Elon Musk is $26 billion richer after Tesla shares’ best day since 2013

Tesla CEO Elon Musk, already the world’s richest person, added another $26 billion to his paper fortune on Thursday after his company’s shares experienced their biggest rally since 2013.

According to Forbes, Musk is now worth around $269 billion, more than $50 billion ahead of his good friend and former Tesla board member Larry Ellison, who remains Tesla’s largest shareholder oracle.

Musk controls nearly 13% of Tesla’s outstanding shares, making up the majority of his net worth, although he also owns a large portion of SpaceX, valued at over $200 billion in private markets. He is also the majority owner of X, formerly Twitter, and artificial intelligence startup xAI.

Musk’s net worth could be even higher, depending on the outcome of a shareholder lawsuit related to his 2018 pay package that is being heard in court.

Thursday’s pop followed Tesla’s better-than-expected earnings reports late Wednesday and Musk’s comments on the conference call that suggested “vehicle growth” will be 20% to 30% next year. Tesla shares rose 22% at the close, the second-largest gain since the company went public in 2010.

Before the earnings announcement, Tesla shares had fallen sharply and were facing their worst month since January. But the stock has erased its annual loss and is now up 5% in 2024, compared with the Nasdaq’s 23% rise.

Tesla reported earnings per share of 72 cents, beating analysts’ average estimate of 58 cents. Profit was boosted by $739 million in revenue from environmental credits and $326 million in revenue from FSD, the company’s fully self-driving monitored system.

Musk spent much of the call touting the autonomous future Tesla is promising, including a ride-hailing service he said will be available to the public in Texas and California as early as next year. Two weeks earlier, Tesla held its long-awaited Robotaxi event and unveiled the concept of its Cybercab.

However, during alphabet Waymo has been operating a commercial driverless service to the public since June, and Tesla has consistently missed its own forecasts for bringing a product to market. The company still does not produce or sell cars that are safe to operate without a human behind the wheel and are ready to steer or brake at any time.

And although Musk introduced both a heavy-duty semi-trailer and a new edition of the Roadster in 2017, the Roadster’s design is still not finished and the company is only in “pilot production” of the semi-trailer.

One topic Musk didn’t address on Wednesday’s call was his campaign and his heavy spending to support Donald Trump.

Since publicly supporting Trump shortly after the first assassination attempt on the former president in July, Musk has ramped up his rhetoric, particularly regarding X, and donated tens of millions of dollars to a political action committee supporting the Republican candidate.

Musk campaigned in the critical swing state of Pennsylvania, which he described as the “pivot point” of this election. Over the weekend, he said he would randomly award $1 million a day to registered voters who sign a petition for his pro-Trump PAC to encourage his fans in battleground states to vote.

The U.S. Department of Justice has warned the PAC that Musk’s campaign could violate federal election law, a source familiar with the matter told NBC News on Wednesday.

Ahead of the earnings announcement, many investors had questions about Musk’s political activities.

“Elon Musk has the right to express his political views, but his public engagement appears to be at odds with his responsibility as CEO to protect shareholder value,” an anonymous retail investor wrote in a forum that Tesla uses to address investor questions place. “How is Tesla dealing with this and confirming that Musk’s actions are not impacting sales or growth?”

The comment had received 168 positive votes before the call. Another question, which received 527 upvotes, asked whether Tesla’s board is taking action to ensure that Musk’s “political engagement does not deviate from Tesla’s core mission and protects shareholder value and brand integrity.”

In a post on X earlier this week, Musk wrote: “I think this election is existential for the United States.”

REGARD: Surprised at how little technology was brought up during the conversation between Musk and Trump