Elon Musk is looking to the east.
The Tesla (TSLA) – Get Free Report CEO shared his thoughts about his competition — and a variety of other topics — in an interview with Andrew Ross Sorkin at The New York Times’ Dealbook conference.
Related: Tesla’s Musk has harsh take on unions as the UAW takes bold new step
The conversation included Musk’s ownership of X, formerly Twitter, and his controversial response to a tweet claiming that “Jewish communities” pushed “dialectical hatred” against white people.
Musk, who is white, tweeted that the user had said “the actual truth” and then commented that the ADL “unjustly attacks the majority of the West, despite the majority of the West supporting the Jewish people and Israel.”
Critical time for Tesla
During the interview, Musk said that he clarified what he meant “almost immediately.”
“I should, in retrospect, not have replied to that particular person and I should have written in greater length as to what I meant,” he said. “I did subsequently clarified in replies, but those clarifications were ignored by the media and, eventually I handed a loaded gun to those who hate me and arguably to those who antisemitic, too, and for that I’m quite sorry.”
Musk also had a terse response for advertisers, including Disney (DIS) – Get Free Report, who have pulled back from X in light of the controversies: “Go f*ck yourself.”
Then the conversation turned to electric vehicles.
This is a critical time for Tesla, which will begin deliveries of its highly anticipated Cybertruck with a launch event Thursday afternoon.
The EV sector has been facing some challenges recently, as Ford (F) – Get Free Report and General Motors (GM) – Get Free Report have postponed or scraped their EV-related plans. And Tesla has been struggling, reporting lower-than-expected deliveries and slashing prices in recent months.
Sorkin cited a letter from 3,882 car dealers spread across the country asking the Biden administration to slow down its proposed regulations mandating the production and distribution of electric vehicles.
“I think if you make a compelling electric car, people will buy it, no question about it,” he said. “I mean, electric car sales in China are gigantic. That’s by far the biggest category.”
Musk calls China ‘toughest competiton’
Musk also said that Tesla’s Model Y is “the best refutation” of the EV doomsayers, as it will be “the best selling car of any kind on earth this year– any kind gasoline, or otherwise.”
China’s electric vehicle market is booming, with government subsidies and a strong infrastructure driving rapid adoption and the projected revenue in the country’s EV sector is expected to reach a $292.1 billion, according to Statista.
“I think the Chinese car companies are extremely competitive, he said, “by far our toughest competition is in China. There’s a lot of people out there who think that the top 10 car companies are going to be Tesla followed by nine Chinese car companies. I think they might not be wrong.”
Musk added that “China is super good at manufacturing and the work ethic is incredible.”
“If we consider different leagues of competitiveness at Tesla,” he said, “we consider the Chinese league to be the most competitive. And by the way we do very well in China because our China team is the best.”
China’s BYD (BYDDY) – Get Free Report is Tesla’s biggest rival worldwide. The company delivered over 911,000 EVs in 2022, compared with Tesla’s 1.31 million deliveries for the year.
BYD came awfully close to matching or surpassing Tesla in the third quarter of 2023 as it delivered over 431,600 EV.
The company recently unveiled the Sea Lion 07, its first mid-size electric SUV, at the 2023 Guangzhou International Auto Show.
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