Elon Musk has at times been the richest man in the world.
He recently really shook things up with his purchase of Twitter and revelations of the corrupt practices and collusion between the Big Tech giant and the federal government.
But The Wall Street Journal made one claim about Elon Musk that left him grimacing.
There is a big difference between net worth and liquidity.
Much of Elon Musk’s wealth is invested in Tesla stocks.
However, in recent months, Tesla stock has declined in value.
Tesla’s market value has fallen by around $700 billion in the last year, and Tesla shares have fallen around 65%.
The Wall Street Journal noted that Musk has mostly been a cash-poor billionaire, relying on loans backed by his Tesla shares.
The Wall Street Journal wrote:
Late last year, just as Tesla’s stock price peaked, he began selling Tesla shares, totaling more than $39 billion including $3.5 billion last week. It’s unclear what his liquidity is like after what he said would be a more than $11 billion tax bill for 2021 and putting up roughly $25 billion in cash as part of buying Twitter.
Mr. Musk’s current Tesla holdings, not including exercisable options, total 424 million shares worth about $52 billion at Friday’s closing price of $123.15 a share.
Simply put, if he could tap all of those shares as collateral under Tesla’s rules, he’d be allowed to borrow about $13 billion. That’s only a bit more than he planned to borrow in April as part of the original Twitter deal using just 40% of his shares as collateral, underscoring how his borrowing power has shrunken with the collapse of the car company’s share price. He later scrapped those proposed margin loans to fund the deal amid investor concerns over the risk.
Some Tesla investors have blamed Musk for his focus on Twitter since purchasing the company.
Some of the loss in value could be political fallout as well.
Leftist boycott
Elon Musk has become a major enemy of the radical Left in recent months.
The Left has long relied on Big Tech companies like Twitter to censor conservative speech.
But when Elon Musk (a free speech absolutist) purchased the company, it was clear that the mass censorship was coming to an end.
Musk has also exposed how the company was taking marching orders from the government to suppress things like the Hunter Biden laptop story.
Leftists have lost their mind over Musk’s takeover of Twitter.
Many have called for boycotts of Tesla as a result.
Of course, Tesla, an electric car company, isn’t getting much of its business from conservatives.
Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who drives a Tesla, has recently said she wants to switch to a different electric vehicle, but hasn’t yet.
It is unclear if Tesla’s financial woes really have any ties to Musk’s purchase of Twitter, but one thing is sure, the company is struggling.
Hopefully Musk can make Twitter profitable to make up the difference.
Patriot Political will keep you up-to-date on any developments to this ongoing story.
