Unwanted side effects. The automobile firm Tesla is going to close an annus horribilis in the markets, with losses that since the beginning of the year have been around 70%. At the beginning of 2022, the shares were around 340 dollars, now they are at 115.
But the great collapse of the car company's titles has accelerated since its owner, Elon Musk, decided to take over the Twitter social network two months ago: since then Tesla's shares have dropped 45%. In the last month alone, the company's value has been cut by nearly $220 billion, the equivalent of Toyota's market capitalization.
The reasons for the slip of the electric car company are multiple. On the one hand, Tesla is a victim of the bearish current that technology titles are suffering this year, many of them overvalued. It should not be forgotten that Tesla, even though it is a company with an industrial vocation, is listed on the Nasdaq index, which accumulates an annual decrease of 33%.
Likewise, current market conditions indicate a certain contraction in global demand, at a time when international organizations point to the possibility of some economies falling into recession.
In fact, the automaker began offering a $3,750 discount to US customers on two models, the Model 3 and Model Y, in early December, according to the Car and Driver portal. This amount doubled, to $7,500 last week for customers for this month's delivery. In addition, Tesla added another incentive, worth 10,000 miles of free energy at Tesla supercharging stations, for electric vehicles delivered in December. Tesla buyers in other countries are also receiving various discounts, Reuters notes, including $5,000 in Canada and about $850 in China.
However, behind Tesla's recent stock market crash is above all Elon Musk. The fact that the tycoon sold 3.6 billion dollars in Tesla shares last week – and almost 40 billion since the end of 2021 – to finance his expansion projects in Twitter and other of his businesses has not helped. Musk has since vowed not to sell any more Tesla shares for two years, though the South African has gone back on numerous other occasions.
Among financial analysts, there are two contradictory positions to justify Tesla's loss of value. There are those who accuse Musk of indirectly damaging the reputation of the car brand after his controversial decisions on Twitter, with thousands of dismissals. Others, on the other hand, believe that the social network distracts Musk too much from his main business, the automobile, and they would prefer it to be more present. Musk as problem and solution, at the same time.
