Securities told Reuters: “We view these Musk comments as tongue in cheek and it’s Elon being Elon.
“It’s certainly a headache for investors for him to venture into this area as his tweeting remains a hot button issue and [Wall] Street clearly is frustrated.”
In other news, the Space X founder has found himself in hot water again after he was named in a criminal lawsuit filed by Olympic boxer Imane Khelif.
The Algerian, 25, made headlines after becoming ensnared in a gender eligibility test row after her opponent Angela Carini, 25, exited their boxing bout just 46 seconds in.
The businessman is currently ranked as the world’s richest person (Jared Siskin/Patrick McMullan via Getty Images)
After Carini pulled the plug, reports began to spread of Khelif failing an International Boxing Association’s (IBA) gender eligibility test.
Despite Khelif being born a woman, famous faces such as Musk and Harry Potter author J. K. Rowling took to social media to issue statements on the situation.
The pair have since been named in the suit for allegedly committing ‘acts of aggravated cyber harassment’.
Featured Image Credit: Jared Siskin/Patrick McMullan/Smith Collection/Gado/Getty Images
