1
00:00:03,120 --> 00:00:11,120
Speaker 1: Bloomberg Audio Studios, Podcasts, radio news.

2
00:00:14,240 --> 00:00:17,120
Speaker 2: Well, Elon muskis now the richest person on the planet.

3
00:00:17,480 --> 00:00:20,319
Speaker 3: More than half the satellites in space are owned and

4
00:00:20,440 --> 00:00:22,160
Speaker 3: controlled by one man.

5
00:00:22,760 --> 00:00:24,640
Speaker 1: Well, he's a legitimate super genius.

6
00:00:24,840 --> 00:00:25,759
Speaker 3: I mean legitimate.

7
00:00:25,960 --> 00:00:28,600
Speaker 2: He says he's always voted for Democrats, but this year

8
00:00:28,640 --> 00:00:29,400
Speaker 2: it will be different.

9
00:00:29,440 --> 00:00:30,400
Speaker 1: He'll vote Republican.

10
00:00:30,680 --> 00:00:33,159
Speaker 2: There is a reason the US government is so reliant

11
00:00:33,200 --> 00:00:33,560
Speaker 2: on him.

12
00:00:33,760 --> 00:00:36,720
Speaker 3: Elon Musk is a scam artist and he's done nothing.

13
00:00:36,479 --> 00:00:40,680
Speaker 2: Anything he does, he's fascinating people.

14
00:00:50,520 --> 00:00:55,160
Speaker 4: Welcome Delon Inc. Bloomberg's weekly podcast about Elon Musk. It's Tuesday,

15
00:00:55,240 --> 00:00:59,480
Speaker 4: April twenty third. I'm your host, David Papadopolis. This week

16
00:00:59,520 --> 00:01:03,480
Speaker 4: it's Slamania. There's so much Tesla news, and most of

17
00:01:03,520 --> 00:01:06,280
Speaker 4: it is bleak for starters. We learned on Friday that

18
00:01:06,319 --> 00:01:09,120
Speaker 4: the nearly four thousand cyber trucks that have been delivered

19
00:01:09,120 --> 00:01:11,960
Speaker 4: to drivers to date have now been recalled for an

20
00:01:12,000 --> 00:01:15,080
Speaker 4: issue with the accelerator pedal. And we have new reporting

21
00:01:15,080 --> 00:01:18,240
Speaker 4: from Dana Hall and Ed Ludlow about what exactly went

22
00:01:18,319 --> 00:01:21,920
Speaker 4: down inside Tesla and in at least one factory parking

23
00:01:21,920 --> 00:01:24,240
Speaker 4: lot when it laid off ten percent of its staff

24
00:01:24,319 --> 00:01:27,160
Speaker 4: last week. This all comes just ahead of an earnings

25
00:01:27,160 --> 00:01:30,080
Speaker 4: call that Musk will be conducting later today. Of course,

26
00:01:30,120 --> 00:01:34,600
Speaker 4: for us, the Tesla earnings call means one thing, bingo,

27
00:01:35,080 --> 00:01:37,480
Speaker 4: and we want to invite you, dear listener, to play

28
00:01:37,520 --> 00:01:40,480
Speaker 4: along with us this evening. It's gonna be a hoop.

29
00:01:41,160 --> 00:01:45,120
Speaker 4: But before we do bingo, we've got to go into

30
00:01:45,480 --> 00:01:50,480
Speaker 4: that big take story on Tesla's mounting woes that Dana Hall,

31
00:01:50,760 --> 00:01:54,520
Speaker 4: who our listeners know very well, wrote with Ed Ludlow.

32
00:01:55,080 --> 00:01:59,720
Speaker 4: Dana welcome, Hello, Hello, and Ed who is a Bloomberg

33
00:01:59,760 --> 00:02:02,600
Speaker 4: report You're in co host of the daily Bloomberg technology

34
00:02:02,680 --> 00:02:03,200
Speaker 4: news show.

35
00:02:03,240 --> 00:02:05,640
Speaker 3: Hello, Ed, Hey, how's it going?

36
00:02:06,240 --> 00:02:09,200
Speaker 4: As always, we also have Max Chapkin, senior reporter at

37
00:02:09,200 --> 00:02:14,960
Speaker 4: Bloomberg BusinessWeek. Max Hey, David Hey, Hey? Okay, So Dana Ed.

38
00:02:15,240 --> 00:02:18,720
Speaker 4: On Sunday night, we published your story, which has been

39
00:02:19,120 --> 00:02:21,639
Speaker 4: one of the most read so far this week on

40
00:02:21,680 --> 00:02:24,640
Speaker 4: the Bloomberg terminal on dot com, with the title Elon

41
00:02:24,800 --> 00:02:32,280
Speaker 4: Musk's Robotaxi dreams plunged Tesla into chaos. Dana, in reporting this,

42
00:02:33,200 --> 00:02:36,000
Speaker 4: what did you learn that was most surprising or telling

43
00:02:36,919 --> 00:02:39,520
Speaker 4: for you in terms of the current moment? The company

44
00:02:39,560 --> 00:02:42,480
Speaker 4: is going through now, so.

45
00:02:42,400 --> 00:02:44,440
Speaker 1: This is really a big moment. I would say that

46
00:02:44,639 --> 00:02:48,160
Speaker 1: whenever a company lays off ten percent of its global workforce,

47
00:02:48,200 --> 00:02:51,160
Speaker 1: which in this case is more than fourteen thousand people,

48
00:02:51,240 --> 00:02:53,919
Speaker 1: and we have reporting that Musk is gunning for actually

49
00:02:53,960 --> 00:02:57,480
Speaker 1: a twenty percent reduction, you just run to the phones

50
00:02:57,560 --> 00:03:00,400
Speaker 1: and you call as many people as possible. So Ed

51
00:03:00,480 --> 00:03:02,280
Speaker 1: and I have been on the phone all week with

52
00:03:02,360 --> 00:03:04,440
Speaker 1: people around the world just try to get a sense

53
00:03:04,480 --> 00:03:07,880
Speaker 1: of what's going on internally. And what struck me the

54
00:03:07,919 --> 00:03:12,440
Speaker 1: most is just how chaotic the layoff process was for people.

55
00:03:12,520 --> 00:03:15,840
Speaker 1: I mean I spoke to employees who had just been recruited,

56
00:03:15,880 --> 00:03:19,119
Speaker 1: who had moved their entire families across the country, who

57
00:03:19,120 --> 00:03:21,160
Speaker 1: had just gone through the onboarding process and then were

58
00:03:21,200 --> 00:03:24,120
Speaker 1: laid off. I talked to, you know, highly trained engineers

59
00:03:24,120 --> 00:03:27,720
Speaker 1: and technicians who arrived at the gigafactory in Nevada to

60
00:03:27,840 --> 00:03:30,799
Speaker 1: a traffic jam, didn't know what was going on. They

61
00:03:30,800 --> 00:03:34,040
Speaker 1: were diverted to a parking lot. Security guards were scanning

62
00:03:34,040 --> 00:03:36,520
Speaker 1: their badges and if the badge did not work, that

63
00:03:36,680 --> 00:03:38,800
Speaker 1: was how you learned that you no longer had a job.

64
00:03:39,360 --> 00:03:42,600
Speaker 1: And you know, I think that layoffs suck no matter what.

65
00:03:42,800 --> 00:03:45,400
Speaker 1: But I mean, these are people who joined a company

66
00:03:45,440 --> 00:03:47,640
Speaker 1: that they were very proud to work at. A lot

67
00:03:47,720 --> 00:03:51,520
Speaker 1: of them are highly skilled engineers. Some people had been

68
00:03:51,520 --> 00:03:54,840
Speaker 1: in the company for years. And I've never seen as

69
00:03:54,920 --> 00:03:59,400
Speaker 1: much anger and anguish and frustration on LinkedIn of all places,

70
00:03:59,440 --> 00:04:02,520
Speaker 1: as I have over the past week. So that really

71
00:04:02,520 --> 00:04:05,280
Speaker 1: struck me. It's a sign that the layoffs were very

72
00:04:05,320 --> 00:04:06,360
Speaker 1: hastily planned.

73
00:04:06,600 --> 00:04:10,920
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's not a great moment there. The Nevada factory

74
00:04:11,000 --> 00:04:16,360
Speaker 4: scene is really pretty intense. You have, I believe someone

75
00:04:16,400 --> 00:04:20,040
Speaker 4: in there you site saying it's the most humiliating and

76
00:04:20,480 --> 00:04:24,160
Speaker 4: harshest coldness sort of experience in their professional lives to

77
00:04:25,240 --> 00:04:29,040
Speaker 4: be in that line to swipe your badge and let's

78
00:04:29,080 --> 00:04:31,520
Speaker 4: say your badge. First of all, the angst as you

79
00:04:31,560 --> 00:04:33,680
Speaker 4: wait your turn to swipe your badge and to see

80
00:04:33,720 --> 00:04:36,880
Speaker 4: if you're allowed in, and then the feeling that you

81
00:04:36,960 --> 00:04:40,120
Speaker 4: must have had as you get rejected with all those

82
00:04:40,120 --> 00:04:44,040
Speaker 4: people behind you watching. That's I don't know that I've

83
00:04:44,080 --> 00:04:46,440
Speaker 4: ever heard one like that, Dana, right.

84
00:04:46,480 --> 00:04:49,000
Speaker 1: I mean, it's a level of kind of public humiliation

85
00:04:49,560 --> 00:04:52,240
Speaker 1: that for many of these people. I mean, it is

86
00:04:52,400 --> 00:04:55,039
Speaker 1: the most humiliating experience of their lives. That's what people

87
00:04:55,040 --> 00:04:58,640
Speaker 1: are saying. And big tech companies have done layoffs before.

88
00:04:59,200 --> 00:05:01,080
Speaker 1: Tesla has done big layoffs before.

89
00:05:01,160 --> 00:05:01,800
Speaker 2: But now you're.

90
00:05:01,680 --> 00:05:05,799
Speaker 1: Seeing like Tesla layoff content on YouTube and on TikTok

91
00:05:06,240 --> 00:05:10,120
Speaker 1: and all over LinkedIn and the fury and the anguish.

92
00:05:10,160 --> 00:05:12,840
Speaker 1: I mean, it's really going to impact the brand. It's

93
00:05:12,880 --> 00:05:15,680
Speaker 1: going to impact recruiting going forward. And I just think

94
00:05:15,920 --> 00:05:18,599
Speaker 1: the reputation of the company has really shifted in the

95
00:05:18,600 --> 00:05:20,240
Speaker 1: public mind over the past.

96
00:05:19,960 --> 00:05:20,400
Speaker 2: Week or so.

97
00:05:20,640 --> 00:05:23,480
Speaker 4: Now, And how about for you, what are the things

98
00:05:23,560 --> 00:05:25,000
Speaker 4: that struck you the most?

99
00:05:25,160 --> 00:05:27,960
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think this was one item amidst a sort

100
00:05:27,960 --> 00:05:31,880
Speaker 3: of chaotic period of headlines and speaking about layoffs is

101
00:05:31,920 --> 00:05:36,760
Speaker 3: never pleasant. But in his memo, Mosk outlined the rationale

102
00:05:36,920 --> 00:05:39,040
Speaker 3: was like cost reduction and productivity. And I think as

103
00:05:39,080 --> 00:05:41,880
Speaker 3: the days went by and we spoke to some pretty

104
00:05:41,960 --> 00:05:44,720
Speaker 3: key sources high up in the company, it had very

105
00:05:44,720 --> 00:05:47,440
Speaker 3: little to do with either productivity or cost reduction.

106
00:05:47,760 --> 00:05:49,680
Speaker 4: Then this is like him coming back to Tesla and

107
00:05:49,680 --> 00:05:50,560
Speaker 4: being like, what the hell's doing?

108
00:05:51,080 --> 00:05:53,960
Speaker 3: But actually the sense I got over a number of

109
00:05:54,080 --> 00:05:56,520
Speaker 3: days speaking to people pretty high up in the company

110
00:05:56,560 --> 00:05:58,800
Speaker 3: as well, is that it had very little to do

111
00:05:58,839 --> 00:06:01,200
Speaker 3: with it at all. I think has been really busy

112
00:06:01,839 --> 00:06:04,320
Speaker 3: at a lot of other companies and he for whatever

113
00:06:04,400 --> 00:06:08,160
Speaker 3: reason started paying attention again at Tesla. And how it

114
00:06:08,240 --> 00:06:11,480
Speaker 3: was explained to me is that he was very upset

115
00:06:11,600 --> 00:06:14,360
Speaker 3: and angry about the first quarter delivery numbers. And his

116
00:06:14,440 --> 00:06:17,920
Speaker 3: logic was very basic that if deliveries were down twenty

117
00:06:17,920 --> 00:06:21,000
Speaker 3: percent sequentially quarter and quarter, then they should just cut

118
00:06:21,040 --> 00:06:24,039
Speaker 3: headcount by twenty percent. And this was kind of what

119
00:06:24,120 --> 00:06:27,240
Speaker 3: he outlined all the business leaders. He gave each of

120
00:06:27,400 --> 00:06:30,839
Speaker 3: the unit leaders or team leaders the same headcount reduction

121
00:06:30,960 --> 00:06:35,640
Speaker 3: goal and aggressive targets to cut headcount. And you know

122
00:06:36,080 --> 00:06:39,680
Speaker 3: it was seen by other leaders in Tesla's being classic

123
00:06:39,760 --> 00:06:43,520
Speaker 3: must psychology. He wants people to be paranoid about Tesla

124
00:06:43,600 --> 00:06:47,880
Speaker 3: being too big, and he wants them to have a

125
00:06:47,960 --> 00:06:53,120
Speaker 3: psychology of being lean and not bloated, and he didn't

126
00:06:53,120 --> 00:06:55,960
Speaker 3: hesitate to do it with frankly pretty savage effect.

127
00:06:56,240 --> 00:06:58,760
Speaker 4: Yeah, so this is I suppose, going back to the

128
00:06:58,760 --> 00:07:03,040
Speaker 4: first sentence of your story, I guess Musk invoking demon mode,

129
00:07:03,160 --> 00:07:07,200
Speaker 4: as his biographer Walter Isaacson says, But Max, what ed

130
00:07:07,360 --> 00:07:10,120
Speaker 4: was just saying, There's something really jumped out at me.

131
00:07:10,200 --> 00:07:13,280
Speaker 4: Which is this is a bit perhaps a reflection of

132
00:07:13,320 --> 00:07:17,640
Speaker 4: a CEO who was frankly distracted by his other half

133
00:07:17,680 --> 00:07:20,480
Speaker 4: dozen companies and suddenly comes back. It is like, what

134
00:07:20,520 --> 00:07:22,680
Speaker 4: the hell is going on here? This is maybe perhaps

135
00:07:22,760 --> 00:07:25,840
Speaker 4: part of the price you pay when your CEO also

136
00:07:26,040 --> 00:07:27,480
Speaker 4: has all these side gigs.

137
00:07:27,960 --> 00:07:31,000
Speaker 2: Yeah, and I mean we've seen that with Tesla over

138
00:07:31,000 --> 00:07:34,480
Speaker 2: and over again. There's also a sense I have anyway

139
00:07:35,560 --> 00:07:39,040
Speaker 2: that this is in part a performance. Right. Elon sees

140
00:07:40,240 --> 00:07:44,360
Speaker 2: being extremely hardcore and treating employees, holding employees to a

141
00:07:44,440 --> 00:07:48,560
Speaker 2: high standard as like part of tesla'ss like part of

142
00:07:48,600 --> 00:07:52,360
Speaker 2: what makes Tesla special. So I agree, like it does.

143
00:07:52,600 --> 00:07:55,600
Speaker 2: It seems very chaotic. And the crazy thing is this

144
00:07:55,680 --> 00:07:58,080
Speaker 2: is in some ways less chaotic than the product stuff,

145
00:07:58,080 --> 00:08:00,640
Speaker 2: which we'll talk about later. But I do you think

146
00:08:01,240 --> 00:08:03,920
Speaker 2: he's at least maybe partly leaning into this because he

147
00:08:04,000 --> 00:08:06,800
Speaker 2: thinks that it's a way to get performance out of people,

148
00:08:06,880 --> 00:08:08,280
Speaker 2: you know, rightly or wrongly. I think a lot of

149
00:08:08,320 --> 00:08:09,960
Speaker 2: the Tesla employees would disagree with that.

150
00:08:10,200 --> 00:08:12,360
Speaker 1: I'd also like to note that to Max's point about

151
00:08:12,360 --> 00:08:15,200
Speaker 1: this being a performance, like, let's keep in mind why

152
00:08:15,280 --> 00:08:18,360
Speaker 1: the performance is happening. Musk is sort of leaning into

153
00:08:18,400 --> 00:08:21,560
Speaker 1: this idea that he's a wartime general coming back to

154
00:08:21,640 --> 00:08:24,680
Speaker 1: like rally the troops around this Robotaxi vision that Wall

155
00:08:24,760 --> 00:08:27,920
Speaker 1: Street is very leary of. But also this is a

156
00:08:27,920 --> 00:08:30,960
Speaker 1: guy who wants to get paid. I mean, what's striking

157
00:08:30,960 --> 00:08:32,960
Speaker 1: to me about the chaos of the past week is

158
00:08:33,080 --> 00:08:35,160
Speaker 1: in the middle of the night on Monday they lay

159
00:08:35,160 --> 00:08:37,640
Speaker 1: off ten percent of the workforce, and then on Wednesday,

160
00:08:38,120 --> 00:08:41,200
Speaker 1: Tesla drops its proxy and the board is like, we

161
00:08:41,240 --> 00:08:43,920
Speaker 1: want to do another vote on Elon's pay package from

162
00:08:43,920 --> 00:08:47,000
Speaker 1: twenty eighteen. They set up this whole like website to

163
00:08:47,080 --> 00:08:50,200
Speaker 1: kind of rally shareholder support. So this is like a

164
00:08:50,320 --> 00:08:53,920
Speaker 1: CEO who is running five other companies is now very

165
00:08:54,000 --> 00:08:57,240
Speaker 1: much like back in the saddle, sending out orders, you know,

166
00:08:57,720 --> 00:09:00,880
Speaker 1: trying to like redirect the company this new vision. But

167
00:09:00,920 --> 00:09:02,800
Speaker 1: he also really wants to get paid. And so I

168
00:09:02,840 --> 00:09:04,679
Speaker 1: just want to want to make sure that our listeners

169
00:09:05,040 --> 00:09:07,880
Speaker 1: and investors are aware that the kind of wider context

170
00:09:07,920 --> 00:09:11,480
Speaker 1: of Musk kind of seemingly to be focused back on

171
00:09:11,679 --> 00:09:14,400
Speaker 1: Tesla is that he really wants that shareholder vote in

172
00:09:14,480 --> 00:09:17,920
Speaker 1: June for people to approve his you know, billions dollar.

173
00:09:17,760 --> 00:09:20,959
Speaker 4: Pay package, and Dan in that sense This is rough

174
00:09:21,040 --> 00:09:24,920
Speaker 4: timing for Musk as he does try to push through

175
00:09:24,960 --> 00:09:29,840
Speaker 4: that same pay package that a Delaware judge had struck

176
00:09:29,880 --> 00:09:31,679
Speaker 4: down that fifty six billion dollar package and said it

177
00:09:31,679 --> 00:09:33,920
Speaker 4: was illegals. They try to push it through again, now

178
00:09:34,720 --> 00:09:38,720
Speaker 4: bad timing. The stock is collapsing, you're laying off workers,

179
00:09:38,760 --> 00:09:40,600
Speaker 4: you're trying to come up with a new path for

180
00:09:40,679 --> 00:09:44,920
Speaker 4: growth going forward. Is the vote on this pay package

181
00:09:44,960 --> 00:09:48,320
Speaker 4: suddenly in question that he's going to win, or is

182
00:09:48,360 --> 00:09:52,240
Speaker 4: the cult of Elon still so strong among shareholders that

183
00:09:52,280 --> 00:09:53,800
Speaker 4: this will sail through once again.

184
00:09:54,679 --> 00:09:56,599
Speaker 1: Well, you know, it's really interesting. I think ed and

185
00:09:56,679 --> 00:09:58,520
Speaker 1: I have talked to a lot of shareholders who are

186
00:09:58,600 --> 00:10:02,679
Speaker 1: quite frustrated the state of the company. There will always

187
00:10:02,720 --> 00:10:05,960
Speaker 1: be this kind of very die hard, long term Elon

188
00:10:06,040 --> 00:10:09,520
Speaker 1: believers who are super into it. But they're like, you know,

189
00:10:09,679 --> 00:10:12,000
Speaker 1: posting on x like trying to get people to vote

190
00:10:12,000 --> 00:10:14,199
Speaker 1: for it, and they're sharing, they're sharing this website. The

191
00:10:14,240 --> 00:10:16,720
Speaker 1: fact that the website even exists is very telling to

192
00:10:16,760 --> 00:10:20,720
Speaker 1: me that the investor support may not be as strong

193
00:10:20,760 --> 00:10:23,920
Speaker 1: as it was. And there have been some like large,

194
00:10:24,120 --> 00:10:27,600
Speaker 1: you know, retail shareholders like Leo from Singapore. I think

195
00:10:27,640 --> 00:10:31,680
Speaker 1: it is he's like publicly said said that he's not

196
00:10:31,760 --> 00:10:33,560
Speaker 1: going to go for it. And so you're seeing some

197
00:10:33,600 --> 00:10:37,160
Speaker 1: real fracturing among the retail base, which is a really

198
00:10:37,280 --> 00:10:39,640
Speaker 1: big part of the shareholder base.

199
00:10:44,679 --> 00:10:48,200
Speaker 4: And are you detecting similar that there is suddenly some

200
00:10:48,920 --> 00:10:50,200
Speaker 4: question about this topic.

201
00:10:50,640 --> 00:10:53,040
Speaker 3: I mean, the challenge of the last few days and

202
00:10:53,559 --> 00:10:56,199
Speaker 3: with the earnings is going to be trying to understand

203
00:10:56,240 --> 00:11:00,320
Speaker 3: what links the layoffs with the Robotaxi thesis with twenty

204
00:11:00,360 --> 00:11:04,040
Speaker 3: five thousand dollars EV. And on the twenty five thousand

205
00:11:04,120 --> 00:11:08,080
Speaker 3: dollars EV part, you know, some of the big institutional investors,

206
00:11:08,160 --> 00:11:10,880
Speaker 3: you know, we're talking about legacy finance firms on Wall Street.

207
00:11:11,400 --> 00:11:14,559
Speaker 3: A mass market affordable vehicle is a big part of

208
00:11:14,600 --> 00:11:17,040
Speaker 3: the ball thesis for many of them. And so it

209
00:11:17,040 --> 00:11:20,240
Speaker 3: will be interesting if, in the first instance, it's true

210
00:11:20,280 --> 00:11:22,920
Speaker 3: that Elon's not really that interested in a twenty five

211
00:11:22,920 --> 00:11:26,840
Speaker 3: thousand dollars EV anymore, how that passes with the institutional

212
00:11:26,880 --> 00:11:30,360
Speaker 3: investor base. But what they have in common is that

213
00:11:30,600 --> 00:11:33,120
Speaker 3: it's Elon's kind of way or the highway right now.

214
00:11:33,320 --> 00:11:35,440
Speaker 3: You know, that's certainly the sense that Donna and I

215
00:11:35,520 --> 00:11:38,600
Speaker 3: got from all these phone calls that whatever the strategy

216
00:11:38,679 --> 00:11:41,480
Speaker 3: ends up being and however, it goes down with the

217
00:11:41,520 --> 00:11:46,000
Speaker 3: investor base. Elon's basically saying I am now focused on robotaxis,

218
00:11:46,040 --> 00:11:48,480
Speaker 3: and you're either coming with me or you're not. And

219
00:11:49,040 --> 00:11:51,800
Speaker 3: you know, conversely, you know, I think Donna and I

220
00:11:51,840 --> 00:11:55,800
Speaker 3: also got the sense that a lot of those recent

221
00:11:55,960 --> 00:11:58,720
Speaker 3: departures from Tesla where people left of their own volition,

222
00:11:58,800 --> 00:12:01,040
Speaker 3: are because they were like, hey, I thought I was

223
00:12:01,080 --> 00:12:04,719
Speaker 3: working on, you know, this transition to sustainable energy and

224
00:12:05,040 --> 00:12:10,160
Speaker 3: electrifying transport. I didn't sign up for robotaxi, and Robotaxi

225
00:12:10,240 --> 00:12:12,120
Speaker 3: is the direction of the company's going in right now.

226
00:12:12,679 --> 00:12:18,280
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's like a huge departure from everything. I think

227
00:12:18,320 --> 00:12:20,360
Speaker 2: a lot of people, including a lot of Elon Musk fans,

228
00:12:20,600 --> 00:12:22,520
Speaker 2: thought they believed. You know, last week we saw this

229
00:12:22,640 --> 00:12:25,400
Speaker 2: kind of insane thing, which is a lot of pro

230
00:12:25,559 --> 00:12:30,480
Speaker 2: Tesla Wall Street investors coming out and essentially saying, he's

231
00:12:30,520 --> 00:12:33,520
Speaker 2: not going to cancel the twenty five thousand dollar electric

232
00:12:33,559 --> 00:12:36,400
Speaker 2: vehicle because if he did, you know, the stock would tank.

233
00:12:36,520 --> 00:12:39,920
Speaker 2: Like they're counting on this for growth. I think a

234
00:12:39,920 --> 00:12:43,480
Speaker 2: lot of these Wall Street guys, ladies investors are willing

235
00:12:43,520 --> 00:12:46,240
Speaker 2: to go along with this kind of pie in the

236
00:12:46,240 --> 00:12:50,239
Speaker 2: sky Robotaxi idea as long as there's some clear concrete

237
00:12:50,280 --> 00:12:53,440
Speaker 2: growth in the meantime, and Elon in all sorts of

238
00:12:53,480 --> 00:12:56,720
Speaker 2: ways is signaling that he's willing to give that up.

239
00:12:57,080 --> 00:13:00,480
Speaker 2: And again that's like Ed saying like that is insert ways,

240
00:13:00,559 --> 00:13:04,200
Speaker 2: like turning his back on a big subset of the

241
00:13:04,320 --> 00:13:07,400
Speaker 2: people who believed in them, and of course his employees.

242
00:13:07,480 --> 00:13:12,680
Speaker 2: It's stunning and crazy, and it doesn't you know, it's possible.

243
00:13:12,760 --> 00:13:15,720
Speaker 2: Elon Musk is very good at like sort of finessing things.

244
00:13:15,720 --> 00:13:17,559
Speaker 2: He's an amazing marketer. You know, maybe he'll find a

245
00:13:17,600 --> 00:13:19,480
Speaker 2: way to communicate this in a way that kind of

246
00:13:19,520 --> 00:13:21,520
Speaker 2: calms everyone down. But at the moment, you know, it

247
00:13:21,559 --> 00:13:24,880
Speaker 2: really feels like a dire situation, a situation where it's

248
00:13:24,880 --> 00:13:28,079
Speaker 2: hard to see how you come out of this next

249
00:13:28,080 --> 00:13:31,040
Speaker 2: earnings call. And there isn't even more panic than there is.

250
00:13:31,080 --> 00:13:34,320
Speaker 4: Right, We're gonna continue Max for a second with you

251
00:13:34,400 --> 00:13:37,720
Speaker 4: in the Robotaxi. But before we do, Dana for the uninitiated,

252
00:13:37,800 --> 00:13:40,480
Speaker 4: give us a little bit of Robotaxi one oh one

253
00:13:40,840 --> 00:13:43,560
Speaker 4: exactly how it is to work if and when it

254
00:13:43,559 --> 00:13:44,280
Speaker 4: comes to fruition.

255
00:13:45,600 --> 00:13:48,160
Speaker 1: So the idea of a of a robotaxi has been

256
00:13:48,160 --> 00:13:51,880
Speaker 1: around since twenty sixteen when Elon Musk kind of published

257
00:13:51,880 --> 00:13:56,400
Speaker 1: that famous master Plan Part DEU. But it's weird because, like,

258
00:13:56,480 --> 00:13:59,480
Speaker 1: on one hand, your car is supposed to be a

259
00:13:59,559 --> 00:14:03,600
Speaker 1: robotech like, you know, our friend Ed Ludlow here recently

260
00:14:04,000 --> 00:14:07,600
Speaker 1: leased a model why with FSD on it, and the

261
00:14:07,679 --> 00:14:11,120
Speaker 1: idea is that eventually Ed's car will be great enough

262
00:14:11,120 --> 00:14:15,000
Speaker 1: that it will function as a robotaxi. But what Elon

263
00:14:15,160 --> 00:14:18,520
Speaker 1: is talking about now is unveiling like a dedicated robotaxi

264
00:14:18,559 --> 00:14:21,200
Speaker 1: that will be part of a Tesla operated fleet, like

265
00:14:21,240 --> 00:14:25,840
Speaker 1: an autonomous electric kind of WEIMO. And so those two

266
00:14:25,840 --> 00:14:28,680
Speaker 1: ideas are almost in conflict with each other, like why

267
00:14:28,720 --> 00:14:31,040
Speaker 1: would like, so if I own a Tesla and with

268
00:14:31,080 --> 00:14:32,880
Speaker 1: the promise that it's going to be self driving, why

269
00:14:32,920 --> 00:14:35,280
Speaker 1: does Tesla then need to make a different car that

270
00:14:35,400 --> 00:14:37,680
Speaker 1: is a dedicated robotaxi. I thought that my car was

271
00:14:37,680 --> 00:14:41,880
Speaker 1: a robotaxi. So just the messaging around this is very confusing.

272
00:14:41,920 --> 00:14:44,320
Speaker 1: But the ideas that Tesla will run its own fleet,

273
00:14:44,360 --> 00:14:46,920
Speaker 1: I mean they're going after they're basically going to take

274
00:14:46,960 --> 00:14:47,920
Speaker 1: on Weimo.

275
00:14:48,240 --> 00:14:50,560
Speaker 4: So if I've got this right, I will both own

276
00:14:50,720 --> 00:14:54,000
Speaker 4: a y or whatever it may be, that that I

277
00:14:54,160 --> 00:14:56,800
Speaker 4: drive or my robot drives for me, and then when

278
00:14:56,840 --> 00:14:59,960
Speaker 4: I'm sleeping at night, I unleash the robot and I say, hey,

279
00:15:00,000 --> 00:15:02,520
Speaker 4: you know what will make me a little money, and

280
00:15:02,560 --> 00:15:04,880
Speaker 4: it drives around at night and picks up.

281
00:15:04,800 --> 00:15:05,720
Speaker 1: You know exactly.

282
00:15:06,000 --> 00:15:09,160
Speaker 4: In addition to that, then there is the apparently, as

283
00:15:09,160 --> 00:15:16,640
Speaker 4: we understand it, the Tesla fleet of purely Robomax's is

284
00:15:16,640 --> 00:15:20,320
Speaker 4: astonished style, right, I.

285
00:15:20,280 --> 00:15:23,040
Speaker 2: Mean, just like we've just entered the realm of like

286
00:15:23,080 --> 00:15:28,120
Speaker 2: fantasyland basically, which I mean it could be worth again,

287
00:15:28,280 --> 00:15:32,840
Speaker 2: like the both thesis here has always been Tesla swallows

288
00:15:32,880 --> 00:15:36,520
Speaker 2: the entire automotive industry and all along people have thought, well,

289
00:15:36,560 --> 00:15:39,600
Speaker 2: to do that, you need to basically have self driving

290
00:15:39,640 --> 00:15:41,640
Speaker 2: cars because that will make it, you know, that'll just

291
00:15:41,680 --> 00:15:44,160
Speaker 2: make the question of like does your car have better

292
00:15:44,200 --> 00:15:46,840
Speaker 2: design like or is it faster or whatever that'll be

293
00:15:46,880 --> 00:15:50,360
Speaker 2: totally irrelevant. But again I've said this before, like there's

294
00:15:50,400 --> 00:15:52,960
Speaker 2: no clear path to make this happen. You don't. You

295
00:15:53,000 --> 00:15:56,560
Speaker 2: don't just like going from like, oh I have really

296
00:15:56,560 --> 00:16:00,640
Speaker 2: good cruise control to I'm going to see tonight and

297
00:16:00,680 --> 00:16:03,480
Speaker 2: my car is going to like, you know, drive you know,

298
00:16:03,520 --> 00:16:06,200
Speaker 2: Add and Danna around San Francisco while they're drinking or whatever,

299
00:16:06,520 --> 00:16:10,280
Speaker 2: like that's a there's a big gap there, like an

300
00:16:10,440 --> 00:16:13,480
Speaker 2: enormous gap, and so the issue is like how long

301
00:16:14,040 --> 00:16:16,360
Speaker 2: does it take to cross that gap? I think if

302
00:16:16,360 --> 00:16:20,840
Speaker 2: you talk to most experts in autonomy, you're talking about

303
00:16:21,080 --> 00:16:22,920
Speaker 2: a period that's going to be like a decade or

304
00:16:23,320 --> 00:16:23,680
Speaker 2: And that's.

305
00:16:23,600 --> 00:16:26,880
Speaker 4: Why, Max, the stock is collapsing and rather right now

306
00:16:26,920 --> 00:16:30,840
Speaker 4: than Tesla's swallowing the entire auto market, Tesla's and horse

307
00:16:30,920 --> 00:16:33,160
Speaker 4: racing terms, is coming back to the field. It's coming

308
00:16:33,200 --> 00:16:35,320
Speaker 4: back to the pack, and it is you know, day

309
00:16:35,320 --> 00:16:37,640
Speaker 4: by day it is still has a large lead, but

310
00:16:37,640 --> 00:16:41,280
Speaker 4: it's coming back to the rest of the competitors now.

311
00:16:41,360 --> 00:16:43,200
Speaker 4: In his he at one point, I think had a

312
00:16:43,400 --> 00:16:46,240
Speaker 4: tweet or an ex last week in which Max, to

313
00:16:46,320 --> 00:16:49,200
Speaker 4: your point, he said, I'm not quite betting the company

314
00:16:49,400 --> 00:16:53,720
Speaker 4: on this effectively, but going balls to the wall on

315
00:16:54,320 --> 00:16:57,840
Speaker 4: autonomy is blindingly obvious. Now, Max, my question for you is,

316
00:16:58,600 --> 00:17:01,640
Speaker 4: we have how does going balls to the wall on

317
00:17:01,680 --> 00:17:06,120
Speaker 4: something compared to like normal hardcore? Is this like hardcore

318
00:17:06,200 --> 00:17:08,640
Speaker 4: to the fifth power or how do I just sort

319
00:17:08,640 --> 00:17:11,800
Speaker 4: of implying that in the hierarchy of hardcore.

320
00:17:11,880 --> 00:17:14,359
Speaker 2: Noess, it goes ball to the wall, and then if

321
00:17:14,400 --> 00:17:17,600
Speaker 2: you get up into another gear you're in extremely hardcore

322
00:17:17,720 --> 00:17:22,280
Speaker 2: or whatever. Bet the company mode I think, I don't know,

323
00:17:22,520 --> 00:17:25,240
Speaker 2: but it sure doesn't sound like he's about to release

324
00:17:25,359 --> 00:17:28,560
Speaker 2: like a really cool twenty five thousand dollars car that

325
00:17:28,600 --> 00:17:31,040
Speaker 2: you can buy next year, and and like there's going

326
00:17:31,119 --> 00:17:35,720
Speaker 2: to be some effort to not bury that car on

327
00:17:35,760 --> 00:17:38,119
Speaker 2: this earnings call, because if they do, it'll be very

328
00:17:38,160 --> 00:17:41,960
Speaker 2: bad for the stock. But I think in the car business,

329
00:17:42,080 --> 00:17:44,760
Speaker 2: historically you need to release new models of car or

330
00:17:44,920 --> 00:17:47,840
Speaker 2: your sales go down. And Elon Musk is making like

331
00:17:47,920 --> 00:17:50,440
Speaker 2: a very different bet, a bet that he can use

332
00:17:50,480 --> 00:17:53,320
Speaker 2: software and the force of his personality and you know,

333
00:17:53,640 --> 00:17:56,800
Speaker 2: maybe some intangibles to sort of change the equation and

334
00:17:56,800 --> 00:17:59,280
Speaker 2: get people to just keep buying the current lineup for

335
00:17:59,560 --> 00:17:59,960
Speaker 2: some time.

336
00:18:00,240 --> 00:18:03,480
Speaker 4: And into all this you also have, as we mentioned

337
00:18:03,520 --> 00:18:07,120
Speaker 4: at the top, the recall of almost four thousand cyber truck.

338
00:18:07,200 --> 00:18:09,520
Speaker 4: Cyber truck was the shiny new thing. I kind of

339
00:18:09,560 --> 00:18:12,560
Speaker 4: thought that was a fairly high number. Four thousand, all right,

340
00:18:12,600 --> 00:18:14,639
Speaker 4: they got some out the door, right, So four.

341
00:18:14,520 --> 00:18:16,720
Speaker 2: Thousand cyber trucks for me, it too soon to know,

342
00:18:16,920 --> 00:18:18,280
Speaker 2: like is it is it good?

343
00:18:18,359 --> 00:18:18,840
Speaker 4: Is it bad?

344
00:18:19,000 --> 00:18:22,080
Speaker 2: Like you just don't really know, like how much of

345
00:18:22,119 --> 00:18:24,879
Speaker 2: that is sort of demand being not as good as

346
00:18:24,920 --> 00:18:27,720
Speaker 2: you'd hope for a car with two million you know,

347
00:18:27,960 --> 00:18:30,959
Speaker 2: reserve initial reservations. How much of it is just you know,

348
00:18:31,040 --> 00:18:33,240
Speaker 2: this is a difficult car to make, as we've discussed.

349
00:18:33,760 --> 00:18:36,160
Speaker 2: You know it could with the Model three they were

350
00:18:36,200 --> 00:18:39,840
Speaker 2: able to start from what looked like very small numbers

351
00:18:39,880 --> 00:18:42,439
Speaker 2: and eventually get up two very big numbers. I suppose

352
00:18:42,440 --> 00:18:44,359
Speaker 2: the same thing could happened before. But like when you

353
00:18:44,359 --> 00:18:49,720
Speaker 2: see headlines like it's beating the Hummer ev it kind

354
00:18:49,720 --> 00:18:52,240
Speaker 2: of hits at the problem with the cyber truck, which

355
00:18:52,280 --> 00:18:54,479
Speaker 2: is that, like we it does not seem like this

356
00:18:54,680 --> 00:18:57,880
Speaker 2: is going to be the kind of like mass market,

357
00:18:58,160 --> 00:19:01,640
Speaker 2: this vision of like Teslas swallowing the automotive industry, it's

358
00:19:01,680 --> 00:19:05,440
Speaker 2: like not happening. Instead, it's differend It's captured a very big,

359
00:19:05,640 --> 00:19:09,399
Speaker 2: very wealthy, arguably very important corner of the market, but

360
00:19:09,520 --> 00:19:12,080
Speaker 2: hasn't really been able to move beyond that. And I

361
00:19:12,080 --> 00:19:14,240
Speaker 2: think one of the reasons is because Elon Musk himself

362
00:19:14,280 --> 00:19:17,120
Speaker 2: can't quite see beyond that, right, He's like an amazing

363
00:19:17,440 --> 00:19:20,760
Speaker 2: intuitive marketer. It's not clear he's ever understood how to

364
00:19:20,880 --> 00:19:23,520
Speaker 2: sell cars to people who aren't like him.

365
00:19:24,040 --> 00:19:27,560
Speaker 4: Dana. For those out there who are inclined to say, oh,

366
00:19:27,680 --> 00:19:30,320
Speaker 4: this is all a tempest in a teapot, and that

367
00:19:30,880 --> 00:19:34,680
Speaker 4: this is the critics and the weak hearted screaming the

368
00:19:34,720 --> 00:19:37,040
Speaker 4: sky is falling, what's their argument?

369
00:19:37,600 --> 00:19:40,840
Speaker 1: Well, their argument is that Elon Musk is the greatest

370
00:19:40,880 --> 00:19:45,200
Speaker 1: genius of our generation and that you know, he's obviously

371
00:19:45,240 --> 00:19:48,879
Speaker 1: really confident about how awesome their neural nets are if

372
00:19:48,920 --> 00:19:51,560
Speaker 1: he's going all out for autonomy, and that now is

373
00:19:51,600 --> 00:19:54,440
Speaker 1: a great time to buy. So you know, I mean

374
00:19:54,480 --> 00:19:56,760
Speaker 1: there are people that believe that.

375
00:19:56,920 --> 00:19:58,720
Speaker 3: You know, we did our best in the big take

376
00:19:58,880 --> 00:20:00,840
Speaker 3: to try and give some of the that clarity on

377
00:20:01,359 --> 00:20:04,879
Speaker 3: where Elon Musk is directing his troops on a ROBOTAXI

378
00:20:05,080 --> 00:20:09,199
Speaker 3: or a cheaper EV model, But now's kind of the

379
00:20:09,200 --> 00:20:11,440
Speaker 3: moment where he has to explain it, because I think

380
00:20:11,480 --> 00:20:14,600
Speaker 3: the downward pressure on the stock year today reflects a

381
00:20:14,640 --> 00:20:18,399
Speaker 3: lot of what we've discussed. That price cuts had their limit.

382
00:20:18,520 --> 00:20:21,200
Speaker 3: They cut to as deep as they could, and they

383
00:20:21,240 --> 00:20:24,359
Speaker 3: still built out inventories of supply. They faced a lot

384
00:20:24,400 --> 00:20:27,600
Speaker 3: of competition in China and now Musk seems to be

385
00:20:27,640 --> 00:20:30,080
Speaker 3: focused not on the business of selling evs to consumers

386
00:20:30,080 --> 00:20:32,719
Speaker 3: around the world, but the big picture of a ROBOTAXI

387
00:20:32,800 --> 00:20:35,040
Speaker 3: So the sense I've certainly got is we just want

388
00:20:35,080 --> 00:20:37,639
Speaker 3: to know the basics, Like, what's the plan here? Elon?

389
00:20:38,280 --> 00:20:42,919
Speaker 4: Okay, so Dana later today first quarter earnings, full earnings

390
00:20:42,960 --> 00:20:45,800
Speaker 4: are out. What exactly are we expecting?

391
00:20:46,720 --> 00:20:48,800
Speaker 1: Well, I mean the numbers are going to be bad.

392
00:20:48,920 --> 00:20:51,600
Speaker 1: I think it's just a question of how bad are they?

393
00:20:51,600 --> 00:20:53,040
Speaker 1: You know, if you and you can look at all

394
00:20:53,080 --> 00:20:58,360
Speaker 1: the typical metrics like EPs, revenue, gross margins, But as

395
00:20:58,520 --> 00:21:01,240
Speaker 1: most longtime teslil watch know, the real thing is the

396
00:21:01,359 --> 00:21:05,520
Speaker 1: tenure of the call. Like is Elon Musk expansive and

397
00:21:05,680 --> 00:21:08,840
Speaker 1: confident and embulent, and does he sell the vision or

398
00:21:09,000 --> 00:21:12,160
Speaker 1: is he like super snippy and like tells the Wall

399
00:21:12,200 --> 00:21:15,000
Speaker 1: Street analysts that there are questions are boneheaded? And does

400
00:21:15,040 --> 00:21:18,000
Speaker 1: he does he sort of get really annoyed and like

401
00:21:18,119 --> 00:21:20,159
Speaker 1: go to YouTube. I mean, so it's it's really like

402
00:21:20,320 --> 00:21:24,080
Speaker 1: the language and his tone that is gonna get be

403
00:21:24,160 --> 00:21:25,560
Speaker 1: the big indicator for Wall Street.

404
00:21:25,600 --> 00:21:28,240
Speaker 2: I think is Dad in a good mood or is

405
00:21:28,440 --> 00:21:29,680
Speaker 2: Dad in a bad mood.

406
00:21:33,800 --> 00:21:36,400
Speaker 4: Okay, So we're talking about the call now, the call

407
00:21:36,520 --> 00:21:40,280
Speaker 4: that Musk will have with investors after the earnings come out,

408
00:21:40,320 --> 00:21:42,000
Speaker 4: which you know what you know, Max, that means it's

409
00:21:42,040 --> 00:21:43,520
Speaker 4: a it's it's bingo time.

410
00:21:43,680 --> 00:21:47,560
Speaker 2: I mean it's the only part of the college right clearly.

411
00:21:47,760 --> 00:21:53,000
Speaker 4: So for our listeners, remind them, how does Tesla earnings

412
00:21:53,119 --> 00:21:54,280
Speaker 4: bingo work?

413
00:21:54,359 --> 00:21:56,520
Speaker 2: Okay, So, first of all, got to give credit to

414
00:21:56,600 --> 00:22:00,080
Speaker 2: Dana Hall, the person who created this, which, actually, to

415
00:22:00,160 --> 00:22:02,399
Speaker 2: be fair, is sort of like a meme thing that

416
00:22:03,160 --> 00:22:07,040
Speaker 2: like the larger community of Elon Musk fans, even even

417
00:22:07,119 --> 00:22:10,640
Speaker 2: critics like they have noticed that he tends to use

418
00:22:10,760 --> 00:22:13,720
Speaker 2: these kind of repeating tropes and as a result, people

419
00:22:13,920 --> 00:22:16,640
Speaker 2: have made for years these bingo cards which we made.

420
00:22:17,119 --> 00:22:20,000
Speaker 2: We did one last quarter. It was really fun ed

421
00:22:20,320 --> 00:22:20,560
Speaker 2: ed you.

422
00:22:20,640 --> 00:22:23,400
Speaker 4: Took part right. You seem to be you really seem

423
00:22:23,440 --> 00:22:24,199
Speaker 4: to enjoy yourself.

424
00:22:24,960 --> 00:22:26,640
Speaker 3: Yeah, I played it. I played him full, and I'm

425
00:22:26,680 --> 00:22:29,080
Speaker 3: going to play him full again this time around. It's tricky.

426
00:22:29,880 --> 00:22:33,200
Speaker 3: There was some well, Max and I found some gentlemen's

427
00:22:33,240 --> 00:22:37,000
Speaker 3: agreements on what did or didn't constitute a particular square.

428
00:22:37,040 --> 00:22:37,720
Speaker 3: But we'll try again.

429
00:22:38,000 --> 00:22:40,399
Speaker 4: Remember, we need an actual job basically ed and I.

430
00:22:40,520 --> 00:22:42,720
Speaker 2: It's like a secret committee that consists of me and

431
00:22:42,960 --> 00:22:46,960
Speaker 2: ed on ib talking about whether or not something you

432
00:22:47,040 --> 00:22:49,879
Speaker 2: know technically. I think last year it was insulting a

433
00:22:49,880 --> 00:22:53,320
Speaker 2: philosophical framework or sorry last quarter. Anyway, We've got some

434
00:22:53,480 --> 00:22:55,399
Speaker 2: new We got some new stuff. A lot of it

435
00:22:55,520 --> 00:23:00,280
Speaker 2: acknowledges this kind of Robotaxi, the questions over the robotaxi. Yeah.

436
00:23:00,320 --> 00:23:03,800
Speaker 4: So Dan hit us with one of the biggest additions

437
00:23:03,880 --> 00:23:06,200
Speaker 4: we have in this quarter's bingo, and what are the

438
00:23:06,240 --> 00:23:07,880
Speaker 4: biggest things we've cut out?

439
00:23:08,840 --> 00:23:10,440
Speaker 1: I mean, we added in a lot of like sort

440
00:23:10,440 --> 00:23:15,040
Speaker 1: of Robotaxi esque lingo. We've got regulatory approval, we have

441
00:23:15,400 --> 00:23:20,600
Speaker 1: limiting factor, profound, end to end artificial intelligence, reasonably optimistic,

442
00:23:21,040 --> 00:23:25,239
Speaker 1: force multiplier, and LMS. Now some of those phrases are

443
00:23:25,280 --> 00:23:27,720
Speaker 1: things that Elan has said before, but in the context

444
00:23:27,800 --> 00:23:30,320
Speaker 1: of this call, like I would expect him to go.

445
00:23:30,520 --> 00:23:32,880
Speaker 2: All in on that ball to the wall, if you will,

446
00:23:32,960 --> 00:23:34,919
Speaker 2: which is I I thought, by the way.

447
00:23:35,080 --> 00:23:37,760
Speaker 4: Oh yeah, okay, oh I see it. Yeah, there it

448
00:23:37,880 --> 00:23:38,440
Speaker 4: is brilliant.

449
00:23:39,080 --> 00:23:41,800
Speaker 1: We have a new color. Last quarter it was red.

450
00:23:41,920 --> 00:23:44,240
Speaker 1: This time we're green for Earth Day.

451
00:23:44,920 --> 00:23:46,280
Speaker 4: Am I to read anything into that?

452
00:23:46,560 --> 00:23:46,720
Speaker 5: Oh?

453
00:23:46,880 --> 00:23:50,440
Speaker 1: Yeah, there's lots of context here. David Green for Earth Day,

454
00:23:50,640 --> 00:23:53,440
Speaker 1: you know, April Earth Day, Earth Days this week, Green

455
00:23:53,600 --> 00:23:56,680
Speaker 1: is the color of money, which PLUSK wants for himself

456
00:23:56,840 --> 00:23:57,959
Speaker 1: and for his shareholders.

457
00:23:58,480 --> 00:23:59,320
Speaker 2: Green with envy.

458
00:23:59,400 --> 00:24:02,800
Speaker 1: He's very envious of Nvidia, and he's very envious of

459
00:24:03,000 --> 00:24:05,200
Speaker 1: open Ai. So there's a lot of you know that

460
00:24:05,440 --> 00:24:07,920
Speaker 1: you really have think of it. Think of it as

461
00:24:07,960 --> 00:24:10,120
Speaker 1: a drop. We're dropping clues for our audience here.

462
00:24:10,359 --> 00:24:13,440
Speaker 4: I gotcha, all right, Max, If we get bingo, Okay,

463
00:24:13,480 --> 00:24:16,840
Speaker 4: if we get it, what's the line that cracks you

464
00:24:16,920 --> 00:24:19,680
Speaker 4: know that uh, that gives it up? Where's it gonna happen?

465
00:24:21,680 --> 00:24:24,359
Speaker 2: I have no idea that the beauty of Bingo is

466
00:24:24,440 --> 00:24:27,399
Speaker 2: that it's completely you know, it's open ended. I do

467
00:24:27,600 --> 00:24:30,800
Speaker 2: want to call our attention to I think it's B three. Uh.

468
00:24:31,040 --> 00:24:33,560
Speaker 2: We had a few different countries last time. This time

469
00:24:33,640 --> 00:24:36,440
Speaker 2: a different country, Miss B three is India. Now, remember

470
00:24:36,560 --> 00:24:38,560
Speaker 2: last week we're talking about he was supposed to go

471
00:24:38,680 --> 00:24:41,960
Speaker 2: to India, which has been canceled at Yeah, he said,

472
00:24:42,000 --> 00:24:44,280
Speaker 2: because he's gonna because he has to focus on Tesla

473
00:24:44,680 --> 00:24:46,720
Speaker 2: and so so this feels like a bit of a

474
00:24:46,760 --> 00:24:48,879
Speaker 2: long shot. But I do wonder if he will acknowledge

475
00:24:48,960 --> 00:24:51,280
Speaker 2: this because you know India, that was a potential you know,

476
00:24:51,359 --> 00:24:54,320
Speaker 2: new factory potential market could be a big financial swing.

477
00:24:54,440 --> 00:24:56,800
Speaker 4: So we'll see if you I mean, Elan, you can't

478
00:24:57,000 --> 00:24:59,679
Speaker 4: cancel a trip like that. We did an entire segment

479
00:24:59,760 --> 00:25:02,680
Speaker 4: of this show on it. That was what was a

480
00:25:02,720 --> 00:25:05,640
Speaker 4: low blow. Now for listeners out there, a couple of things.

481
00:25:05,880 --> 00:25:09,040
Speaker 4: Remember everyone, you can get your own card at Bloomberg

482
00:25:09,080 --> 00:25:13,320
Speaker 4: dot com, backslash Elon Inc. You could follow along as

483
00:25:13,520 --> 00:25:18,479
Speaker 4: Ed plays on his Twitter account at ludlow and right

484
00:25:18,560 --> 00:25:21,720
Speaker 4: Max also on Bloomberg's homepage dot com.

485
00:25:21,920 --> 00:25:25,119
Speaker 2: That's right. We'll be blogging the earnings and I am

486
00:25:25,240 --> 00:25:27,359
Speaker 2: under special instructions to keep an eye on the Bingo

487
00:25:27,440 --> 00:25:29,280
Speaker 2: card during the call. So so I'll be doing that

488
00:25:29,440 --> 00:25:32,639
Speaker 2: and consulting with Ed if there are any questions about

489
00:25:32,800 --> 00:25:33,879
Speaker 2: whether we've got a square or not.

490
00:25:34,359 --> 00:25:37,159
Speaker 4: I ran this through our fancy Bloomberg models, and the

491
00:25:37,200 --> 00:25:39,560
Speaker 4: percent I came up with the percent chance that we're

492
00:25:39,560 --> 00:25:42,399
Speaker 4: going to hit this is seventeen percent, so almost one

493
00:25:42,440 --> 00:25:44,760
Speaker 4: in five, which is you know, I feel like it's

494
00:25:44,800 --> 00:25:46,639
Speaker 4: pretty good. It's like, you know, it gives everyone a

495
00:25:46,680 --> 00:25:49,400
Speaker 4: little something to look forward to. There's a chance. Now, Dan,

496
00:25:49,680 --> 00:25:52,720
Speaker 4: have we figured out yet what happens if we hit it?

497
00:25:53,240 --> 00:25:56,680
Speaker 4: Do we all just start frantically screaming Bingo are their

498
00:25:56,840 --> 00:25:58,639
Speaker 4: gifts for all our listeners? What do we do?

499
00:25:59,640 --> 00:25:59,840
Speaker 3: Well?

500
00:26:00,080 --> 00:26:02,280
Speaker 1: You know, this Bingo project is a work in progress.

501
00:26:02,400 --> 00:26:05,200
Speaker 1: I mean one downside is that everyone has the same card,

502
00:26:05,480 --> 00:26:08,680
Speaker 1: so potentially we could all be winners. But I think

503
00:26:08,720 --> 00:26:10,320
Speaker 1: it's I think it's just a way to kind of

504
00:26:10,840 --> 00:26:13,400
Speaker 1: get everyone to really listen to this earning call as

505
00:26:13,440 --> 00:26:17,879
Speaker 1: a linguist would for the key phrases that Musk uses

506
00:26:18,000 --> 00:26:20,080
Speaker 1: this time around, which is, you know, frankly, one of

507
00:26:20,080 --> 00:26:22,359
Speaker 1: the most pivotal earnings calls of his career. I mean,

508
00:26:22,400 --> 00:26:24,679
Speaker 1: he's been on every earnings call that Tesla's ever had

509
00:26:24,720 --> 00:26:27,680
Speaker 1: since they went public in June of twenty ten except

510
00:26:27,720 --> 00:26:30,240
Speaker 1: for one of them. And you know, tens of thousands

511
00:26:30,280 --> 00:26:32,160
Speaker 1: of people tune in, So we hope that you will

512
00:26:32,200 --> 00:26:34,040
Speaker 1: tune in also and play along with us.

513
00:26:34,359 --> 00:26:36,359
Speaker 2: If we win, you need to buy a cyber truck.

514
00:26:41,760 --> 00:26:46,359
Speaker 4: Okay, So we're now going to do our feud of

515
00:26:46,440 --> 00:26:48,720
Speaker 4: the I guess this is a feud, so this will

516
00:26:48,760 --> 00:26:51,880
Speaker 4: go in our f It's feud ish of the week.

517
00:26:52,480 --> 00:26:57,960
Speaker 4: Max we've got Tucker Carlson, Joe Rogan, and Elon Musk

518
00:26:58,400 --> 00:26:58,840
Speaker 4: do tell.

519
00:27:00,119 --> 00:27:03,600
Speaker 2: On Monday morning, when I was expecting to see, you know,

520
00:27:03,920 --> 00:27:07,800
Speaker 2: further clarification about the ROBOTAXI or perhaps you know, how

521
00:27:07,960 --> 00:27:11,080
Speaker 2: Elon Musk is bringing this new, you know, extremely hardcore

522
00:27:11,119 --> 00:27:14,280
Speaker 2: approach to this chapter of Tesla, he appeared to instead

523
00:27:14,400 --> 00:27:19,800
Speaker 2: be sort of disagreeing, repeatedly dunking on, amplifying various dunks

524
00:27:20,000 --> 00:27:22,880
Speaker 2: on former Fox News host Tucker Carlson, who until very

525
00:27:22,960 --> 00:27:25,879
Speaker 2: recently someone who I thought of as an ally. Tucker

526
00:27:25,960 --> 00:27:28,520
Speaker 2: went on, Joe Rogan said a lot of funny things

527
00:27:29,040 --> 00:27:31,200
Speaker 2: such as, well, I think we have a clip, but

528
00:27:31,440 --> 00:27:35,280
Speaker 2: I can let's play the clip. Evolution is real, and

529
00:27:35,400 --> 00:27:37,800
Speaker 2: if there is, this is in rectant I don't know,

530
00:27:38,320 --> 00:27:42,200
Speaker 2: but it's it's visible, like you can measure it in

531
00:27:42,400 --> 00:27:43,120
Speaker 2: certain animals.

532
00:27:43,440 --> 00:27:46,359
Speaker 5: You can measure adaptation. Yeah, but there's no evidence that.

533
00:27:46,720 --> 00:27:48,000
Speaker 5: In fact, I think we've kind of given up on

534
00:27:48,040 --> 00:27:50,600
Speaker 5: the idea of evolution. The theory of evolution is articulated

535
00:27:50,600 --> 00:27:52,879
Speaker 5: by Darwin is like kind of not true and in

536
00:27:52,920 --> 00:27:56,879
Speaker 5: what sense, well, in the most basic sense, the idea

537
00:27:57,040 --> 00:28:00,360
Speaker 5: that you know, all life emerged from a single sell

538
00:28:00,560 --> 00:28:03,359
Speaker 5: organism and over time, and there would be a fossil

539
00:28:03,359 --> 00:28:04,200
Speaker 5: record of that, and there's not.

540
00:28:04,600 --> 00:28:06,760
Speaker 2: There are lines for Elon Musk. I think we've learned

541
00:28:06,800 --> 00:28:08,639
Speaker 2: that on the course of doing this show. And like

542
00:28:09,040 --> 00:28:12,119
Speaker 2: once when someone goes like way too deep down like

543
00:28:12,240 --> 00:28:16,199
Speaker 2: a scientific rabbit hole. He gets off the bus and he.

544
00:28:16,600 --> 00:28:20,480
Speaker 4: And saying that that Darwin is a fraud and that

545
00:28:20,600 --> 00:28:24,640
Speaker 4: evolution as a hoax would be that red line that's

546
00:28:24,640 --> 00:28:25,399
Speaker 4: been crossed here.

547
00:28:25,800 --> 00:28:29,600
Speaker 2: Yeah, somebody wrote a criticizing tweet and Elon replied, sigh,

548
00:28:30,080 --> 00:28:33,160
Speaker 2: So you know now now Tucker, you know former Fox

549
00:28:33,280 --> 00:28:35,359
Speaker 2: News host Tucker Carlson, do you have a show on it?

550
00:28:35,640 --> 00:28:38,160
Speaker 4: He yeah, he has a show on its show.

551
00:28:38,280 --> 00:28:42,000
Speaker 2: He is arguably the most important content creator on x Now. Elon.

552
00:28:42,240 --> 00:28:44,520
Speaker 2: There was some sort of chat around this, people saying, oh,

553
00:28:44,560 --> 00:28:46,360
Speaker 2: Elon's over Tucker Carlson, and he said, no, I'm just

554
00:28:46,760 --> 00:28:49,720
Speaker 2: just you know, friends can disagree with one another. But

555
00:28:49,840 --> 00:28:53,160
Speaker 2: it does feel like there's a bit of an effort,

556
00:28:53,960 --> 00:28:56,280
Speaker 2: maybe dare I say, having something to do with the

557
00:28:56,320 --> 00:28:58,400
Speaker 2: fact that they're about to report earnings. They're worried about,

558
00:28:58,680 --> 00:29:01,440
Speaker 2: you know, finding by for this car. He does seem

559
00:29:01,520 --> 00:29:03,920
Speaker 2: to be trying to cut a little bit of distance

560
00:29:03,960 --> 00:29:05,840
Speaker 2: between himself and U and Tucker.

561
00:29:06,040 --> 00:29:09,040
Speaker 4: Oh you oh, you're reading that sort of thing into it,

562
00:29:09,200 --> 00:29:13,240
Speaker 4: Like this is him suddenly worrying about how he's viewed

563
00:29:13,320 --> 00:29:16,760
Speaker 4: by his by the base who But that was.

564
00:29:16,760 --> 00:29:19,760
Speaker 2: My thought as I was looking at it on Monday morning,

565
00:29:19,960 --> 00:29:22,320
Speaker 2: although I have to say he did tweet a bunch

566
00:29:22,360 --> 00:29:26,760
Speaker 2: of other crazy stuff, So so I don't. I don't

567
00:29:26,880 --> 00:29:31,040
Speaker 2: know if it may just be that, like there's certain

568
00:29:31,280 --> 00:29:33,760
Speaker 2: certain lines that Elon Musk just won't cross, and one

569
00:29:33,800 --> 00:29:37,040
Speaker 2: of them is saying that everyone knows that evolution is false.

570
00:29:37,520 --> 00:29:39,720
Speaker 4: Dan does this ultimately do we get a cage match

571
00:29:39,760 --> 00:29:43,760
Speaker 4: here at some point between Tucker and eleanor this is uh,

572
00:29:43,920 --> 00:29:46,320
Speaker 4: this is way too much of a of a low

573
00:29:46,400 --> 00:29:47,479
Speaker 4: simmering spat.

574
00:29:48,120 --> 00:29:51,520
Speaker 1: Yeah, I don't. I think it's feud ish, feud ish.

575
00:29:51,880 --> 00:29:54,320
Speaker 1: Maybe a low simmering spat is a bit is better.

576
00:29:54,440 --> 00:29:56,640
Speaker 1: I don't think it really rises to full on feud

577
00:29:56,800 --> 00:29:58,600
Speaker 1: just yet. I'll keep an eye on it. I mean,

578
00:29:58,680 --> 00:30:01,040
Speaker 1: Max is keeping a closer eye that I am. So

579
00:30:04,440 --> 00:30:07,480
Speaker 1: there's only so much Elon content that one can absorb,

580
00:30:07,720 --> 00:30:11,400
Speaker 1: report and produce in a given news cycle.

581
00:30:11,760 --> 00:30:13,880
Speaker 2: I will say it's kind of a weird red line

582
00:30:13,880 --> 00:30:15,640
Speaker 2: with Tucker if this is your red line, because he

583
00:30:15,680 --> 00:30:17,480
Speaker 2: said a lot of controversial stuff in the past. I mean,

584
00:30:17,520 --> 00:30:20,760
Speaker 2: he made like an entire documentary about testicle tanning, and

585
00:30:21,040 --> 00:30:25,080
Speaker 2: and that was okay.

586
00:30:25,160 --> 00:30:27,040
Speaker 4: I guess I think you know what. I think we

587
00:30:27,120 --> 00:30:31,920
Speaker 4: need to end the show right there. That's it, Max,

588
00:30:32,000 --> 00:30:35,280
Speaker 4: Thank you very much, thanks for having me, ed, thank

589
00:30:35,320 --> 00:30:36,040
Speaker 4: you for joining us.

590
00:30:36,160 --> 00:30:37,800
Speaker 3: Thank you so much for having me. And this is

591
00:30:37,880 --> 00:30:41,160
Speaker 3: going to be the most important earnings, maybe in Tesla's history,

592
00:30:41,240 --> 00:30:43,479
Speaker 3: but certainly the most important earnings.

593
00:30:43,480 --> 00:30:46,280
Speaker 1: Fingo Dana, Always a pleasure.

594
00:30:53,360 --> 00:30:56,520
Speaker 4: This episode was produced by Stacy Wong. Naomi Shaven and

595
00:30:56,640 --> 00:31:00,400
Speaker 4: Rayhan Harmanti are our senior editors. The idea for this

596
00:31:00,720 --> 00:31:05,120
Speaker 4: very show also came from Rayhon Blake Maples handles engineering,

597
00:31:05,120 --> 00:31:08,000
Speaker 4: and we get special editing assistants from Jeff Grocott. Our

598
00:31:08,160 --> 00:31:12,200
Speaker 4: supervising producer is Magnus Hendrickson. The elon Ing theme is

599
00:31:12,280 --> 00:31:16,440
Speaker 4: written and performed by Taka Yasuzawa and Alex Sugihira. Brendan

600
00:31:16,520 --> 00:31:19,520
Speaker 4: Francis Newnhim is our executive producer, and Sage Bauman is

601
00:31:19,520 --> 00:31:23,280
Speaker 4: the head of Bloomberg Podcasts. I'm David Papadopolis. If you

602
00:31:23,400 --> 00:31:26,080
Speaker 4: have a minute, rate and review our show, it'll help

603
00:31:26,160 --> 00:31:28,400
Speaker 4: other listeners find us. See you next week.