Plunging U.S. revenue at X risks opening up a "massive hole" on its balance sheet that Musk needs to plug to stave off its financial collapse.

Musk’s repeated outbursts against advertisers have dried up the main source of revenue for the loss-making company formerly known as Twitter. A recent decision to sue them for heeding his own advice to not buy ads on the platform hasn’t helped. At some point, he will have to provide a fresh infusion of cash to salvage his $44 billion takeover.

  • John Richard@lemmy.world
    1083·
    4 months ago

    I have to give Musk credit. At least he help narrow my car buying decision to know at least one brand that I’ll never buy.

    • Nollij@sopuli.xyzEnglish
      371·
      4 months ago

      There are many reasons to avoid Tesla, regardless of Musk. The complete lack of independent repair was my deal breaker, but you’ll find your own. Their competition is looking pretty good these days, too.

      • DesertCreosote@lemm.ee
        131·
        4 months ago

        I was talking with a solar company about a solar install with battery storage last year, and they only offered the Powerwall as an option. I literally laughed at them and said there was no way I was tying an enormously expensive piece of home infrastructure to Tesla, because they couldn’t guarantee it’d keep working if Tesla decided to shift direction.

        • octopus_ink@lemmy.mlEnglish
          6·
          4 months ago

          I have rejected every one of the endless stream of door to door solar panel sellers primarily because not ONE would leave me substantial documentation of any kind to decide if I wanted to talk to them - the only thing they wanted was a full “consultation.” My view is that if you can’t give me something that illustrates genearlly what you are about to pitch to me, then you probably just want the chance to apply some shady sales tactics.

          Were these door to door guys? Did you go with them? Do you have any opinions on the door to door guys? 🙂

          • DesertCreosote@lemm.ee
            3·
            4 months ago

            No, this was part of a group buy program in my area, which was designed to reduce prices. I ended up turning them down because it was still more expensive than it seemed like it should be, and they were going with an older single inverter system instead of a newer and more efficient micro inverter system.

            I’ve heard the door to door guys tend to massively upcharge. I haven’t had any come through here, though, so I don’t have any direct experience.

            • octopus_ink@lemmy.mlEnglish
              2·
              4 months ago

              Thanks! (Sorry for the late reply.) Any particular resources you’d recommend for research? Everything I find googling is either immediately clearly an advertisement, or becomes clearly an advertisement as I continue reading.

              • DesertCreosote@lemm.ee
                2·
                4 months ago

                Honestly I don’t have anything specific I’d recommend. When I was looking into it, I just did a ton of reading on forums along with articles about how to get everything set up. I also looked at the prices I was offered compared to the prices I’d be able to pay elsewhere, and got quotes from several different companies.

                In the end there were a bunch of reasons I didn’t go with solar. I really love it as an idea, and I really want to do it, but it’s enormously expensive. There are lease options, but they’re also expensive and many of them seemed predatory. My utility ended their purchasing program for solar-generated power, and I’m still required to pay a large monthly fee to be connected to the grid, so I couldn’t plan to offset my costs there either. The tax credits are helpful, but you still need to pay up front.

                • octopus_ink@lemmy.mlEnglish
                  2·
                  4 months ago

                  Thanks! I appreciate this analysis - and predatory is exactly how I felt about the people who came to my door, even if they were polite and friendly, and even though I couldn’t seem to dig out that word.

  • some_guy@lemmy.sdf.org
    62·
    4 months ago

    That’s because it is almost exclusively tied up in his various corporate holdings that include everything from rocket builder SpaceX and brain chip company Neuralink to his latest startup, xAI.

    None of these investments are easily fungible. Only Tesla is a publicly traded company. So the easiest solution at his fingertips is to liquidate a portion of his remaining 12% stake.

    Let it fucking burn.

  • rsuri@lemmy.world
    601·
    4 months ago

    He’ll probably just get tesla shareholders to gift him the money. They’ve shown they’ll sign off on pretty much anything he asks for.

    • Laser@feddit.org
      44·
      4 months ago

      Musk: How about a multiple billion dollar pay package?
      Sane people: You’ve already had it.
      Musk: I’ve had one, yes. What about a second multiple billion dollar pay package?

      • AA5B@lemmy.world
        18·
        4 months ago

        The thing y’all keep forgetting is that it’s mostly in stock. He has HUGE incentive to keep Tesla going successfully, because of the immediate impact of the stock price on his wealth

        • Laser@feddit.org
          6·
          4 months ago

          Even if I didn’t know that, after 10 seconds of thinking it would be clear that a company that made about $46bn in the last four years can’t just pay out more than that in actual money, they don’t have the cash reserves.

          For him, he can borrow against the stocks, so it’s about as good as money, maybe not 100%, but still a sizeable amount.

          I think it’s dumb to agree to goals and compensation / rewards after the goals have already been met. I can’t go to my employer and retroactively demand more pay for previously agreed work, even if it turned out better than he or the customer expected.

          I think Tesla stock holders were mislead and / or stupid, there’s no dividend so the only way to profit is to sell at one point, and Tesla’s position in the market is only getting weaker by the year. Outside of their car business, they have nothing of interest, though some people will never tire to emphasized that Tesla is a tech company - just what that concrete tech is that other companies or customers will want is still somewhat of a mystery. Same if it justifies current market evaluation.

          I wouldn’t bet against Tesla stocks - I know the market can stay irrational longer than I can stay solvent.

          Given Musk’s recent behavior alienating his potential core customers, he is a liability rather than an asset. The cybertruck damaged the brand, the semi which was delayed by 3 years does not fit the needs ICE trucks do, rental and other companies are phasing out Teslas because of their fast depreciation- but robotaxis will fix it, right?

          How anyone has a positive outlook on their performance with him as the CEO is almost beyond me, but if you assume there’s a personality cult, it makes sense.

    • Tyfud@lemmy.world
      8·
      4 months ago

      That’s because he installed his family and sycophants into the board at Tesla. They were literally put there to vote for whatever he wants. The shareholders approved the board appointees, and now they’re completely fucked unless someone calls for a full replacement of the board of executives at Tesla.

      It’s his company, for better (unlikely) or worse (very likely).

      Edit, for reference.

      His brother is literally one of the board members.

  • GiddyGap@lemm.ee
    602·
    4 months ago

    Stop buying Teslas! Many other great or better EV choices out there.

    • TheBraveSirRobbin@lemmy.world
      1511·
      4 months ago

      Are there? Last I’d heard other options either didn’t have infrastructure to charge vehicles on long trips and / or took too long to charge.

      I really haven’t looked into this so please just take this as a genuine question, and if you do have suggestions on other EVs I’d be curious what they are even though I’m not really in the market for one right now.

      • jaemo@sh.itjust.works
        19·
        4 months ago

        I’ve no complaints about the 2020 Ioniq. Road trips we’ve taken have all had more than adequate chargers, but contextually this is Vancouver Island/Lower Mainland/Gulf islands and they government definitely had a hard-on to put in as much as they could a few years ago, so finally ownership density is starting to catch up a tad now, but new chargers seem to appear all the time.

        Nothing beats just being able to charge at home though.

      • CeeBee_Eh@lemmy.world
        161·
        4 months ago

        Last I’d heard other options either didn’t have infrastructure to charge vehicles on long trips

        Literally isn’t an issue going forward. Other EVs can use Tesla chargers.

        • sfbing@lemmy.world
          1·
          4 months ago

          “Going forward” is actually “not quite yet” for most non-Te sla manufacturers, unfortunately.

      • MasterNerd@lemm.ee
        151·
        4 months ago

        You can still use Tesla superchargers with other cars, you just need an adapter.

        • raptore39@lemm.ee
          4·
          4 months ago

          We have been waiting for our free MachE adapter now for …checks email… 5 months. Apparently we’ll have it by September 2024.

        • TheBraveSirRobbin@lemmy.world
          1·
          4 months ago

          I knew they did a trial run of it somewhere in like Norway or Scandinavia or something but didn’t know it went anywhere. Good to know that there are better options

      • 𝕽𝖚𝖆𝖎𝖉𝖍𝖗𝖎𝖌𝖍@midwest.social
        9·
        4 months ago

        Rivians seem to be (a) popular, and (b) getting much better reviews than the Cybertruck. So if you’re truck hunting, that’s a good option.

        Didn’t the industry recently standardize on the Tesla connector, though? Wouldn’t that mean you could charge at any Tesla station?

        These aren’t Tesla specific.

        • AA5B@lemmy.world
          3·
          4 months ago

          Didn’t the industry recently standardize on the Tesla connector

          Most of the industry announced that they will standardize on NACS. I believe they expect to actually do it over 2025-2026. That’s not far off but it’s not now.

          I just got back from a 1,200 mile road trip and the Tesla Superchargers were plentiful, fast, easy. The first was at a mall, where the car was done charging by the time we found the food court.

          I suppose I can’t really comment on other brands, except the one time I tried, I didn’t have the right adapter.

          Rivians seem like great technology and styling, however they’re on their first pair of high end vehicles. They’ve announced more reasonably priced models that could be built in higher quantity but they’re not selling them yet. I suppose that does compare with Tesla only selling “Foundation Series” trim level but the difference is those are intended to have a lower cost trim

  • ArugulaZ@lemmy.zip
    43·
    4 months ago

    Maybe if he was smart, he’d just give up on the social network and sell it off to someone else. But he’s not smart, so he’ll keep sinking money into it until cooler heads in the company prevail. The era of social media dominance, I’m sorry to say, is over.

  • Zier@fedia.io
    441·
    4 months ago

    2 4 1 deal, how to trash 2 companies at once. Good job space karen!

  • vga@sopuli.xyz
    42·
    4 months ago

    Could he sell all of it? And then completely fuck off? br, tesla (car) owner

    • Nurgus@lemmy.world
      222·
      4 months ago

      Who would buy it now, though? It can’t have much value left. (Edit: Twitter. Not talking about Tesla, that’s a whole different arc.)

      • vga@sopuli.xyz
        113·
        4 months ago

        Judging by the used car online sites, it has about as much value left as any other car with similar age and kilometers. If I had to buy a car right now, I’d probably take a hard look at the alternatives. But they’d have to actually be better, I usually make car purchase decisions based on the qualities of the car.

        Although Musk is certainly trying to make such principles difficult.

        Good thing my car is new enough that I don’t have to make this choice for several years. Perhaps the competition will have caught up by the time I need to get a new one.

        • gnuplusmatt@reddthat.com
          202·
          4 months ago

          Competition has exceeded tesla. I recently got BYD Seal, and it is better than the equivalent priced tesla

          • vga@sopuli.xyz
            132·
            4 months ago

            I’m glad it worked for you. Things will have to change a bit globally that I would consider a BYD.

            Oh right, perhaps already I don’t make purchase decisions purely based on the qualities of the car :)

            • gnuplusmatt@reddthat.com
              6·
              4 months ago

              I figures it was a simple calculus, especially since BYD is the OEM that supplies parts for many of the other brands, especially the batteries.

              I’d rather benefit from that status than support a egotist like Musk. Besides anywhere outside America the Teslas are made in China, just like the BYDs 😆

              • AA5B@lemmy.world
                13·
                4 months ago

                I’d rather benefit from that status than support a egotist like Musk

                Have you looked at what your money would support, buying from BYD? If part of your decision is who profits, both choices are horrible and you could argue Musk I less horrible. This is one of the reasons I try to keep that out of my decisions.

          • toasteecup@lemmy.worldEnglish
            2·
            4 months ago

            I’m in the very very early stages of ecar research. Mind helping me and share what features or data make the BYD Seal better than a Tesla?

      • jonne@infosec.pub
        7·
        4 months ago

        It’s still a car company with factories in multiple countries and pretty much the best battery tech and the best charging network. If they get bought by an established car company, they keep building the model 3 and Y cars while fixing the production issues there’s still a lot of value there. You just need someone in charge that doesn’t spend their days shit posting.

          • jonne@infosec.pub
            1·
            4 months ago

            Oh yeah, Twitter probably has a negative value with all the debt Musk loaded onto it to buy the company (it’s crazy that that’s legal).

  • irreticent@lemmy.world
    42·
    4 months ago

    “A recent decision to sue them for heeding his own advice to not buy ads on the platform hasn’t helped.”

    Gotta love it. He told advertisers to fuck off, they fucked off, now he’s even more mad at them.

  • Valmond@lemmy.world
    5214·
    4 months ago

    Why is this news…

    Some rich guy might do something that doesn’t really change anything for anyone.

    • Voroxpete@sh.itjust.works
      422·
      4 months ago

      Because it will affect Tesla’s share price (negatively), just like it did last time, and Fortune’s job is to report on things that affect share prices.

      There is also a public interest element, because Musk is currently the richest man on earth - which affords him massively undue power and influence - but he won’t be if he manages to crash the Tesla stock price with a massive sell-off.

      Tesla is exceedingly overvalued right now which makes it a very volatile stock. We already saw the price crater the last time he sold stock to keep Twitter afloat, and it only really recovered when he pinkie swore not to do it again.

      • IphtashuFitz@lemmy.worldEnglish
        12·
        4 months ago

        Not to mention that if he sells enough Tesla shares he could lose majority control of it. If that happens and enough shareholders band together they could force all the Elon sycophants off of the board of directors, then the new board could force him out as CEO.

        • jonne@infosec.pub
          14·
          4 months ago

          A lot of shareholders have drunk the Elon kool-aid tho, look at the recent shareholder vote about Elon’s ridiculous pay package.

          There’s a lot of true believers that treat it like a meme stock and don’t look at the fundamentals.

          It’s going to go down eventually, but it might take longer than you’d expect based on the numbers.

          • Voroxpete@sh.itjust.works
            3·
            4 months ago

            100%. Tesla shareholders are an almost entirely irrational market. Turns out buying into a stock that over-priced does not self-select for a healthy ability to assess risks.

      • AA5B@lemmy.world
        310·
        4 months ago

        I understand the aversion to Musk coming out as a horrible human being, but Tesla is still pivotal to the EV industry. Or maybe we get a twisted view of reality in the US, but most EVs sold are still Teslas and teslas are arguably the cheapest, most compelling EVs available for sale.

        • Legacy manufacturers have always resisted the newer technology, and when they finally invested the money, took the first opportunity to step back away from them.
        • Rivian and Lucid have exciting technology and styling, and the opportunity to take the lead with compelling EV but are still too young. Neither have yet released a car that they can sell in volume. Remember all the stories of Tesla almost going bankrupt trying to scale up the model 3? They still need to get past that.
        • GM seemed to have a lot of promise but took a few years off from EVs, and really flubbed the new releases, so are returning their focus to ICE vehicles
        • Ford had a great strategy but too much dealer resistance and profiteering. No one is buying a car that starts off much more expensive than comparable models, has huge dealer markup, and salesmen steering yu away. They’re a good argument for Tesla’s approach of selling direct
        • does vw sell any EVs in the US? Technically I guess there are Porsche and Audi EVs, for the well off.
        • Toyota and Subaru compliance models aren’t even a blip

        Is Hyundai/Kia our only hope if Tesla has problems? They’re coming in strong with relatively inexpensive and compelling models, but somehow always fly under the radar. For anyone understanding the importance of the technology shift from ICE to EV, we need Tesla

        • Voroxpete@sh.itjust.works
          1·
          4 months ago

          I think this is a culture difference. In Canada Hyundai and Kia are everywhere (at least around the GTA). Probably a third of the cars I regularly see on the street. Definitely not flying under the radar.

    • boonhet@lemm.ee
      2·
      4 months ago

      Potential Tesla stock price crash aside - if he sells enough stock, the company will be less associated with him and people on the left (you know, people who actually WANT EVs and not coal rollin’ pickup trucks) would be more likely to buy Teslas again. Because to be fair, they do make some damn awesome powertrains (and attach an aerodynamic smart fridge to it unfortunately, but eh, you can’t have everything all at once, now can you)

    • 5714@lemmy.dbzer0.com
      2·
      4 months ago

      Profits stolen by Musk, that do not get reinvested into Tesla, are wasted for unnecessary and or harmful labour time and infrastructure (political advertising etc). Tesla workers produced those profits and now the products of their life-time gets wasted by decision makers like Musk Tesla workers have little power over.

    • AA5B@lemmy.world
      13·
      4 months ago

      Twitter used to be very widely used.

      Tesla, at least in the US is by far the biggest EV manufacturer

      They’re both a pretty big deal and he’s well on his way to wrecking one: we hope it’s not both

    • auzy@lemmy.world
      211·
      4 months ago

      The problem with Tesla really is Elon.

      If he sells his majority stake, I suspect it would be a lot better.

      The biggest reason against buying them is him. They also make more than cars (their powerwalls seem alright).

      If X fails though, I suspect all those bigots will flood over to here (Facebook and X seem to be distracting them for now).

      Let them have their nazi prison. Just make it not profitable

      • A7thStone@lemmy.world
        81·
        4 months ago

        Personally I’d be wary of putting a giant brick of lithium in my house, especially from a company with the questionable quality control of Tesla.

        • auzy@lemmy.world
          3·
          4 months ago

          I agree partially, but in practice, the LFP batteries should be fine (I would never trust the PowerWall 2).

          Unfortunately, been looking at other alternatives, and there don’t seem to be many seamless home batteries that cut in instantly in the event of a power outage (like an online UPS) either.

          The reality is though, I expect Tesla to lose this market anyway (they only just introduced the PowerWall 3 in AU… Even cheap chinese manufacturers have been using LFP for a while)

      • Iheartcheese@lemmy.world
        82·
        4 months ago

        The people who aren’t buying Teslas because they hate Musk aren’t gonna change their mind because he sold some stock. The company is tainted forever.

        • auzy@lemmy.world
          5·
          4 months ago

          They won’t a tiny amount… But controlling share they might.

          I can’t afford a Tesla. However, my biggest concern is that musk will half arse firmware or sabotage the company somehow.

          If he doesn’t have controlling share, that’s a win and I suspect quality control will likely improve too

        • ...m...@ttrpg.network
          31·
          4 months ago

          The company is tainted forever.

          …he didn’t found the company, engineer the cars, systems, nor infrastructure: there’s a lot of salvageable value in tesla if he goes away…

          • auzy@lemmy.world
            1·
            4 months ago

            The only real engineering he’s done is likely the boring company (who the duck wants to drive in a claustrophobic one lane tunnel) and the submarine thing the cave divers said wouldn’t work (so he called them pedos)

            • Ragnarok314159@sopuli.xyz
              2·
              4 months ago

              He didn’t engineer anything because he doesn’t know how. At most he drew some kindergarten levels drawings on a white board.

              • auzy@lemmy.world
                31·
                4 months ago

                The reality is… He is an engineer. Not all engineers have good ideas.

                The difference is, he won’t accept criticism

                I do software development and have had a few crap ideas (I once thought I could make a optimised OpenGL library using Matricies). The difference between normal people and him, is that when I got told it was a crap idea, I deleted the project. When he gets a crap idea, he attacks the person giving feedback, so there is NO incentive to provide anything but good feedback

                When you’re surrounded by yes men you’ll only increasingly become over confident in yourself

                • Ragnarok314159@sopuli.xyz
                  11·
                  4 months ago

                  No, Elon isn’t an engineer. He doesn’t have an engineering degree from an ABET certified school, no FE or PE license, nor does he understand basic engineering or design principles.

                  You can lick his boots and lie all you want, but Elon is a rich bitch trust fund baby who takes credit for the ideas of others and you defend him. It’s honestly sad, coming from a mechanical engineer, that you as someone who works in software development, would call him an engineer.

        • LowleeKun@feddit.orgDeutsch
          2·
          4 months ago

          I mean i am too poor and don’t need a car but i could see myself buying a tesla once elon really is gone and the other two factors change for me.

      • tacosplease@lemmy.world
        2·
        4 months ago

        Having worked with Tesla I can tell you not all their problems would leave with Elon, but it would certainly be a great start.

      • InternetUser2012@lemmy.today
        21·
        4 months ago

        If he sells it all, I’ll buy a Tesla the next day. Until then, dinosaur bones for me. Unless an economical and very powerful aftermarket swap parts become readily available.