Tesla shares were rising sharply on Wednesday, although not because the electric-vehicle maker was doing all that all well.
In fact, Tesla (TSLA) is struggling. First-quarter deliveries were just 336,381, down 13% from a year ago and a whole lot less than anyone expected. Bloomberg’s estimate was 390,000 deliveries; others were as high as 397,000.
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Sales have tumbled in Europe. Sales have tumbled in the U.S. and Canada. Sales from Tesla China were down 49% in February and they were off 11% in March after a refreshed Model Y midsize SUV came out.
Tesla vehicles and dealerships have been vandalized in the U.S., Canada and Europe. A Seattle critic scratched a Tesla with a key — which was recorded by a camera on the vehicle.
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Elon is Tesla and Tesla is Elon and . . .
Tesla’s problem is not just a Tesla problem.
At least in Europe and the U.S., the problem has evolved into CEO Elon Musk himself.
He is smart, wildly ambitious and easily diverted.
Last year, he fell in love with politics. He fell in love with the high he got from jumping around on a stage at Donald Trump’s campaign rallies and showing up at Trump press availabilities at the Oval Office with one of his children on his shoulders.
Tesla CEO and Trump adviser Elon Musk wears a cheesehead hat at a political rally in Green Bay, Wis., before the Wisconsin Supreme Court election on Tuesday, April 1, 2025.
He publicly backed far-right German politicians and even gave what looked liked a Nazi salute.
He and his Department of Government Efficiency charged headlong and more into chopping federal payrolls for the Trump administration, using young eager-beavers to find waste, fraud and worse — only to discover that many of the so-called details were easily dismissed for any number of reasons.
Many of them in fact had to do with the group’s lack of familiarity with how the government works. The purported savings may be far less than Doge claimed. (Doge is also not an actual department; Congress hasn’t approved it. It is also the name of a cryptocurrency that Musk has touted.)
Musk parachuted into the Wisconsin Supreme Court election, declaring it was “critical for the future of civilization.” He donated $3 million to the Wisconsin Republican Party. He spent upward of $20 million for the GOP-backed candidate, Brad Schimel.
Musk even gave away $1 million checks to two voters who had signed a petition to stop “activist” judges.
And for all that, Schimel, the Trump-GOP-Musk-backed candidate, lost on Tuesday by fully 10 percentage points.
The ‘President Musk’ problem
Musk became so ubiquitous that critics began calling him “President Musk.”
And slowly but surely, Elon Musk seems to have overstayed his welcome. Besides, since he’s classified as a special government employee, he can work only 130 days in a 365-day period.
Trump told staff Musk would be dialing back his activities by May or June, and Tesla shares jumped Wednesday morning when Politico reported that his tenure in Washington may be nearing an end.
The shares at last check were 5.3% higher at $282.79.
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Among those Musk managed to alienate appears to be Susie Wiles, the president’s chief of staff, who likes to keep a lid on things.
The Trump staffers were sent into frenzies by Musk’s “unexpected and off-message comments on X, his social-media platform — including sharing unvetted and uncoordinated plans to gut federal agencies,” Politico said.
Going back to Tesla would thrill his fans, especially Tesla uber stock bulls like analyst Dan Ives of Wedbush, who watched Tesla sales sink and sink and sink.
“The more Tesla becomes a political symbol, the worse it is to the brand and the stock,” Ives told Fortune magazine last month.
Musk also runs a number of other companies — like SpaceX and Neuralink — to which he might want to renew his attention.
The shares, in fact, fell as much as 55% between mid-December and mid-March, finally bottoming at $217.02 on March 11. The shares are up more than 30% since.
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