Of all the forms of hagiography of Elon Musk practiced by some in the financial press, the proposition that Musk’s Tesla has somehow been a financial success is the most ludicrous. Excluding the creation of electric cars and solar panels from the analysis and performing straight financial number-crunching, one can only come to the conclusion that Tesla has been a failure.
Musk’s greatest skill is in raising capital, but in the past five years that new capital—in excess of $20 billion—has led to greater losses and a much, much more levered balance sheet for Tesla. No value is being created for Tesla shareholders. It’s just a sea of red ink and constant dilution of shareholders and additions of new creditors.
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