Tesla stocks are in yet another nosedive this week — and investors are getting increasingly furious at CEO Elon Musk, The Wall Street Journal reports, for failing to actually run the company during a time of crisis.
“There is no Tesla CEO today,” tweeted Gary Black, a hedge fund manager who owns around $50 million worth Tesla stock.
Tesla’s stock fell more than six percent on Monday, following a weekend whirlwind of disaster for Musk. Overall, it’s lost well over half its value since the beginning of the year.
The billionaire CEO is still investing most of his time at Twitter, in a disastrous acquisition that’s been fraught with controversy from the start.
As Twitter disintegrates, Tesla investors say it’s inflicting serious collateral damage on Tesla’s reputation. Just in the past week, Musk — who sold more than $19 billion in Tesla stock this year, $4 billion of which was used to finance his troubled acquisition of the social media company — took to Twitter to make transphobic jokes, lash out at former company executives, and spread COVID misinformation.
Understandably, Tesla investors aren’t impressed by Musk’s antics, and are blaming him for abandoning his role at the carmaker.
“The market voted today that the $TSLA brand has been negatively impacted by the Twitter drama,” Black wrote. “Where before EV buyers were proud to drive their Teslas to their friends or show off Teslas in their driveways, now the Twitter controversy is hurting Tesla’s brand equity.”
Ross Gerber, a longtime Tesla investor, also blamed Musk for “working at another company,” saying that “Tesla deserves a focused CEO.”
“It would be helpful to know what Elon’s plans are,” Gerber added.
Tesla has had a rotten year independent of Musk’s Twitter drama. Shares are down dramatically, marking its worst year on record.
Meanwhile, Musk claimed over the weekend that he continues “to oversee both Tesla and SpaceX, but the teams there are so good that often little is needed from me.”
That sentiment more or less coincides with NASA head and former astronaut Bill Nelson sighing in relief this week after being reassured that SpaceX was actually being run by SpaceX’s president and COO Gwynne Shotwell — and, pointedly, not Musk.
In short, it’s really starting to look like Musk, especially when it comes to his public image, is doing far more harm than good to his companies as of late.
Whether Tesla will be able to shake the massive shadow he’s cast over any of his companies at this point is anyone’s guess. But we’ll be watching.
READ MORE: Tesla Investors Voice Concern Over Elon Musk’s Focus on Twitter [The Wall Street Journal]
More on Musk: Head of NASA Relieved to Hear Elon Musk Isn’t REALLY Running SpaceX