Bloomberg stated that Elon Musk, the “Technoking” of electric car company Tesla and aspiring CEO of Twitter, lost $12 billion of his own wealth on the day he expressed his political opinions on Twitter.
Musk spends a great deal of time playfully posting on Twitter. Recently, he has spoken in general terms the adjustments that must be done at Twitter, a firm he desires to purchase. On Wednesday, though, the CEO of Tesla expressed dissatisfaction and posted his political beliefs.
Bloomberg said that as the day proceeded, Tesla’s stock price fell to its lowest level in 2022, wiping off $12.3 million of Elon Musk’s fortune.
Tesla’s exclusion was the catalyst
Musk’s rage started with Tesla’s removal from the S&P 500, a list of firms graded according to their social, environmental, and governance (ESG) standards. The S&P 500 is a relatively new benchmark that investors utilize prior to making investing decisions, as reported by Reuters. Consequently, it is evident that the firms on the list have made significant efforts to safeguard the environment and usher in a new age.
Using this measure, Tesla, which has been a pioneer in the development of electric vehicles and is focused on developing battery capacity for networks and promoting solar energy, should qualify. And it did. However, in a recent update, the EV manufacturer was removed from the list, which evidently angered Musk, who tweeted about it.
Margaret Dorn, an official at S&P, told Reuters that Tesla’s delisting followed claims of racial discrimination at its facilities and accidents involving its autonomous vehicles.
When pressed to clarify why Exxon was at the top of the list, an index spokesperson told Reuters that Musk may have been referring to a list of firms that made the index classified by their market capitalization and not by their ESG score.
Musk is the aim
Musk went so far as to assert that the S&P Global rating agency had lost its credibility. Musk’s outspokenness has also landed him on the wrong side of the governing regime. He has frequently bemoaned the White House’s disregard for his and Tesla’s attempts to make electric transportation a reality.
President Joe Biden lauded General Motors and Ford earlier this year for their efforts in electric vehicles without mentioning Tesla.
Musk expressed his anger in the following tweet.
Separately, he predicted that political assaults against him will intensify in the following months.