Why did Musk Tweet about Tesla, and why he didn’t mention a Going-Private transaction with the Securities and Exchange Commission?
His tweets have caused him all sorts of headaches over the years. He was fined by the Securities and Exchange Commission and had to give up the chairmanship ofTesla because of a take- private statement he made. He is currently under a consent decree with the SEC that requires a lawyer to approve his tweets about Tesla before he can post them. A federal appeals court has rejected Musk’s attempts to quit the consent decree.
The SEC concluded that Musk had not discussed a going-Private transaction of $420 per share with any potential funding source, after initially launching an investigation. Musk eventually reached a settlement with the SEC requiring him to step down as chairman of Tesla and establishing the position of Twitter sitter.
Musk claimed on August 7th, that he had the funding to take the company private at $42 a share. (Tesla has been a publicly traded company since 2010.)
The interview came after a particular troubling run of tweets for Musk, in which he promoted conspiracy theories about a mass shooting in Texas, was accused of antisemitism after claiming that George Soros “hates humanity,” and retweeted discredited theories about crime and race.
CNBC’s David Farmer asked why he makes statements that have been criticized as racist and anti-semitic, especially when they can hurt the companies he runs, when he answered that he was talking aboutTesla and time management, and not conspiracy theories.
Inigo Montoya’s encounter with the thocne murderer of his father in The Princess Bride
Musk referred to a scene from The Princess Bride in which the character of Inigo Montoya confronted the man who killed his father.