They can’t say he didn’t warn them. A little less than 3 weeks ago, Tesla CEO Elon Musk said that people betting against Tesla have ‘about 3 weeks before their position explodes’.
It put the timing around when Tesla releases its production and delivery results for the second quarter, but we have already released the most important number that will be announced in those results: the Model 3 production rate at the end of the quarter, which was apparently 5,000 units.
Today, the stock is reacting with a 5% surge in pre-market trading.
Evidently, the market still didn’t think that Tesla would achieve the production milestone.
Over the last few months, Musk has been talking a lot about proving doubters wrong.
In May, Musk bought $10 million worth of Tesla stock (TSLA) just as he predicted a short squeeze that would be a ‘next level short burn of the century’.
As we reported last month, it looked like his prediction already started to become reality as Tesla’s stock price rose and people betting against the company reportedly lost billions of dollars in June.
But a short interest analyst said that there’s no evidence of a significant short squeeze on Tesla’s stock yet as Musk predicted because the people betting against the company were holding on.
Now Tesla is up 5% in pre-market trading at the time of writing. It’s an important surge, but there’s still not enough information to confirm the short-squeeze that Musk predicted.
For those unaware, a short-squeeze is when traders with a short position on a stock rush to cover their position by buying back the shares that they borrowed to sell short.
Back in 2012, Musk commented on the short interest of Tesla’s stock and warned that anyone holding a stock position against the company will have a “tsunami of hurt” coming for them. During the 12 following months, Tesla’s stock price increased by 461% – much of which was attributed to a short squeeze after Tesla reported its first quarterly profit in Q1 2013.
When Musk started predicting trouble for shorts again, I asked him how he thinks it will compare to the previous carnage. He responded:
It will be next level. These are really big numbers.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) May 4, 2018
Now we will see how it starts to play out in the next few days.
Electrek’s Take
If it indeed plays out as Musk predicted and it looks like it might based on the pre-market trading today, they can’t say that he didn’t warn them.
I think it’s fair that he warned them too because even though I know Tesla enthusiasts are often at odds with Tesla shorts, not all of them are full of hate and dead set on seeing Tesla burned to the ground.
Some of them may have simply been misled by misleading media reports about the automaker and they think that they can make a few bucks.
I am seeing the polarization around Tesla increasing lately and the amount of hate between both sides is getting out of control.
If it turns out that Musk was right with his prediction, let’s not gloat in it too much and try to take it down a notch.
Instead, EV enthusiasts should focus on the fact that Tesla is putting new all-electric vehicles on the road at an unprecedented pace. That’s what is most important here in my opinion.
What do you think? Let us know in the comment section below.
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