The latest reports indicate that Elon Musk has sold up to $20 billion worth of Tesla shares since he announced his intention to buy Twitter in a $44 billion deal. Most recently, the Tesla CEO offloaded 19.5 million of his shares in the company worth $2.95 billion, based on filings with the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).
This news caused the Tesla stock to close its last trading day in the red, down by nearly 3%.
On November 8, the Tesla CEO sold 19.5 million Tesla shares at an average price of $202.56. While Elon Musk is yet to address the latest sell-off, the money may go towards financing his recent $44 billion deal to acquire Twitter.
The entrepreneur initially began selling his Tesla stock in November after he used a Twitter poll to ask his 63 million followers whether he needed to sell 10% of his stake in Tesla. At that time, he sold nearly $5 billion worth of shares in the electric vehicle manufacturer, accounting for about 3% of all his holdings.
In April 2022, the Tesla boss sold another 9.6 million shares worth $8.5 billion at the time. He said:
“No further TSLA sales planned after today.”
With the latest sale, Musk has now sold about $20 billion worth of Tesla shares since he started investing in the social media platform in April.
Despite selling billions in Tesla shares, Musk still had to get $7 billion from investors including the founder of the Oracle software group, Larry Ellison, and major crypto exchange Binance to finance his Twitter buyout. Notably, a consortium of banks also loaned him $13 billion.
In the meantime, similar to other tech firms, Tesla’s value has taken a major hit in 2022 amid sour market conditions and a global market rout. The electric vehicle manufacturer’s shares have lost over 46% this year, still outperforming tech giants like Meta which are down by over 70% year-to-date (YTD).
Tesla Misses Earnings Expectations
Tesla reported its Q3 earnings filing in late October, posting $3.3 billion in profit and $21.45 billion in revenue, but falling short of Wall Street expectations. As reported then, the firm also reported a $170 million impairment loss on its Bitcoin investment.
Buy Bitcoin NowTesla offloaded $936 million worth of Bitcoin, nearly 75% of its holdings, in Q2 2022. The world’s biggest EV maker by market capitalization made no changes to its BTC holdings in Q3 2022 when the value of its digital assets was valued at $218 million, unchanged from the past quarter.
“Digital assets are considered indefinite-lived intangible assets under applicable accounting rules. Accordingly, any decrease in their fair values below our carrying values for such assets at any time subsequent to their acquisition will require us to recognize impairment charges, whereas we may make no upward revisions for any market price increases until a sale.”
Nonetheless, after closing its latest trading day down by nearly 3%, Tesla is now in the green. The electric car firm’s shares are trading at 194.24, up by +1.54%.
