Tesla, TSLA & the Investment World: the Perpetual Investors' Roundtable

[SO16]

View attachment 380588

These are recent Twitter replies by Elon. He continues to give stinkeye to the SEC but also continues to show respect to judges. It's a bit of a dangerous game, however.

Could the judge have ruled already?

 

[Krugerrand]

My best guess on the worst case result from this latest kerfuffle:

The judge asks the SEC what it wants. They respond, "A fine and a closing of Musk's twitter account." The judge agrees.

Then for marketing, Tesla will either have to start advertising, or Elon will have to start agreeing to media requests for more frequent interviews.

No, I think if there’s any penalty at all, Elon takes Tesla private. I think this will be the final straw.

 

[CuriousSunbird]

Could the judge have ruled already?

Extremely unlikely given the timing.

 

[SO16]

No, I think if there’s any penalty at all, Elon takes Tesla private. I think this will be the final straw.

Where would he get the money? Hopefully not the Saudis.

 

[SO16]

View attachment 380588

These are recent Twitter replies by Elon. He continues to give stinkeye to the SEC but also continues to show respect to judges. It's a bit of a dangerous game, however.

Giving respect/stink eye should have no bearing on the outcome whatsoever.

 

[EVNow]

View attachment 380588

These are recent Twitter replies by Elon. He continues to give stinkeye to the SEC but also continues to show respect to judges. It's a bit of a dangerous game, however.

I wish he was less confrontational with SEC, get them to be on his side investigating shorts rather than the other way round.

 

[Causalien]

Yeah, it was Henry Ford in 1919. We've speculated about this possibility here on TMC before. If starlink was operational now, Elon could take Tesla private himself, without needing outside investors (though I'm sure he'd keep a few insiders).

The other interesting topic raised today was moving TSLA to a different Exchange, outside the clamy handz of the SEC. @neroden how pausible is this?

Weird, I was trying to confirm this, but searching for "ford crashing stock to take company private" yielded no meaningful results.

Whether or not elon meant to do it. Opportunity wise, this is a good time to take it private. Just please don't tweet 420. You can alwars revise the price later.

 

[Thekiwi]

View attachment 380588

These are recent Twitter replies by Elon. He continues to give stinkeye to the SEC but also continues to show respect to judges. It's a bit of a dangerous game, however.

Elon is currently defending his original 500k tweet - which makes me think he really didn’t want to send that clarification follow up tweet (which changed the meaning considerably),.

 

[Fact Checking]

Based on Elon’s recent tweets, I think this is behind us. Judge appears to have sided with Elon.

Judge isn't fully briefed yet, so she probably isn't siding with anyone yet - but I agree that the SEC jumped the gun here in several regards:

• Elon has a First Amendment right to post non-material information on Twitter.
• Intent absolutely matters: if Elon's intent was to post non-material information then why would the settlement limit it? Elon's first tweet created the appearance of material information, which was quickly clarified with the second tweet. The settlement doesn't cover tweets with unintentional meaning.
• There was no meaningful market reaction: less than 10k TSLA shares traded in after hours trading in the relevant time period. Tweet was clarified before trading begun.
• But even if we adopt the SEC's view that the tweet is covered by the settlement, it's still not material information: Tesla already disclosed the 350k-500k Model 3 target in the ER call, which with ~80k S/X gives an upper guidance of 430k-580k vehicles made in 2019, with large error bars. The 500k tweet was within that guidance, i.e. was not material non-public information.

Tesla should go on the offensive and ask the judge to order the SEC to file motions under seal, because clearly mistaken, premature filings of the SEC are a far bigger harm to investors and the public interest than any tweets the SEC purports to be worried about ...

 

[traxila]

Why does this always happen when I buy call options?







How about a Model Y announcement? That could certainly help out. What say you Musk Man?

 

[Causalien]

BTW., today's PUT options volume and general price capping market action was weird: did the SEC lawyers illegally leak their planned action against Tesla again, enabling illegal market manipulation by shorts?

Answer is yes. Who watches the watchers. Congress insider trading is an open secret, yet nothing is done.

We've established previously that someone inside sec is leaking enforcement decisions to shorters in advance.

 

[abasile]

View attachment 380588

These are recent Twitter replies by Elon. He continues to give stinkeye to the SEC but also continues to show respect to judges. It's a bit of a dangerous game, however.

Whatever ends up happening here, you can't buy advertising this good. Trying to punish Elon over that "500k" tweet really does make the SEC look petty, especially considering that it didn't actually represent new, material information. I don't think any of this is going to hurt Tesla with younger buyers. On the contrary, it's getting the word out that Tesla is now making a lot of cars. This isn't to say that Elon shouldn't be more careful, however.

 

[ls7corvete]

Extremely unlikely given the timing.

If a judgement has been made, I will cry collusion.

 

[SO16]

Weird, I was trying to confirm this, but searching for "ford crashing stock to take company private" yielded no meaningful results.

Whether or not elon meant to do it. Opportunity wise, this is a good time to take it private. Just please don't tweet 420. You can alwars revise the price later.

Elon Musk's plan to take Tesla private isn't crazy. Just ask Henry Ford

 

[elasalle]

It's going to take a while till the dust settles, and this will cause negative momentum for the SP, regardless of what the SEC/judge does.
When you play with fire you get burnt.

EM did mention Model Y reveal on March 15th. Tesla should officially announce the ModelY reveal, and screw this ...

 

[Mobius484]

I suspect that Elon’s October 4 tweet referring to the “Shortseller Enrichment Commission” inspired SEC officials to be on the alert for any excuse to retaliate.

I thought I heard jim Clayton say that he wasn’t aware Elon said that. He seemed to shrug it off and pretend he didn’t know about it which was sus anyhow...

 

[Curt Renz]

Elon is currently defending his original 500k tweet - which makes me think he really didn’t want to send that clarification follow up tweet (which changed the meaning considerably),.

If there had been no clarifying tweet, the original tweet might have been quickly forgotten, and the SEC response may never have occurred.

 

[Fact Checking]

I wish he was less confrontational with SEC, get them to be on his side investigating shorts rather than the other way round.

Elon cannot "please" the SEC I believe: the SEC is a treasure trove secret information about the securities industry. Many SEC lawyers/staffers are working there with the explicit intent to get a view behind the curtain, collect a few favors, not ruffle feathers and then in a few years work for large Wall Street firms afterwards, for 10x the salary.

I.e. the SEC is fully captured by anti-Tesla interests under this administration, and Tesla/Elon should not trust them and should not cuddle them until end of next year, when a Democratic administration more friendly towards environmental protection and renewable energy companies might be sworn in, with a new SEC leadership.

 

[SebastianR]

I wish he was less confrontational with SEC, get them to be on his side investigating shorts rather than the other way round.

I guess this ship has sailed long time ago. The problem with institutions like the SEC is that they tend to think so highly of themselves that they get really upset if they are challenged. Their institutional setup is not likely to let them take a step back and say “yea he’s got a point”...

Other than that: my argument that Tesla won’t need Wall St. for the time being seems to be supported by the follow on tweets. Elon doesn’t behave like someone trying to have a new round of financing but rather like some who is trying to prove a point.

This might be his attempt to win back some freedom: if he wins this, I can’t imagine the SEC ever going after him again without a very clear case at their hands.

 

[lascavarian]

If I were the judge, in consideration that the SEC accepted this agreement and took $20 million dollars no less. And then the SEC comes seeking relief when what has been said is within what was said on the earnings call, I would be asking the SEC a lot of pointed questions as to what they expected. I might want to review the fine in fact, perhaps it might be excessive. Perhaps I might want the SEC to submit a weekly review of all the Tweets by Elon as to their material impact so as to tune the process and expectations for both parties.

It seems to me the EC has vastly more status as to what is material vs a tweet where there is no expectation as to investment or equity expertise. But just my immaterial opinion.