TSLA Stock 10% Down, Top Tesla Investor Says Tesla Achieves More after Leadership Shuffle

UTC by Teuta Franjkovic · 3 min read
TSLA Stock 10% Down, Top Tesla Investor Says Tesla Achieves More after Leadership Shuffle
Photo: Thomas Hawk / Flickr

James Anderson, a major investor in Tesla Inc. said the company is better run after independent directors were appointed to supervise Elon Musk. But today TSLA stock is in red.

Today Tesla Inc (NASDAQ: TSLA) stock is down more than 10%. At the moment of writing, it is trading at $631.27.

James Anderson, head of global equities for Baillie Gifford, one of Tesla Inc’s biggest institutional investor, said TSLA stock is now considered a “better run”. The company had its legal problems after it hired independent directors to oversee Chief Executive Officer Elon Musk.

But let’s start from the beginning. After a settlement with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), it was decided that Musk, for the next three years, won’t be the Chairman of Tesla. The company then agreed to replace him and name an independent chairman, either from among its current independent directors or as one of the two new board members Tesla must add as part of the settlement. The company decided for Robyn Denholm who, therefore, left her role as CFO and Head of Strategy at Telstra, Australia’s largest telecommunications company. She has also acted as an independent director on the board of Tesla since 2014.

Anderson said that at that ties, all investors were convinced Musk is “getting things wrong,” but that he feels “more comfortable now.”

Denholm Obviously Pro-Musk

He added the Denholm’s appointment as chairwoman was a decisive move and that, now, he doesn’t think Musk needs to be CEO.

However, Denholm is in no way against Musk and she tries to accentuate this fact from her very first beginnings. Last year, she cited a few examples of Muskian boldness. Some of them include Tesla’s production of 97,000 vehicles last quarter, and its completion of Gigafactory 3 in Shanghai in a mere 10 months, achievements that took many by surprise.

“Believe it or not, development of the Shanghai factory is actually ahead of schedule, and it has started production of Model 3 on a trial basis. There is a huge opportunity for growth in China,” said Denholm.

She was also one of the Musks’s greatest proponents even when it comes to tweeting.

She said:

“Twitter is part of everyday business for many executives today… From my perspective, he uses it wisely. I don’t think he poses any challenges… The company is running very well and the board itself is very engaged. We meet with him all the time.”

Is Coronavirus Panic Spread by Media Really Dumb?

Be it as it may, that doesn’t mean Musk stopped tweeting. No way.

The last (and we are sure it wasn’t the least) of his tweets is the one calling the whole panic amid the fast-spreading coronavirus – dumb.

The first who felt the most competent to answer was MSNBC’s Stephanie Ruhle who immediately tweeted back saying that people are panicking because of a lack of “expert leadership.”

Musk, of course, answered back by saying:

“Virality of C19 is overstated due to conflating diagnosis date with contraction date & over-extrapolating exponential growth, which is never what happens in reality. Fatality rate also greatly overstated. Because there are so few test kits, those who die with respiratory symptoms are tested for C19, but those with minor symptoms are usually not. Prevalence of coronaviruses & other colds in general population is very high!”

The thing is, just 10 days ago on February 29, there was one confirmed death from coronavirus in the United States.

Now the rapidly-spreading virus has killed 22 people and affected more than 30 states and the District of Columbia, turning into a health crisis.

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