Liam Denning, Columnist

Musk Poured Rocket Fuel on Tesla’s Stock Crash

The company’s technoking sold some stock right at the top and then kept selling, accelerating a steep slide through 2022.

January 12, 2023 at 12:00 PM UTC

By Liam Denning

Liam Denning is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering energy. A former banker, he edited the Wall Street Journal’s Heard on the Street column and wrote the Financial Times’s Lex column.

Elon Musk seen at a SpaceX press conference in February when Tesla’s stock was coming off the boil. — Elon Musk seen at a SpaceX press conference in February when Tesla’s stock was coming off the boil.
Photographer: JIM WATSON/AFP

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Tesla investors begin the new year trying to escape the shadow of 2022, when more than $670 billion of value was wiped out. At the center of that, in a very real sense, is Elon Musk: Tesla Inc.’s chief executive, technoking and biggest shareholder.

Not as big as he was 14 months ago, though. Musk began heavy selling of Tesla in November 2021. Concerns about weakening demand in China — and, conversely, hopes that the worst is over — have taken center stage of late, especially as Tesla missed delivery estimates for the fourth quarter. But that shouldn’t distract investors from taking a long, hard look at the scale and pattern of Musk’s sales.