‘Elon Doesn’t Care About Tesla Anymore’: Musk's Supporters Question His Commitment To The Company

Forbes

Ahead of a shareholder vote on restoring the tech entrepreneur's $50 billion stock award, Musk faces strident resistance from previously reliable sources who now question his commitment to the electric vehicle company.  Read the full story on Forbes: https://www.forbes.com/sites/alanohnsman/2024/06/11/elon-doesnt-care-about-tesla-anymore-musks-biggest-fans-are-turning-on-him/  Subscribe to FORBES: https://www.youtube.com/user/Forbes?sub_confirmation=1  Fuel your success with Forbes. Gain unlimited access to premium journalism, including breaking news, groundbreaking in-depth reported stories, daily digests and more. Plus, members get a front-row seat at members-only events with leading thinkers and doers, access to premium video that can help you get ahead, an ad-light experience, early access to select products including NFT drops and more:  https://account.forbes.com/membership/?utm_source=youtube&utm_medium=display&utm_campaign=growth_non-sub_paid_subscribe_ytdescript  Stay Connected Forbes newsletters: https://newsletters.editorial.forbes.com Forbes on Facebook: http://fb.com/forbes Forbes Video on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/forbes Forbes Video on Instagram: http://instagram.com/forbes More From Forbes:  http://forbes.com  Forbes covers the intersection of entrepreneurship, wealth, technology, business and lifestyle with a focus on people and success.

Transcript

00:00Today on Forbes, Elon Musk's biggest fans are turning on him.

00:07For years, Elon Musk had no greater fan than Tesla investor Ross Gerber.

00:12When Musk mocked the SEC on Twitter a few years ago, Gerber asked Musk to vent to him

00:17privately because, quote, you're just helping the enemy.

00:21When Tesla's board asked shareholders in 2018 to award Musk with stock potentially

00:26worth tens of billions of dollars, Gerber backed it because, quote, true shareholders

00:32are all in on Elon.

00:35But after a year in which Musk has made increasingly controversial comments and fixated on newer

00:40endeavors like X, formerly known as Twitter, and his artificial intelligence startup, XAI,

00:46Gerber has had enough.

00:48The CEO of Los Angeles-based wealth manager Gerber Kawasaki has suddenly become a strident

00:54and outspoken critic of the entrepreneur he's long admired.

00:57And with a looming shareholder vote to restore a pay package for Tesla's CEO worth around

01:03$50 billion, he'll be voting no, the first time he's so publicly opposed one of the Tesla

01:09board's recommendations.

01:11Gerber told Forbes, quote, when I voted for the package in 2018, that was based off information

01:17I had at the time and the fact that Elon worked at Tesla full time.

01:21Now my reluctance to vote for it has to do with new factors, the most important being

01:25that he doesn't work at Tesla anymore.

01:27He works for XAI and he works for X.

01:30Tesla is not his priority.

01:33Gerber isn't the only Tesla fan to have turned on Musk after years of devotion.

01:37Singapore-based Leo Koguan once described Musk as, quote, the only person I really respect

01:43on earth.

01:45And he claims to be Tesla's biggest retail shareholder.

01:48Koguan also voted against the board's proposal to restore stock awards Musk was stripped

01:53of by a Delaware judge in January.

01:56Koguan told Forbes, quote, I've discovered Tesla has one shareholder, a one-person board,

02:01and one tyrant CEO.

02:03The priority is he should work and do his job as CEO of Tesla.

02:08Musk has repeatedly pushed back on accusations he's not focused enough on Tesla, even as

02:12the number of other companies he's running has grown to include SpaceX, Boring Company,

02:17Neuralink, X, and XAI.

02:21In a recent earnings call, Musk said, quote, I work pretty much every day of the week.

02:25It's rare for me to take a Sunday afternoon off.

02:28I'm going to make sure Tesla is quite prosperous.

02:30It is prosperous, and it will be very much so in the future.

02:35More state institutional investors have also been spooked by Musk's antics and voted against

02:40the compensation proposal, including Norway's $1.7 trillion sovereign wealth fund, Amalgamated

02:46Bank, the California Public Employees Retirement System, New York City comptroller Brad Lander,

02:52and Nordea Asset Management, as well as advisory firms Institutional Shareholder Services and

02:58Glass Lewis.

03:00Along with the billionaire's pay, the annual shareholder meeting Thursday will also put

03:04to a vote Musk's plans to reincorporate Tesla in Texas from Delaware, where he'd move the

03:10company to avail himself of the state's lighter approach to business regulation.

03:14The meeting will also put to a vote new board terms for people close to him, his brother

03:18Kimball and James Murdoch.

03:22Musk and bullish equity analysts like Wedbush's Dan Ives and Morgan Stanley's Adam Jonas expect

03:27the compensation vote to come out in his favor based on shareholder surveys.

03:32Gerber isn't so sure.

03:34Musk, who owns 13 percent of the company, quote, can't vote his shares.

03:38So if you take that out, it comes down to the institutional shareholders who are being

03:42advised to vote against it.

03:44He added, quote, I'm kind of looking at the outcome as a coin flip right now.

03:50That the outcome isn't a foregone conclusion suggests something of a reckoning for Musk,

03:54who has fallen in public esteem from a widely praised serial entrepreneur and cleantech

03:59visionary to a pugnacious and erratic billionaire who seems unconcerned with offending current

04:04and potential Tesla customers, regulators and even presidents, seemingly spending more

04:09time on X posting to his 187 million followers than strategizing with engineers on new

04:14models and features.

04:16The result has been inflammatory tweets that are anti-Semitic, racist and anti-trans and

04:21high profile misfires like Tesla's bulky Cybertruck.

04:25None of that helps the company's brand as EV market competition grows more fierce.

04:31For full coverage, check out Alan Onsman's piece on Forbes.com.

04:37This is Kieran Meadows from Forbes.

04:39Thanks for tuning in.

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Transcript

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