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Billionaire Oracle founder Larry Ellison and former Kellogg executive Kathleen Wilson-Thompson are joining the company’s board of directors, Tesla announced Friday.

Tesla is Ellison’s second-largest investment as of October, Ellison said then. Ellison owns 3 million shares in the company, according to the announcement. He also said that he and Musk are close friends. Wilson-Thompson spent 17 years as an executive at the Kellogg Company, and currently serves as the executive vice president and global chief human resources officer of the Walgreens Boots Alliance, the holding company that sits above Walgreens.

Tesla was required to add two new independent board members as part of the settlement Elon Musk and the company signed with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) earlier this year. The SEC had charged Musk with securities fraud in September over the “false and misleading” statements he made on Twitter in August, when he suddenly announced plans to turn Tesla back into a privately held company. He quickly settled with the agency two days after rejecting its initial offer.

Tesla’s board has been viewed by critics as weak, stacked with members who have close personal or professional ties to Musk. Shareholders have pushed the company in the past to add more outside voices; in November, a group representing nearly $1 billion of Tesla holdings asked the company to install more independent oversight.

Ellison’s holdings and his friendship with Musk are unlikely to raise any enforcement eyebrows, says Jay Dubow, a former SEC enforcement division branch chief, who’s now a partner at Pepper Hamilton LLP. “A large stockholder would normally be a good director as he or she would have all stockholders’ interests in mind when making decisions,” Dubow says in an email. Friendship alone doesn’t invalidate Ellison’s independence, either, Dubow says.

That sentiment is shared by Stephen Diamond, an expert on corporate governance at Santa Clara University’s law school. Diamond says, in an email to The Verge, that Ellison’s investment in Tesla isn’t a disqualifying factor. “Most investors will respond positively to the fact that he is an investor,” he says. “The larger problem is that no one on the board has serious knowledge of the auto industry. This will undermine the ability of the board to supervise Musk.”

Tesla was also required to name a new chairman of the board of directors as part of the settlement, in place of Musk, who was banned from the position for three years. The company elevated then-current board member Robyn Denholm to that position in early November.



Musk’s public communications about Tesla are also supposed to be reviewed and approved, though he recently told 60 Minutes that no one was reading his tweets, and that he “might make some mistakes” as a result. Tesla followed up Musk’s interview with a statement that said the settlement “is being complied with.
 
Tesla stock to drop because price cuts reveal demand ‘air pocket’

Tesla’s decision to cut the price of its popular Model 3 suggests the electric car maker is approaching an “air pocket” in demand, which Morgan Stanley says could weigh on its bottom line and stock price.

Analyst Adam Jonas on Tuesday cut his first-quarter deliveries by 23 percent, reduced his Model 3 average transaction price to $53,000 by the end of the year and slashed his 12-month price target for the stock by more than 8 percent.


He also reduced his 2019 earnings per share estimate to $1.30 from $4.17 and his 2020 estimate to $6.69 from $10.22.

“The company is undergoing multiple transitions with sales momentum slowing, shift to online channels, management changes, setting a foot into China and the early Model Y unveil among other developments,” Jonas wrote. “We continue to see the stock as fundamentally overvalued while potentially strategically undervalued.”


The analyst’s new $260 stock price target implies about 10 percent downside to Tesla shares over the next year from Monday’s close at $290.92. Shares fell 3 percent in midday trading Tuesday following the Morgan Stanley note.

The electric car maker said last month that it is lowering the price of its Model 3 by $1,100 thanks to the end of a costly customer referral program. That second price cut to the Model 3 this year brought the cost of its least expensive auto to $42,900, according to the company’s website.

Most recently, CEO Elon Musk also sparked controversy when, later in February, he confirmed that the company is shifting its sales to online only and giving drivers up to a week to return their newly purchased vehicles if they aren’t satisfied. Tesla explained in a blog post that moving sales online will allow it to market the Model 3 for the long-awaited base model price of $35,000.


“For what many investors believe to be a high growth tech firm, Tesla has made notable moves to cut costs/prices and stimulate orders,” Jonas said. “We are not inclined to buy now as we don’t believe we’d be compensated for the amount of risk we’re taking. The potential longer-term ‘resolution’ of the Tesla story as we approach nine years after its IPO may require a few more chapters to play out.”

Jonas has an equal-weight rating on Tesla shares.
 
When Elon Musk Tried to Destroy a Tesla Whistleblower

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By the larger-than-life standards of Elon Musk, the story was far from a blockbuster. On June 4, 2018, Business Insiderreported that Tesla Inc. was scrapping or reworking 40 percent of the raw materials at the Gigafactory, its huge battery plant in the Nevada desert. The article cited a source who figured the inefficiency had cost Musk’s electric car company $150 million, describing giant piles of scrap materials in the factory. Tesla denied the report, and a few hours later, the world moved on.



The world, that is, except Elon Musk. Although he wasn’t asked about the Business Insider story the following day at the company’s annual meeting, he stewed for weeks, dispatching a team of investigators to try to figure out who’d shared the information with the press.



The leaker, they determined, was one Martin Tripp, a slight man of 40 who’d spent his career in a series of low-level manufacturing jobs before finding his way to the assembly line at the Gigafactory. Tripp later claimed to be an idealist trying to get Tesla to tighten its operations; Musk saw him as a dangerous foe who engaged in “extensive and damaging sabotage,” as he wrote in a staff memo. He implied that Tripp had shared the data not only with the press but also with “unknown third parties.”

Could larger forces be at work? Musk wondered out loud. Could Tripp be coordinating with one of Tesla’s many enemies—oil companies, rival automakers, or Wall Street short sellers? “There are a long list of organizations that want Tesla to die,” he warned.



On June 20, the company sued Tripp for $167 million. Later that day, Tripp heard from the sheriff’s department in Storey County, Nev. Tesla’s security department had passed a tip to police. An anonymous caller had contacted the company to say Tripp was planning a mass shooting at the Gigafactory.


When the police confronted Tripp that evening, he was unarmed and in tears. He said he was terrified of Musk and suggested the billionaire might have called in the tip himself. A sheriff’s deputy attempted to cheer up Tripp and then called Tesla to tell the company that the threat, whoever had made it, was bogus. Tripp wasn’t dangerous.

Many chief executive officers would try to ignore somebody like Tripp. Instead, as accounts from police, former employees, and documents produced by Tesla’s own internal investigation reveal, Musk set out to destroy him.

Tesla’s PR department spread rumors that Tripp was possibly homicidal and had been part of a grand conspiracy. On Twitter, Musk suggested the Business Insider reporter, Linette Lopez, was on the payroll of short sellers and claimed Tripp had admitted to taking bribes from her in exchange for “valuable Tesla IP.” Lopez denied the allegation.

The Tripp incident was the beginning of a social media meltdown so epic that the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission forced Tesla to appoint a so-called Twitter sitter, an in-house lawyer who’s supposed to vet Musk’s tweets. Since last summer, Musk’s antics have included:

① Baselessly accusing a British cave diver on Twitter of pedophilia;

② Falsely claiming on (where else?) Twitter that investors had put up funds to take Tesla private at $420 a share, leading to an SEC lawsuit;

③ Somehow igniting a feud with B-list hip-hop artist Azealia Banks (“Elon will learn very soon who is more powerful of us two,” Banks posted on Instagram);

④ Puffing a joint during a live podcast taping, causing the federal government to review the security clearance needed for his rocket company, SpaceX.

Musk’s treatment of Tripp threatens to complicate this legal and regulatory mess. The security manager at the Gigafactory, an ex-military guy with a high-and-tight haircut named Sean Gouthro, has filed a whistleblower report with the SEC. Gouthro says Tesla’s security operation behaved unethically in its zeal to nail the leaker. Investigators, he claims, hacked into Tripp’s phone, had him followed, and misled police about the surveillance. Gouthro says that Tripp didn’t sabotage Tesla or hack anything and that Musk knew this and sought to damage his reputation by spreading misinformation.

A Tesla spokeswoman said in a statement that Gouthro’s allegations “are untrue and sensationalized,” but she didn’t comment on specifics. She pointed out that Gouthro never raised any concerns until he was fired for “poor performance.” Gouthro disputes this and says his performance reviews were mostly positive. He says he’s coming forward to let regulators and the public know what Tesla is capable of.

“They had the ability to do things I didn’t even know existed,” he says. “It scared the shit out of me.”


Gouthro isn’t the first person to blow the whistle on security operatives at a fast-growing transportation company. Two years ago, Richard Jacobs, a manager of global intelligence at Uber Technologies Inc., claimed his colleagues surreptitiously recorded conversations of rival executives and its own employees, among other ethically dubious actions. He later walked back some of his accusations, but Uber’s new management has since apologized, disavowed surveillance, and generally promised to be nicer. Two of the Uber investigators named by Jacobs, Nicholas Gicinto and Jacob Nocon, sued him for defamation, calling his claims “character assassination for cash.” They said his accusations would make it hard for them to get new jobs.

They were wrong. While the press reacted to Uber’s alleged misdeeds with shock—“F---ing blockbuster bonkers criminal allegations,” tweeted Amir Efrati, a reporter at the Information—Musk saw some promising recruits. In early 2018 he named Jeff Jones, a top Uber security executive, as his global security chief and hired Gicinto and Nocon as investigators, interviewing the three personally, according to Gouthro. Musk defended Gicinto to the tech news site Gizmodo, saying he’d been “thrown under the bus by Uber for the sins of others.” Tesla didn’t make Gicinto or Nocon available for comment; Jones, who left Tesla in November, declined to comment.




the rest at:

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/feat...d-to-destroy-tesla-whistleblower-martin-tripp
 
Tesla backflips on retail outlet closures, pushing up prices on EVs

Tesla has backflipped on plans to move all sales of its electric vehicles online, announcing that it has decided to keep “significantly more” retail outlets open, and pay for this by raising its car prices by around 3 per cent worldwide.

The about-face comes just eight days after the US EV maker announced plans to shut down most of its showrooms, in a move it said was necessary in order to achieve lower prices and reach a wider market.

In a statement on its website late on Sunday (US time), Tesla said that after close evaluation of “every single Tesla retail location,” it has decided to keep significantly more open than previously announced.

This included some that had been closed already “due to low throughput,” which Tesla said would now be reopened, but with a smaller crew.



“In addition, there are another 20 per cent of locations that are under review, and depending on their effectiveness over the next few months, some will be closed and some will remain open,” the statement said.

Tesla doesn’t exactly explain why it has had this change of heart – although there is some speculation, based on a Wall Street Journal report, that it is largely because the EV maker could not get out of some of its retail leases.

This might be cold comfort for the company’s remaining retail staff, particularly after the unceremonious laying off 7 per cent of its full time staff and all non-critical contractors and temp staff.

It’s not a particularly comforting for investors, either, as Bloomberg has reported.

“The seemingly spontaneous yet dramatically altering strategic decisions doesn’t lend a lot of confidence,” Joe Spak, an analyst at RBC Capital Markets, wrote Monday in a note.

“It makes it seem like Tesla is making decisions on the fly and reacting to very short-term factors.”

Still, Tesla shares were largely unaffected, with the stock gaining 3 per cent on Monday to $US290 a share, maintaining its market value at more than $US50 billion, much to the chagrin of the army of “short-sellers” who are betting on the company failing.

Some analysts expect it to go much higher. Jed Dorsheimer, of Canaccord Genuity, has a $US450 a share target.

“While the reversal to keep stores open does call into question the soundness of the initial decision, we view this as the right course of action and think that test drives are still an important part of the sales process until the electric vehicle penetration rates increase meaningfully,” he told Bloomberg.

The good news for customers is that the price rises will not apply to the base $US35,000 Model 3, but only to the more expensive variants of Model 3, as well as Model S and X. And for those more expensive cars, customers have a week’s grace to place an order before prices rise, on March 18.

In its statement on Sunday, Tesla also tried to assert that the plan to conduct all sales online remained in place.

“Tesla owners coming in to stores will simply be shown how to order a Tesla on their phone in a few minutes,” the statement said.

“And the generous return policy of 1000 miles or 7 days, whichever comes first, should alleviate the need for most test drives.

“However, cars will still be available for test drives at stores at the potential Tesla owner’s request. Stores will also carry a small number of cars in inventory for customers who wish to drive away with a Tesla immediately.”
 
Tesla stock tanks a day after announcement on store closures

Tesla shares fell 8 percent Friday, a day after the electric car maker said it will be shuttering some stores and cutting jobs to reduce costs.

CEO Elon Musk also said Tesla won’t turn a profit during the first quarter as it works to deliver its mid-size Model 3 sedan at a more affordable price tag of $35,000.


“Given that there is a lot happening in Q1, and we are taking a lot of one time charges, and there are a lot of challenges getting cars to China and Europe, we do not expect to be profitable in Q1,” Musk said on a call with reporters Thursday evening. “We do think that profitability in Q2 is likely.”

The release of the cheapest Model 3 so far has elicited a range of reactions from investors. Some analysts say the move is ultimately a step Tesla must take to fulfill its goal of becoming a major automaker, but others worry the car will cut too deeply into Tesla’s profits.

The store closures are part of a push to slash costs as much as possible to ensure the lowest-priced version of the car makes money.

“There’s no way around it,” Musk said on the call.

Musk reversed Wall Street guidance Thursday in predicting a loss for the first quarter, one month after saying he was optimistic the company would be profitable. He added that he still expects Tesla to make money in the second quarter.
 
Tesla closing retail stores in shift to online-only sales strategy

Tesla is moving all of its sales online, a dramatic shift in its sales strategy that will result in the closure of stores and some layoffs as the automaker looks for ways to reduce costs in order to bring a cheaper Model 3 to market.

Tesla CEO Elon Musk didn’t say how many stores would close. He noted that some stores would remain and turn into information centers and showrooms. The company didn’t provide specific numbers on how many retail employees might be affected.

“We will be closing some stores and that will be some reduction in head countas a result; there’s no question about that,” Musk said. “There’s no other wayfor us to achieve the savings required to provide this car and be financiallysustainable. I wish there was another way, but unfortunately, it will entailreduction in workforce on the retail side, no way around it.”

The shift to online-only sales, plus other cost efficiencies, allowed the company to lower all vehicle prices by about 6 percent on average and finally offer a $35,000 Model 3.

Meanwhile, Tesla plans to hire more service technicians, or mechanics, Musk noted during a call with reporters Thursday. Tesla didn’t provide details on how many mechanics it plans to hire.

In order to mitigate the need for a test ride, Tesla is extending the returnpolicies on its vehicles. New customers will be able own a car for a week anddrive for 1,000 miles and still return it for a full refund if they don’t like it, Musk said.

“That’s why we’re going to essentially allow somebody to use the car for freefor a week, and return it for a full refund,” Musk said. “And we’re going tomake it super easy to get a refund, like one-click refund.”

Tesla announced Thursday that it was offering a $35,000 version of the Model 3, which will have 220 miles of range and be able to reach a top speed of 130 miles per hour.

The company also said it’s introducing a Model 3 Standard Range Plus version — which offers 240 miles of range, a top speed of 140 mph and 0-60 mph acceleration of 5.3 seconds, as well as most premium interior features — at $37,000 before incentives.
 
Tesla: Beware Of A Dead Cat Bounce

Tesla’s shares have fallen over $30 or 10% in March to $289 since Elon Musk announced a $35,000 Model 3 version and that it would be closing almost all of its stores (which is now planned to be between 30% to 50% of them). The stock is down over $87 or 23% from their recent high of $376.79 on December 13 last year. It settled around $276 for three days last week before it moved higher to almost $291 on Monday before dropping over $7 on Tuesday to $283 but has bounced back up by around $6 today to around $289.

The chart below shows that the stock has topped out around $380 four times since June 2017 with a low-end of a range near $250. However, since mid-December when it last failed to break through the resistance level, it has been making a series of lower highs and lower lows, which is not positive price action.

It has had some timeframes when it has moved higher for a few days but has resumed moving lower. The tide may turn positive when Musk announces the Model Y tomorrow, but be aware of any upturn being a dead cat bounce.





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Tesla 3 year stock price chartSTOCKCHARTS.COM

A series of unfortunate announcements

There has been a lot of news flow around the company over the past few weeks, most of which has not been positive. Elon Musk tweeted incorrect information about how many cars Tesla will make in 2019, it announced the closing of almost all of its stores, that customers would have to order a car online, there wouldn’t be cars for test drives (but would have a week or 1,000 miles to return a car) and Musk has picked a fight with the SEC.
 
Are Teslas Death Traps? Failing Brakes and Violent Fires Spark Major Fears

Tesla and media outrage go hand in hand these days. It is usually because of something that Elon Musk has tweeted about the SEC, but occasionally it is because a Tesla vehicle is involved in a crash. As reported by Zero Hedge, yet another of Musk’s line of luxury electric cars has had a serious accident. With a history of major fires alongside accusations of “auto-pilot” failure, fatal Tesla crashes get an obscene amount of media coverage. Is it fair that Tesla gets raked over the coals every time something like this happens? Are those batteries as safe as Tesla claims and are the NHTSA tests of lithium battery-powered electric cars sufficient?



US Roads Are Dangerous, Florida is Especially Dangerous

First of all, it’s important to consider just how many crashes occur on US roads every year. It is an absolute certainty that there is a huge bias for the media to report when a Tesla crash happens and particularly when a fatality occurs. In the United States there were 37,133 road deaths in 2017, so why is it so significant when one of those crashes is a Tesla? Florida is no utopia when it comes to driving as it was reported as the 3rd worst state for motor vehicle fatalities that same year.

As Elon Musk Disrupts Car Industry, Boomers Push Back

Tesla Autopilot is safer than human driving (according to Tesla’s own statistics)


There is no doubt that a significant cause of the furor comes around the fact that Tesla is a pioneering company. The world is full of gasoline-powered cars and those who rely on their sale for a living. Tesla disrupts some of the oldest and most powerful industries in the US from the colossal Oil industry down to car dealerships, Elon Musk has found a way to irk a considerable amount of people. Throw into the mix that Baby Boomers have an inherent distrust of computers and new tech, and you have a perfect storm.

Let’s throw out the sentiment and look at the facts starting with the autopilot. Elon Musk’s incredible talent for marketing would certainly have you believe this to be the case. Tesla’s statement reported in an article from Electrek certainly seems to suggest that using their service is a definite improvement on the human alternative,
 
Tesla needs $2.5 billion in fresh capital, says a top analyst, and it's causing the stock to drop

  • "Musk admitted that from today's perspective there is 'some merit' to raising capital," Morgan Stanley analyst Adam Jonas said.
  • Morgan Stanley forecasts Tesla will raise $2.5 billion in the third quarter of this year.
  • Tesla CFO Zach Kirkhorn warned shareholders that the company will likely report a loss for its second quarter.


Tesla TSLA CEO Elon Musk's comments during the latest quarterly update were a hint that the electric vehicle maker will soon need to raise billions more in capital, Morgan Stanley said on Thursday.

"Given improvements in efficiency and upcoming expansion plans, Mr. Musk admitted that from today's perspective there is 'some merit' to raising capital," Morgan Stanley analyst Adam Jonas said in a note to investors. Jonas is widely followed on Wall Street as an early authority on both Tesla and electric vehicles.

Morgan Stanley forecasts Tesla will raise $2.5 billion in the third quarter of this year, coming "from strategic sources," Jonas said. The firm has a $240 a share price target on Tesla's stock, as Jonas said "concerns over demand and liquidity" will weigh on the stock.

"We think Tesla is waiting to demonstrate a recovery in demand and cash flow before looking to stabilize its balance sheet," Jonas added.

On the company's conference call with investors, Musk deferred on the company raising capital any time soon.

"I don't think raising capital should be a substitute for making the company operate more effectively," Musk said. "I do think there is some merit to raising capital, but is sort of probably about the wrong timing."

Tesla CFO Zach Kirkhorn also warned shareholders that the company will likely report a loss for its second quarter, as well.

Tesla's stock fell 1% in premarket trading from Wednesday's close of $258.66 a share.

WATCH: Musk should not make wild forecasts, says Sonnenfeld
 
Scandalust313 said:
When is the Tesla bubble gonna burst?
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I don't thik it does you know? Even if there was a 50% correction on the stock it would still be overvalued. I'm still kicking myself that when it was around $200 in 2018 or 2019 i listened to analysts who said it was overvalued and was a sell not a buy kmt
 
dasmooth1 said:
I don't thik it does you know? Even if there was a 50% correction on the stock it would still be overvalued. I'm still kicking myself that when it was around $200 in 2018 or 2019 i listened to analysts who said it was overvalued and was a sell not a buy kmt
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Crazy!
 
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