January 23, 2024 • 27 mins
From our friends over at the Elon, Inc. podcast from Businessweek, hosted by David Papadopoulos, is this special episode we're sharing to our What Goes Up listeners. Please enjoy this episode, subscribe to their feed, and leave a review!
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For years, Tesla fans and critics alike have produced mock bingo cards ahead of Tesla earnings calls. And so, in honor of Tesla’s next call, which will be held Jan. 24 after markets close, the Elon Inc. crew produced our own bingo game. This week we preview Tesla’s Q4 2023 earnings and introduce our picks for which Muskisms will carry the day. You can download a PDF of this quarter’s bingo card here.
In this episode we also recap the other major events from the week: A visit to Auschwitz, a farewell to a former political ally and a paltry attempt at feud of the week.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:03):
Well, Elon Musk gives now the richest person on the planet.
More than half the satellites in space are owned and
controlled by one man, starting his own artificial intelligence company.
Speaker 2 (00:15):
Well, he's a legitimate super genius, I mean legitimate.
Speaker 1 (00:18):
He says.
Speaker 3 (00:18):
He's always voted for Democrats, but this year it will
be different. He'll vote Republican.
Speaker 1 (00:23):
There is a reason the US government is so reliant
on him.
Speaker 4 (00:26):
Elon Musk is a scam artist and he's done nothing.
Speaker 2 (00:30):
Anything he does is fascinating the people. Welcome to Elon, Inc.
Where we discuss Elon Musk's vast corporate empire, his latest
gambits and antics, and how to make sense of it all.
(00:50):
I'm Joe Webber, sitting in for David Papa Duplas for
the first time on Eloni. We're gonna get you ready
for Tesla's earnings called this Wednesday, and we have a
little surprise to take the fun factor to ludicrous mode.
To help us prep the popcorn will convene Dana Hole,
who's covered more Tesla earnings call than any other reporter
I know. Hi, Dana, Good morning. Sarah Fryar, who leads
(01:14):
the Big Tech team here at Bloomberg News. Hello, and
Max Chafkin, Senior reporter at Bloomberg BusinessWeek. Hey, but first,
some recent topics we've discussed on elon ink have been
back in the news. A big one anti Semitism. Both
X and Musk have been accused of amplifying hate speech
on the platform. On Monday, Musk got a private tour
(01:35):
of the Aschwitz concentration camp in southern Poland. Later he
participated in a discussion hosted by Ben Shapiro, a controversial
media pundit. Let's listen, why as.
Speaker 4 (01:47):
Many Jewish friends as non Jewish friends. I'm like Jewish
by association, I'm aspirationally.
Speaker 2 (01:51):
Jewish, Sarah, what do you make of this visit to
Aschwitz and sort of this Musk non apology apology.
Speaker 4 (01:58):
It's extremely crn to go to a concentration camp to
try to launder your image and say that you are
aspirationally Jewish, basically like this happened to your people by association.
I mean, I can't believe it happened.
Speaker 1 (02:20):
Just welcome to the tribe, brother, Thank you. As a
Jewish American, I'm just so happy to have encountered another
Jewish American. Elon Musk I also agree, why is doing
this cringe? So our editor Naomi joke yesterday that you know, normally,
if you commit an anti Semitic faux pa, you have
(02:40):
to go to the Holocaust Museum in Washington, d C.
If you commit a world historical anti Semitic foe pa,
if you allow hundreds or maybe even thousands of crazy
anti Semitic accounts, if you buy into crazy conspiracy theories,
if you, as the world's richest man, promote all this nonsense,
then you have to actually go to Ashwitz. And so yeah,
(03:02):
I mean, he's like attempting to make things right, I guess,
but of course doesn't seem to be really addressing any
of the normal stuff, and is claiming Jewish identity in
an extremely depressing and cringe worthy way.
Speaker 3 (03:16):
In my opinion, just struck me as like a very
political It's like all optics. It's like there's Elon Musk
looking somber with let us note his three year old
toddler on his shoulders.
Speaker 2 (03:28):
And an Auschwitz survivor standing next to him too, and an.
Speaker 3 (03:30):
Oshwitz survivor standing next to him, and then like the
images that were released, it very much struck me. It
looked like a political campaign.
Speaker 1 (03:38):
Stop.
Speaker 3 (03:38):
Obviously, Musk is not running for any kind of office,
but it had all of the stage craft of a
political moment during the week when Tesla's reporting earnings and
so for him to sort of take the time to
fly to Poland and fly back. Why now it's all
because of X and advertising, right, Sarah, I mean, this
is still sort of an effort to lure the advertisers back.
Speaker 4 (03:57):
It's wild because this is the only thing that Elon
Musk and Linda Yakarino are talking about. Linda's the CEO
when they speak publicly like they're just doubling down on
the how could you think we were ever anti semitic? Meanwhile,
if you look at what Elon Musk is tweeting, there's
there it runs the gamut. There's there's all sorts of
(04:19):
anti immigrant sentiments, all sorts of of you know, other
race t stuff, and he's promoting a lot of these
accounts that are the worst of the worst. It is
not just anti semitism. It is a wholesale embrace of
people who were banned before were considered dangerous to have
on the platform in the name of his his free
(04:40):
speech initiative and So.
Speaker 1 (04:41):
The funniest thing about this about this event was that
Elon Musk and the European Jewish Association which hosted it,
started with this kind of thought experiment like what if
we had X during the late Weimar period in Germany,
maybe we would never have had the Holocaust? And Elon
Musk claimed essentially that, yes, if we'd only had Twitter,
you know, back in the late thirties, early nineteen forties,
(05:04):
a Holocaust never would have happened, which, like I guess,
you know, pay sign up for groc guys.
Speaker 2 (05:09):
Okay. Elsewhere in current events, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis dropped
out of the Republican presidential race ahead of the New
Hampshire primary. One of our mini Elon in pilots was
all about DeSantis announcing his campaign on X with Elon,
which was glitchy, shall we say, I.
Speaker 1 (05:28):
Think we've got.
Speaker 2 (05:30):
Just a massive number of people online, so it's serve
as as training somewhat so very glitchy, Sarah Fryar Howell history,
remember that Musk DeSantis embrace just a you know.
Speaker 4 (05:45):
A bad bet, right, but you know, it wasn't the
only candidate that he has aligned himself with. He also
did one of those for RFK Junior, the known anti
vax conspiracy theorist. He's also been in spaces with the
vik Ramaswami. This is is all kind of wishful thinking
on his part, because he would really like it if
(06:08):
he didn't have to cozy up to either Trump or Biden.
But sounds like that's what he's going to have to do.
And he's already We've already discussed on this podcast that
he has said he will not vote Biden. And so
we do see a lot more Trump aligned rhetoric these
days on X, including voting conspiracy theories.
Speaker 2 (06:31):
Max if Runda Santis is out of the race. Who
is Elon's horse? Now?
Speaker 1 (06:37):
I mean we've we're already seeing I looked at Elon's
X page earlier today, and you know, he's he's tweeting
about twenty twenty election stuff. We've talked about this on
the podcast before. He's been stopped to steal curious, you know,
for some time, and he is, you know, reiterating those concerns,
sort of rebroadcasting or or promoting what essentially amount to
like willful misreadings by Donald Trump and Donald Trump type
(07:02):
supporters of the twenty Tony voting results, among many other things.
I mean, he is essentially, you know, moving towards Trump.
As Sarah said, I mean, I think I think we're
already seeing it. I'm guessing we'll see it more like Frankly,
like many billionaires who affiliate with the right right, where
like there were other candidates that they might have preferred.
We have a new Hampshire primary today. It doesn't look
(07:23):
great for NICKI Haley, and I think we're gonna see
this same evolution playing out among other people, not just Elon.
Speaker 2 (07:29):
Musk, Max any Musk Trump predictions. Obviously, Trump was a
prolific tweeter before Musk purchased the platform. Trump obviously has
not been active on X but there's sets up this
dynamic where you've got Musk and Trump.
Speaker 1 (07:48):
Perhaps another first of all, to me, Musk supporting Trump
is like a four on conclusion. Basically, I think it's
it's going to happen. I think you could argue it is,
it has already happened. The real question to me is
like what happens. You know after twenty twenty, there were
all of these right leaning social networks that launched, you know,
one of which was truth Social, Donald Trump's company, and
(08:08):
then another one of them is X essentially, and it
does seem like X has a chance of like claiming
that market. You do sort of wonder, you know, this
is kind of a deep cut. I mean, you really
have to be the interested in sort of right wing
media and media landscape to care like what happens to
truth Social, parlor Getter, what's the right wing dating site
of the right stuff?
Speaker 2 (08:26):
Like, they're all these sort of.
Speaker 1 (08:27):
Media business media adjacent businesses that seem like their reason
for being doesn't quite doesn't exist as much now that
now that Elon Musk has so firmly turned X to
that market.
Speaker 2 (08:39):
So in that sense, you know, it's like all gravy
for Elon.
Speaker 1 (08:42):
I think I think the consolidation of the Republican Party
probably allows, you know, X honestly to consolidate this sort
of ecosystem.
Speaker 4 (08:50):
But let's be clear, Trump does not need X the
way he needed Twitter in twenty twenty or twenty sixteen.
It is a completely different platform now and Trump has
managed to build up his own network that he has
control over of email addresses, of phone numbers, of people
who will hand him those five dollars donations when he
(09:12):
sends a scary thought. I think that that's really how
we are seeing political fundraising evolve, and the idea that
a politician needs to use X in order to rally
their base may still be in Musk's mind, which is
why he rewarded the candidates that we're leaning into it.
But as we've seen, that hasn't been successful for them.
(09:34):
And I think that what Trump is seeing with a
platform is the same thing we're all seeing. It is
not as effective anymore for driving results with an audience.
The followers that it shows you you have are not
all visiting the platform anymore. So I think in that sense,
maybe Musk needs Trump more than Trump needs Musk at
(09:55):
this point.
Speaker 1 (09:56):
I one hundred percent agree with that, And I do
think there's some question about whether Trump ever needed Twitter,
like I think there was a there has been a
tendency to kind of like overstate the impact of social media,
and a lot of times media kind of chases like
whatever people are into rather than like setting the agenda.
But with Trump, it definitely is kind of has reached
(10:18):
a different dynamic where he's basically been absent from this
platform for a very long time, and it hasn't seemed
to make a huge difference.
Speaker 2 (10:25):
One more fallout of DeSantis exiting the race, there was
a potential Few of the Week max from Elon Musk
trolling economist Paul Krugman, who's a commist at the New
York Times. What happened?
Speaker 1 (10:39):
Well, I mean, I'm a little as an Elon feud connoisseur,
I am sad to report that Paul Krugman, the Nobel
Prize winning economists Princeton University, New York Times columnist, well
known progressive liberal commentator, did not take the bait.
Speaker 2 (10:54):
So it's kind of a fake.
Speaker 1 (10:55):
Krugman trolled DeSantis, essentially saying like, let's not forget how
wrong Rondistances was on covid, pointing to long standing criticisms
among the left that Dessant has kind of ignored you know,
basic CDC guidelines and so on, and Elon must responded like,
you are a disgrace to the economics profession, which Krugman
sadly did not take the bait. And I'm mostly sad
(11:17):
because it was sort of amusing to think of Elon
as a connoisseur of like academic economics, Like he's like, oh, man,
you know, you're just like disgracing canes or like like
Elon has no idea who like it does not follow
the deep nuances of economics, like he follows the Wait.
Speaker 3 (11:34):
He's starting university and he has an economics degree from
or business degree from Wharton. Come on, he has like
some grounding in business as a point, But.
Speaker 1 (11:42):
That doesn't mean he's like some kind of connoisseur of
who you know, like academic economic academia. Yeah, he doesn't
know what whether Krugman's or disgraced anything. He's just responded
to the vibes.
Speaker 3 (11:54):
It's not a few if it's not what's below a feud?
Is it like a schoolyard scrap. It's like a it's like.
Speaker 2 (11:59):
A we have I think it's a big nothing burger.
It's like it's like.
Speaker 1 (12:03):
On the hurricue, you have the one to five on
the hurricane scale, but below that it's like a tropical storm.
This is like a tropical depression. Maybe I guess as
far as fews go.
Speaker 2 (12:13):
Maybe watch yeah Witchery mix And now for our main
event earnings. Okay. Publicly traded companies like Tesla get to
do these quarterly meetings where they reveal how much money
they made or lost. It's to face the music moment
that gives investors, analysts, and journalists a better look at
(12:37):
what's happening in a given companies business. Dana, you are
the Tesla pro here. How many earnings have you done?
And can you give us a short history of Tesla's
earnings calls?
Speaker 3 (12:49):
So I've covered Tesla since two thousand and nine. They
went public in June of twenty ten, and I don't
think I've ever missed an earnings call. So that's what
ten years, four times year, I don't know, I've done
like over forty maybe fifty that rest in my life.
And they're pretty wild because if you so, like, most
corporate earnings calls are pretty boring, frankly, like the CEO
(13:13):
reads scripted remarks, the CFO reads scripted remarks that basically
repeat what they've just put out in the shareholder letter,
and then they take questions from analysts that are like,
congratulations on a good quarter, Bob, like can you give
us some color about the YadA YadA? And it's just like,
very frankly, it's very boring. Like test Le earnings calls
are not like that at all, like Elon is not scripted.
(13:35):
He gets really pissed off at the analysts. He gets
bored and like a big question like when this call
starts is like ooh, what kind of mood is dear
leader in? And we've had some really wild earnings calls
over the years. I mean, at one point in twenty
eighteen he called Tony Secanagi, who's like a great analyst
at Bernstein, like you know that his question he like
didn't answer his question. He was like this is boring
(13:57):
and boneheaded. At one point he went to YouTube and
took spent twenty five minutes talking to like a millennial
who has like a YouTube channel, and they're just really
they're very interesting calls, and so much of like how
Stock reacts is to what does Elon say? And then
like what's the actual news from the call? Because it's
all about like what does he say about, you know,
(14:18):
things going forward? And the January call is always really
important because it kind of sets out the expectations for
the year. So tomorrow the question is like are we
going to get embulent, expansive, like wonderful Elon or is
he going to be like morose Elon talking about how
they're digging their own grave, Like that's the big question
on everybody's mind.
Speaker 2 (14:36):
Elon is such a fixture here, right, Like how many
of these has he missed in your time covering the company?
Speaker 3 (14:44):
He's only missed one. He made this big show a
couple of years ago about how he's like not going
to be in the earnings calls unless he has big
news to announce. And then there was one call that
he missed that the CFO led that was great, and
then Elon was back and he just can't stay out
of the limelight, like he's got to be the main character. Like,
so he's only he's been on every single call.
Speaker 2 (15:06):
Okay, So because this is a January call, this one
is more year ahead leaning than a typical one, which
would typically look back at the previous quarter. Is that right? Yeah?
Speaker 3 (15:17):
Yeah, especially because Tesla has not given guidance for twenty
twenty four. They have not said publicly how many vehicles
they expect to deliver in twenty twenty four. We know
that they delivered roughly one point eight million cars in
twenty twenty three through so like what is the forecast?
Like we're seeing kind of slowing growth in the EV sector.
Like evs are still growing as part of the overall
(15:39):
auto market, but it's not this like blockbuster fifty percent
year of year growth. So that's a big question for investors.
Are they going to say that they're going to deliver
two million or two point five? Like what is the
growth trajectory? And then how much does Musk talk about
all the other aspects of the business. Is he going
to be like, we're an AI company, or is he
going to talk about energy or insurance or you know,
(16:02):
the optimist robot. I mean, there's all these different sort
of aspects of the business that people are curious about.
Speaker 2 (16:08):
And and what do everybody who's watching the company, what
do we think about what the twenty twenty four numbers
could look like, especially after all the price cuts of
last year but also possibly this slowing demand.
Speaker 4 (16:20):
Well did they tend to over promise? You know, because
I know like a lot of companies have the opposite strategy,
where they underpromise and then they try to beat that.
But historically Tesla has said more good things are going
to happen than actually end up happening. So what do
we think?
Speaker 3 (16:37):
It's kind of weird they'll give like a range where
a Musk will be like, well, like there could be
a force measure and things that I can't control, like
earthquakes and pandemics and tsunamis, and like, I don't really
know how things are going to go. But he actually
tends to blame the macroeconomic environment quite a bit, like
you know, on previous startings calls, he's he's really bashed
to FED and high interest rates and been like, look,
(17:00):
you could sell more cars if interest rates were lower.
The fact that interest rates are high is making the
cars too expensive for people, which is why they made
this big gambit to chase volume over profit margins. And
they could do that again. He could say we're going
to continue to dominate and we're going to cut prices,
and I mean that would be one strategy. It's just
that then the margins are much smaller. But you know,
(17:20):
Tesla has room to play with their margins, and we
could see that again in twenty twenty four.
Speaker 1 (17:25):
It also seems like there's like a real guidance and
then an Elon Musk guidance. Elon will throw in hey,
like anything's possible, like full self drive. There's this whole
other category of stuff that doesn't relate to like number
of units sold or like margins where the guidance is
whacked out, and kind of everyone agreed. Everyone understands that
this is like, these are not real timelines. These are
(17:46):
Elon Musk timelines. You know. I was reading an analyst
note that Dana sent me just before we went on,
and they're talking about the question of robotaxis as anywhere
from three years to a decade out like that. That's
the timeline that this analyst was suggest which is like
a huge range, and it reflects the fact that Elon
Musk has essentially said robotaxis are just around the corner
(18:07):
basically every year for almost a decade. So it's like
very confusing and analysts have just learned to, I think,
just kind of ignore slash discount some of those wilder promises.
Speaker 2 (18:24):
And now for the really fun part. The brains behind
Elon Inc. Have created a special bingo card which you
can download at Bloomberg dot com, slash Elon Inc. Or
on the Mini BusinessWeek social media accounts. Max, what is
earnings bingo and how do I play along? Okay, so
earnings bingo is this is a thing that exists.
Speaker 1 (18:45):
We did not invent this you know, all credit to
the Elon stands out there on Twitter as well as
the Elon critics, the tesla Q army. Basically anyone who
has an opinion about this guy has been making these
bingo cards for years.
Speaker 2 (18:59):
And the idea is you.
Speaker 1 (19:01):
Have a card the one that we have, which you
can go to Bloomberg dot com slash Elon Inc. And
download and it's twenty four squares. It's plus I love it,
plus the free space. I'll just tell you, so, some
of these are are ones that I think are definitely
gonna happen like these are. This is like easy money
some of these. So so for instance, through the Okay,
(19:23):
so we've got B I n G G four that's
cyber truck.
Speaker 2 (19:27):
That's come on. That's a gimme. That's practically a free space.
Speaker 1 (19:30):
Now B one is definitely less likely, I would say,
and that one's audibly puffs joint. So, as I understand it,
like my job at Bloomberg now, at least part of
my job anyway, is I'm gonna be listening to that
podcast as the you know, person who has to listen
for the audible joint puffing. By the way, sorry, B
two because It's not enough to just puff a joint.
(19:52):
It has to be it has to be audible.
Speaker 2 (19:55):
Dan, do you have a favorite on here that you're
gonna hopefully get to scratch out.
Speaker 3 (19:59):
Yes. I think what's really interesting is, you know, Elon
just has this very peculiar way of speaking that all
of his fans then adopt. And I am a big fan.
I forget what the square is, but reasonably optimistic, because
you know, Elon will say I'm reasonably optimistic that we'll
have full self driving at the end of the year,
or I'm reasonably optimistic that we will, you know, sell
(20:19):
fifty thousand cyber trucks in twenty twenty four. And so
the Bingo card is really about Musk and his language
and his very unique use of language and how he
invents all these words that then enter the lexicon, like
gigafactory is not a real word, but Elon started calling
his battery plant a gigafactory, and now every automaker in
(20:41):
every battery company on the planet talks about how they
have a gigafactory. Similarly, megapack like what the hell is
a mega pack? It's Tesla's name for their like utility
scale battery products. So I mean, I would love to
get a like linguist on the phone someday to talk
to us all about this. But his use of language
is very unique and it is adopted by his life
regions of fans. And the other thing about the earnings
(21:03):
calls is that like tens of thousands of people listen
to them, like employees listen to them, fans listen to them,
like a lot of people dial in and listen. And
it's not just like Wall Street analysts. It's like hundreds
of thousands of people.
Speaker 1 (21:18):
We talk a lot about on this podcast about like
how to think about Elon, and I think on the
last episode Davey Alba compared him to Donald Trump right
as as sort of a political influencer and so on.
But I was thinking, like with the looking at this
BNGO card and thinking about the way, as Dana says,
that Elon sort of remixes himself, like he has these
tropes that he repeats and reuses, And you know, I
(21:38):
think the sort of great oral poets, right, like the
way that I think linguists believe that oral poetry Homer
and so on was consumed was you'd have these like
little like couplets or little bits of language that would
then be arranged in order. And it's almost like that
with Elon, where he's got these like catchphrases that just
get tossed in and it becomes like a part of
the fandom. As Dana said, it's something that the that
(22:00):
his fans repeat and also that they look for, right
and it's it is like the experience of like one
of these Elon Musk Earnings calls. It's like not all
that different from the Taylor Swift concert right where you
see the snake and you're like, oh, the snake, Like
here it is, except here, it's like it's like optimists
or dojo or the phrase, you know, digging our own
(22:21):
grave or whatever. My other favorite square here is not
many people understand this, which is just like a thing
that he says all the time and just really speaks
to like this sense of inn Elon fandom, of that
you're given access to this truth or really it's like
a set of truths that are not well understood, and
if you understand them, you are going to have You're
(22:42):
gonna get rich, you're gonna you're gonna be a part
of this. It's not only gonna be a source of
cultural meaning, but it's gonna be a source of wealth.
Speaker 4 (22:47):
Now, I was just gonna say, like, I love O
three refers to Earth as a market because that is
just so how he talks about everything, like are you
with humanity or against it? We're fighting for our consciousness,
We're fighting for the future of Earth, and referring to
Earth as a market implies that there will be future
(23:08):
planetary markets, which is of course his worldview.
Speaker 3 (23:11):
And because he uses these tropes so often, part of
the challenge of listening to a Tesla earnings call as
a journalist or an analyst is that you almost get
like a focus hangover, because you have to listen very
carefully for any change in nuance because that's what the
news is like. Is he slightly altering these tropes in
a way that's either positive or negative for the future
(23:33):
of the company, And is he backing away from you know,
dojo or is he talking down cyber truck. I mean,
on the last call he very famously said that with
the cyber truck we dug our own grave. And it
was like, ooh, like what is that about, man? So
you have to listen very very carefully for any kind
of change in nuance or tone.
Speaker 4 (23:50):
We dug our own grave.
Speaker 1 (23:53):
Every big things are gray better than themselves, and.
Speaker 3 (23:55):
It's kind of it's just really wild and usually but
I'm on the calls, I'm like blowug and I'm listening
and I've got my Bingo card. But I'm also like texting,
like employees and analysts and like fans, and everyone's like,
you know, did you catch when he said this? Did
you catch when he said that? And you if you've
never listened to an earnings call, we really encourage you
to join along.
Speaker 2 (24:15):
And play and go to Bloomberg dot com slash elon
and to download our first Bengo card. I think we'll
do this again, will we? Okay, well we.
Speaker 3 (24:27):
Have to the great thing about the Bingo card is
that everybody wins. We only made one card, so for
everyone loses.
Speaker 2 (24:35):
Yeah, yeah, what happens if I win? Do I get
all that money that you were talking about? Max?
Speaker 1 (24:39):
Well, I just want to say, like it sounds kind
of superficial to be Dana opened this conversation talking about
do we get dour elon? Do we get happy elon?
But like that actually matters, and like that's what what
Dan's kind of saying is that because he repeats these phrases,
like it sounds like we're just we're doing like theater
criticism or something. But like the fortunes of this company
(24:59):
hundred it's of billions of dollars, you know, hundreds of
thousands of jobs sort of depend on like what Elon projects,
and like does he sound depressed, you know when he's
talking to this audience of analysts and fans and like
it's such a weird It's just such a weird world
we live in, and like you can kind of understand.
I doubt this is a cause for Elon to believe
(25:19):
in the simulation, but it kind of makes me like
question our reality when so much depends on you know,
basically how Wall Street interprets Elon Musk's mood.
Speaker 2 (25:31):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (25:32):
The other thing that's really fun fun to do if
you have a terminal is while he's talking, watch gip
post and you can see the stock trade after hours
in real time. And if he gets like dark, and
if we get like dark Elon, you will just see
the stock completely tank. And then if he's like embulent
and like very confident, you'll see the stock go up.
Speaker 4 (25:50):
So that's like another trick of the trade that a
lot of people do. You all just learned to terminal function.
Speaker 1 (25:56):
I love that Dan and I are going to be
live blogging on the terminal as well.
Speaker 2 (26:00):
You know, get ready.
Speaker 3 (26:01):
People are also already criticizing our Bingo card. We don't
have a square that says the limiting factor. We don't
have a square that says, you know, talks about population collapse.
But to be fair, like he doesn't really talk about
population collaps on the earnings calls. He talks about them
like all the rest of the time.
Speaker 1 (26:18):
You know what, Listeners, tell us what's wrong with our
Bingo card?
Speaker 2 (26:23):
Tell us what's missing?
Speaker 1 (26:24):
Make your own Bengo cards. We you know, yeah, we'll
be back in qeqe Q one is only three months away, exactly.
Speaker 2 (26:33):
All right, enough, let's call it. Thanks for listening to
Elon Inc. And thanks to our panel Dana, Sarah and Max,
thank you, Thank you.
Speaker 3 (26:44):
Always a pleasure.
Speaker 2 (26:52):
This episode was produced by Stacey Wong me and We
Shaven and Rayhan Hermanchi are our senior editors. The idea
for this very show came from Rayhan. Like Maple's handles
engineering and we get special editing assistants from Jeff crocott.
Our supervising producer is Magnus Hendrickson. The Elon Inc. Theme
is written and performed by Taka Yazazawa and Alex Sigira.
(27:13):
Sage Bauman is the head of Bloomberg Podcast and our
executive producer. I'm Joe Webber covering for David pop Douglass.
If you have a minute, please rate and review our show.
It'll help other listeners find us. Also, let us know
what you think of Tesla Bingo. See you next week.
Well, Elon Musk gives now the richest person on the planet.
More than half the satellites in space are owned and
controlled by one man, starting his own artificial intelligence company.
Speaker 2 (00:15):
Well, he's a legitimate super genius, I mean legitimate.
Speaker 1 (00:18):
He says.
Speaker 3 (00:18):
He's always voted for Democrats, but this year it will
be different. He'll vote Republican.
Speaker 1 (00:23):
There is a reason the US government is so reliant
on him.
Speaker 4 (00:26):
Elon Musk is a scam artist and he's done nothing.
Speaker 2 (00:30):
Anything he does is fascinating the people. Welcome to Elon, Inc.
Where we discuss Elon Musk's vast corporate empire, his latest
gambits and antics, and how to make sense of it all.
(00:50):
I'm Joe Webber, sitting in for David Papa Duplas for
the first time on Eloni. We're gonna get you ready
for Tesla's earnings called this Wednesday, and we have a
little surprise to take the fun factor to ludicrous mode.
To help us prep the popcorn will convene Dana Hole,
who's covered more Tesla earnings call than any other reporter
I know. Hi, Dana, Good morning. Sarah Fryar, who leads
(01:14):
the Big Tech team here at Bloomberg News. Hello, and
Max Chafkin, Senior reporter at Bloomberg BusinessWeek. Hey, but first,
some recent topics we've discussed on elon ink have been
back in the news. A big one anti Semitism. Both
X and Musk have been accused of amplifying hate speech
on the platform. On Monday, Musk got a private tour
(01:35):
of the Aschwitz concentration camp in southern Poland. Later he
participated in a discussion hosted by Ben Shapiro, a controversial
media pundit. Let's listen, why as.
Speaker 4 (01:47):
Many Jewish friends as non Jewish friends. I'm like Jewish
by association, I'm aspirationally.
Speaker 2 (01:51):
Jewish, Sarah, what do you make of this visit to
Aschwitz and sort of this Musk non apology apology.
Speaker 4 (01:58):
It's extremely crn to go to a concentration camp to
try to launder your image and say that you are
aspirationally Jewish, basically like this happened to your people by association.
I mean, I can't believe it happened.
Speaker 1 (02:20):
Just welcome to the tribe, brother, Thank you. As a
Jewish American, I'm just so happy to have encountered another
Jewish American. Elon Musk I also agree, why is doing
this cringe? So our editor Naomi joke yesterday that you know, normally,
if you commit an anti Semitic faux pa, you have
(02:40):
to go to the Holocaust Museum in Washington, d C.
If you commit a world historical anti Semitic foe pa,
if you allow hundreds or maybe even thousands of crazy
anti Semitic accounts, if you buy into crazy conspiracy theories,
if you, as the world's richest man, promote all this nonsense,
then you have to actually go to Ashwitz. And so yeah,
(03:02):
I mean, he's like attempting to make things right, I guess,
but of course doesn't seem to be really addressing any
of the normal stuff, and is claiming Jewish identity in
an extremely depressing and cringe worthy way.
Speaker 3 (03:16):
In my opinion, just struck me as like a very
political It's like all optics. It's like there's Elon Musk
looking somber with let us note his three year old
toddler on his shoulders.
Speaker 2 (03:28):
And an Auschwitz survivor standing next to him too, and an.
Speaker 3 (03:30):
Oshwitz survivor standing next to him, and then like the
images that were released, it very much struck me. It
looked like a political campaign.
Speaker 1 (03:38):
Stop.
Speaker 3 (03:38):
Obviously, Musk is not running for any kind of office,
but it had all of the stage craft of a
political moment during the week when Tesla's reporting earnings and
so for him to sort of take the time to
fly to Poland and fly back. Why now it's all
because of X and advertising, right, Sarah, I mean, this
is still sort of an effort to lure the advertisers back.
Speaker 4 (03:57):
It's wild because this is the only thing that Elon
Musk and Linda Yakarino are talking about. Linda's the CEO
when they speak publicly like they're just doubling down on
the how could you think we were ever anti semitic? Meanwhile,
if you look at what Elon Musk is tweeting, there's
there it runs the gamut. There's there's all sorts of
(04:19):
anti immigrant sentiments, all sorts of of you know, other
race t stuff, and he's promoting a lot of these
accounts that are the worst of the worst. It is
not just anti semitism. It is a wholesale embrace of
people who were banned before were considered dangerous to have
on the platform in the name of his his free
(04:40):
speech initiative and So.
Speaker 1 (04:41):
The funniest thing about this about this event was that
Elon Musk and the European Jewish Association which hosted it,
started with this kind of thought experiment like what if
we had X during the late Weimar period in Germany,
maybe we would never have had the Holocaust? And Elon
Musk claimed essentially that, yes, if we'd only had Twitter,
you know, back in the late thirties, early nineteen forties,
(05:04):
a Holocaust never would have happened, which, like I guess,
you know, pay sign up for groc guys.
Speaker 2 (05:09):
Okay. Elsewhere in current events, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis dropped
out of the Republican presidential race ahead of the New
Hampshire primary. One of our mini Elon in pilots was
all about DeSantis announcing his campaign on X with Elon,
which was glitchy, shall we say, I.
Speaker 1 (05:28):
Think we've got.
Speaker 2 (05:30):
Just a massive number of people online, so it's serve
as as training somewhat so very glitchy, Sarah Fryar Howell history,
remember that Musk DeSantis embrace just a you know.
Speaker 4 (05:45):
A bad bet, right, but you know, it wasn't the
only candidate that he has aligned himself with. He also
did one of those for RFK Junior, the known anti
vax conspiracy theorist. He's also been in spaces with the
vik Ramaswami. This is is all kind of wishful thinking
on his part, because he would really like it if
(06:08):
he didn't have to cozy up to either Trump or Biden.
But sounds like that's what he's going to have to do.
And he's already We've already discussed on this podcast that
he has said he will not vote Biden. And so
we do see a lot more Trump aligned rhetoric these
days on X, including voting conspiracy theories.
Speaker 2 (06:31):
Max if Runda Santis is out of the race. Who
is Elon's horse? Now?
Speaker 1 (06:37):
I mean we've we're already seeing I looked at Elon's
X page earlier today, and you know, he's he's tweeting
about twenty twenty election stuff. We've talked about this on
the podcast before. He's been stopped to steal curious, you know,
for some time, and he is, you know, reiterating those concerns,
sort of rebroadcasting or or promoting what essentially amount to
like willful misreadings by Donald Trump and Donald Trump type
(07:02):
supporters of the twenty Tony voting results, among many other things.
I mean, he is essentially, you know, moving towards Trump.
As Sarah said, I mean, I think I think we're
already seeing it. I'm guessing we'll see it more like Frankly,
like many billionaires who affiliate with the right right, where
like there were other candidates that they might have preferred.
We have a new Hampshire primary today. It doesn't look
(07:23):
great for NICKI Haley, and I think we're gonna see
this same evolution playing out among other people, not just Elon.
Speaker 2 (07:29):
Musk, Max any Musk Trump predictions. Obviously, Trump was a
prolific tweeter before Musk purchased the platform. Trump obviously has
not been active on X but there's sets up this
dynamic where you've got Musk and Trump.
Speaker 1 (07:48):
Perhaps another first of all, to me, Musk supporting Trump
is like a four on conclusion. Basically, I think it's
it's going to happen. I think you could argue it is,
it has already happened. The real question to me is
like what happens. You know after twenty twenty, there were
all of these right leaning social networks that launched, you know,
one of which was truth Social, Donald Trump's company, and
(08:08):
then another one of them is X essentially, and it
does seem like X has a chance of like claiming
that market. You do sort of wonder, you know, this
is kind of a deep cut. I mean, you really
have to be the interested in sort of right wing
media and media landscape to care like what happens to
truth Social, parlor Getter, what's the right wing dating site
of the right stuff?
Speaker 2 (08:26):
Like, they're all these sort of.
Speaker 1 (08:27):
Media business media adjacent businesses that seem like their reason
for being doesn't quite doesn't exist as much now that
now that Elon Musk has so firmly turned X to
that market.
Speaker 2 (08:39):
So in that sense, you know, it's like all gravy
for Elon.
Speaker 1 (08:42):
I think I think the consolidation of the Republican Party
probably allows, you know, X honestly to consolidate this sort
of ecosystem.
Speaker 4 (08:50):
But let's be clear, Trump does not need X the
way he needed Twitter in twenty twenty or twenty sixteen.
It is a completely different platform now and Trump has
managed to build up his own network that he has
control over of email addresses, of phone numbers, of people
who will hand him those five dollars donations when he
(09:12):
sends a scary thought. I think that that's really how
we are seeing political fundraising evolve, and the idea that
a politician needs to use X in order to rally
their base may still be in Musk's mind, which is
why he rewarded the candidates that we're leaning into it.
But as we've seen, that hasn't been successful for them.
(09:34):
And I think that what Trump is seeing with a
platform is the same thing we're all seeing. It is
not as effective anymore for driving results with an audience.
The followers that it shows you you have are not
all visiting the platform anymore. So I think in that sense,
maybe Musk needs Trump more than Trump needs Musk at
(09:55):
this point.
Speaker 1 (09:56):
I one hundred percent agree with that, And I do
think there's some question about whether Trump ever needed Twitter,
like I think there was a there has been a
tendency to kind of like overstate the impact of social media,
and a lot of times media kind of chases like
whatever people are into rather than like setting the agenda.
But with Trump, it definitely is kind of has reached
(10:18):
a different dynamic where he's basically been absent from this
platform for a very long time, and it hasn't seemed
to make a huge difference.
Speaker 2 (10:25):
One more fallout of DeSantis exiting the race, there was
a potential Few of the Week max from Elon Musk
trolling economist Paul Krugman, who's a commist at the New
York Times. What happened?
Speaker 1 (10:39):
Well, I mean, I'm a little as an Elon feud connoisseur,
I am sad to report that Paul Krugman, the Nobel
Prize winning economists Princeton University, New York Times columnist, well
known progressive liberal commentator, did not take the bait.
Speaker 2 (10:54):
So it's kind of a fake.
Speaker 1 (10:55):
Krugman trolled DeSantis, essentially saying like, let's not forget how
wrong Rondistances was on covid, pointing to long standing criticisms
among the left that Dessant has kind of ignored you know,
basic CDC guidelines and so on, and Elon must responded like,
you are a disgrace to the economics profession, which Krugman
sadly did not take the bait. And I'm mostly sad
(11:17):
because it was sort of amusing to think of Elon
as a connoisseur of like academic economics, Like he's like, oh, man,
you know, you're just like disgracing canes or like like
Elon has no idea who like it does not follow
the deep nuances of economics, like he follows the Wait.
Speaker 3 (11:34):
He's starting university and he has an economics degree from
or business degree from Wharton. Come on, he has like
some grounding in business as a point, But.
Speaker 1 (11:42):
That doesn't mean he's like some kind of connoisseur of
who you know, like academic economic academia. Yeah, he doesn't
know what whether Krugman's or disgraced anything. He's just responded
to the vibes.
Speaker 3 (11:54):
It's not a few if it's not what's below a feud?
Is it like a schoolyard scrap. It's like a it's like.
Speaker 2 (11:59):
A we have I think it's a big nothing burger.
It's like it's like.
Speaker 1 (12:03):
On the hurricue, you have the one to five on
the hurricane scale, but below that it's like a tropical storm.
This is like a tropical depression. Maybe I guess as
far as fews go.
Speaker 2 (12:13):
Maybe watch yeah Witchery mix And now for our main
event earnings. Okay. Publicly traded companies like Tesla get to
do these quarterly meetings where they reveal how much money
they made or lost. It's to face the music moment
that gives investors, analysts, and journalists a better look at
(12:37):
what's happening in a given companies business. Dana, you are
the Tesla pro here. How many earnings have you done?
And can you give us a short history of Tesla's
earnings calls?
Speaker 3 (12:49):
So I've covered Tesla since two thousand and nine. They
went public in June of twenty ten, and I don't
think I've ever missed an earnings call. So that's what
ten years, four times year, I don't know, I've done
like over forty maybe fifty that rest in my life.
And they're pretty wild because if you so, like, most
corporate earnings calls are pretty boring, frankly, like the CEO
(13:13):
reads scripted remarks, the CFO reads scripted remarks that basically
repeat what they've just put out in the shareholder letter,
and then they take questions from analysts that are like,
congratulations on a good quarter, Bob, like can you give
us some color about the YadA YadA? And it's just like,
very frankly, it's very boring. Like test Le earnings calls
are not like that at all, like Elon is not scripted.
(13:35):
He gets really pissed off at the analysts. He gets
bored and like a big question like when this call
starts is like ooh, what kind of mood is dear
leader in? And we've had some really wild earnings calls
over the years. I mean, at one point in twenty
eighteen he called Tony Secanagi, who's like a great analyst
at Bernstein, like you know that his question he like
didn't answer his question. He was like this is boring
(13:57):
and boneheaded. At one point he went to YouTube and
took spent twenty five minutes talking to like a millennial
who has like a YouTube channel, and they're just really
they're very interesting calls, and so much of like how
Stock reacts is to what does Elon say? And then
like what's the actual news from the call? Because it's
all about like what does he say about, you know,
(14:18):
things going forward? And the January call is always really
important because it kind of sets out the expectations for
the year. So tomorrow the question is like are we
going to get embulent, expansive, like wonderful Elon or is
he going to be like morose Elon talking about how
they're digging their own grave, Like that's the big question
on everybody's mind.
Speaker 2 (14:36):
Elon is such a fixture here, right, Like how many
of these has he missed in your time covering the company?
Speaker 3 (14:44):
He's only missed one. He made this big show a
couple of years ago about how he's like not going
to be in the earnings calls unless he has big
news to announce. And then there was one call that
he missed that the CFO led that was great, and
then Elon was back and he just can't stay out
of the limelight, like he's got to be the main character. Like,
so he's only he's been on every single call.
Speaker 2 (15:06):
Okay, So because this is a January call, this one
is more year ahead leaning than a typical one, which
would typically look back at the previous quarter. Is that right? Yeah?
Speaker 3 (15:17):
Yeah, especially because Tesla has not given guidance for twenty
twenty four. They have not said publicly how many vehicles
they expect to deliver in twenty twenty four. We know
that they delivered roughly one point eight million cars in
twenty twenty three through so like what is the forecast?
Like we're seeing kind of slowing growth in the EV sector.
Like evs are still growing as part of the overall
(15:39):
auto market, but it's not this like blockbuster fifty percent
year of year growth. So that's a big question for investors.
Are they going to say that they're going to deliver
two million or two point five? Like what is the
growth trajectory? And then how much does Musk talk about
all the other aspects of the business. Is he going
to be like, we're an AI company, or is he
going to talk about energy or insurance or you know,
(16:02):
the optimist robot. I mean, there's all these different sort
of aspects of the business that people are curious about.
Speaker 2 (16:08):
And and what do everybody who's watching the company, what
do we think about what the twenty twenty four numbers
could look like, especially after all the price cuts of
last year but also possibly this slowing demand.
Speaker 4 (16:20):
Well did they tend to over promise? You know, because
I know like a lot of companies have the opposite strategy,
where they underpromise and then they try to beat that.
But historically Tesla has said more good things are going
to happen than actually end up happening. So what do
we think?
Speaker 3 (16:37):
It's kind of weird they'll give like a range where
a Musk will be like, well, like there could be
a force measure and things that I can't control, like
earthquakes and pandemics and tsunamis, and like, I don't really
know how things are going to go. But he actually
tends to blame the macroeconomic environment quite a bit, like
you know, on previous startings calls, he's he's really bashed
to FED and high interest rates and been like, look,
(17:00):
you could sell more cars if interest rates were lower.
The fact that interest rates are high is making the
cars too expensive for people, which is why they made
this big gambit to chase volume over profit margins. And
they could do that again. He could say we're going
to continue to dominate and we're going to cut prices,
and I mean that would be one strategy. It's just
that then the margins are much smaller. But you know,
(17:20):
Tesla has room to play with their margins, and we
could see that again in twenty twenty four.
Speaker 1 (17:25):
It also seems like there's like a real guidance and
then an Elon Musk guidance. Elon will throw in hey,
like anything's possible, like full self drive. There's this whole
other category of stuff that doesn't relate to like number
of units sold or like margins where the guidance is
whacked out, and kind of everyone agreed. Everyone understands that
this is like, these are not real timelines. These are
(17:46):
Elon Musk timelines. You know. I was reading an analyst
note that Dana sent me just before we went on,
and they're talking about the question of robotaxis as anywhere
from three years to a decade out like that. That's
the timeline that this analyst was suggest which is like
a huge range, and it reflects the fact that Elon
Musk has essentially said robotaxis are just around the corner
(18:07):
basically every year for almost a decade. So it's like
very confusing and analysts have just learned to, I think,
just kind of ignore slash discount some of those wilder promises.
Speaker 2 (18:24):
And now for the really fun part. The brains behind
Elon Inc. Have created a special bingo card which you
can download at Bloomberg dot com, slash Elon Inc. Or
on the Mini BusinessWeek social media accounts. Max, what is
earnings bingo and how do I play along? Okay, so
earnings bingo is this is a thing that exists.
Speaker 1 (18:45):
We did not invent this you know, all credit to
the Elon stands out there on Twitter as well as
the Elon critics, the tesla Q army. Basically anyone who
has an opinion about this guy has been making these
bingo cards for years.
Speaker 2 (18:59):
And the idea is you.
Speaker 1 (19:01):
Have a card the one that we have, which you
can go to Bloomberg dot com slash Elon Inc. And
download and it's twenty four squares. It's plus I love it,
plus the free space. I'll just tell you, so, some
of these are are ones that I think are definitely
gonna happen like these are. This is like easy money
some of these. So so for instance, through the Okay,
(19:23):
so we've got B I n G G four that's
cyber truck.
Speaker 2 (19:27):
That's come on. That's a gimme. That's practically a free space.
Speaker 1 (19:30):
Now B one is definitely less likely, I would say,
and that one's audibly puffs joint. So, as I understand it,
like my job at Bloomberg now, at least part of
my job anyway, is I'm gonna be listening to that
podcast as the you know, person who has to listen
for the audible joint puffing. By the way, sorry, B
two because It's not enough to just puff a joint.
(19:52):
It has to be it has to be audible.
Speaker 2 (19:55):
Dan, do you have a favorite on here that you're
gonna hopefully get to scratch out.
Speaker 3 (19:59):
Yes. I think what's really interesting is, you know, Elon
just has this very peculiar way of speaking that all
of his fans then adopt. And I am a big fan.
I forget what the square is, but reasonably optimistic, because
you know, Elon will say I'm reasonably optimistic that we'll
have full self driving at the end of the year,
or I'm reasonably optimistic that we will, you know, sell
(20:19):
fifty thousand cyber trucks in twenty twenty four. And so
the Bingo card is really about Musk and his language
and his very unique use of language and how he
invents all these words that then enter the lexicon, like
gigafactory is not a real word, but Elon started calling
his battery plant a gigafactory, and now every automaker in
(20:41):
every battery company on the planet talks about how they
have a gigafactory. Similarly, megapack like what the hell is
a mega pack? It's Tesla's name for their like utility
scale battery products. So I mean, I would love to
get a like linguist on the phone someday to talk
to us all about this. But his use of language
is very unique and it is adopted by his life
regions of fans. And the other thing about the earnings
(21:03):
calls is that like tens of thousands of people listen
to them, like employees listen to them, fans listen to them,
like a lot of people dial in and listen. And
it's not just like Wall Street analysts. It's like hundreds
of thousands of people.
Speaker 1 (21:18):
We talk a lot about on this podcast about like
how to think about Elon, and I think on the
last episode Davey Alba compared him to Donald Trump right
as as sort of a political influencer and so on.
But I was thinking, like with the looking at this
BNGO card and thinking about the way, as Dana says,
that Elon sort of remixes himself, like he has these
tropes that he repeats and reuses, And you know, I
(21:38):
think the sort of great oral poets, right, like the
way that I think linguists believe that oral poetry Homer
and so on was consumed was you'd have these like
little like couplets or little bits of language that would
then be arranged in order. And it's almost like that
with Elon, where he's got these like catchphrases that just
get tossed in and it becomes like a part of
the fandom. As Dana said, it's something that the that
(22:00):
his fans repeat and also that they look for, right
and it's it is like the experience of like one
of these Elon Musk Earnings calls. It's like not all
that different from the Taylor Swift concert right where you
see the snake and you're like, oh, the snake, Like
here it is, except here, it's like it's like optimists
or dojo or the phrase, you know, digging our own
(22:21):
grave or whatever. My other favorite square here is not
many people understand this, which is just like a thing
that he says all the time and just really speaks
to like this sense of inn Elon fandom, of that
you're given access to this truth or really it's like
a set of truths that are not well understood, and
if you understand them, you are going to have You're
(22:42):
gonna get rich, you're gonna you're gonna be a part
of this. It's not only gonna be a source of
cultural meaning, but it's gonna be a source of wealth.
Speaker 4 (22:47):
Now, I was just gonna say, like, I love O
three refers to Earth as a market because that is
just so how he talks about everything, like are you
with humanity or against it? We're fighting for our consciousness,
We're fighting for the future of Earth, and referring to
Earth as a market implies that there will be future
(23:08):
planetary markets, which is of course his worldview.
Speaker 3 (23:11):
And because he uses these tropes so often, part of
the challenge of listening to a Tesla earnings call as
a journalist or an analyst is that you almost get
like a focus hangover, because you have to listen very
carefully for any change in nuance because that's what the
news is like. Is he slightly altering these tropes in
a way that's either positive or negative for the future
(23:33):
of the company, And is he backing away from you know,
dojo or is he talking down cyber truck. I mean,
on the last call he very famously said that with
the cyber truck we dug our own grave. And it
was like, ooh, like what is that about, man? So
you have to listen very very carefully for any kind
of change in nuance or tone.
Speaker 4 (23:50):
We dug our own grave.
Speaker 1 (23:53):
Every big things are gray better than themselves, and.
Speaker 3 (23:55):
It's kind of it's just really wild and usually but
I'm on the calls, I'm like blowug and I'm listening
and I've got my Bingo card. But I'm also like texting,
like employees and analysts and like fans, and everyone's like,
you know, did you catch when he said this? Did
you catch when he said that? And you if you've
never listened to an earnings call, we really encourage you
to join along.
Speaker 2 (24:15):
And play and go to Bloomberg dot com slash elon
and to download our first Bengo card. I think we'll
do this again, will we? Okay, well we.
Speaker 3 (24:27):
Have to the great thing about the Bingo card is
that everybody wins. We only made one card, so for
everyone loses.
Speaker 2 (24:35):
Yeah, yeah, what happens if I win? Do I get
all that money that you were talking about? Max?
Speaker 1 (24:39):
Well, I just want to say, like it sounds kind
of superficial to be Dana opened this conversation talking about
do we get dour elon? Do we get happy elon?
But like that actually matters, and like that's what what
Dan's kind of saying is that because he repeats these phrases,
like it sounds like we're just we're doing like theater
criticism or something. But like the fortunes of this company
(24:59):
hundred it's of billions of dollars, you know, hundreds of
thousands of jobs sort of depend on like what Elon projects,
and like does he sound depressed, you know when he's
talking to this audience of analysts and fans and like
it's such a weird It's just such a weird world
we live in, and like you can kind of understand.
I doubt this is a cause for Elon to believe
(25:19):
in the simulation, but it kind of makes me like
question our reality when so much depends on you know,
basically how Wall Street interprets Elon Musk's mood.
Speaker 2 (25:31):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (25:32):
The other thing that's really fun fun to do if
you have a terminal is while he's talking, watch gip
post and you can see the stock trade after hours
in real time. And if he gets like dark, and
if we get like dark Elon, you will just see
the stock completely tank. And then if he's like embulent
and like very confident, you'll see the stock go up.
Speaker 4 (25:50):
So that's like another trick of the trade that a
lot of people do. You all just learned to terminal function.
Speaker 1 (25:56):
I love that Dan and I are going to be
live blogging on the terminal as well.
Speaker 2 (26:00):
You know, get ready.
Speaker 3 (26:01):
People are also already criticizing our Bingo card. We don't
have a square that says the limiting factor. We don't
have a square that says, you know, talks about population collapse.
But to be fair, like he doesn't really talk about
population collaps on the earnings calls. He talks about them
like all the rest of the time.
Speaker 1 (26:18):
You know what, Listeners, tell us what's wrong with our
Bingo card?
Speaker 2 (26:23):
Tell us what's missing?
Speaker 1 (26:24):
Make your own Bengo cards. We you know, yeah, we'll
be back in qeqe Q one is only three months away, exactly.
Speaker 2 (26:33):
All right, enough, let's call it. Thanks for listening to
Elon Inc. And thanks to our panel Dana, Sarah and Max,
thank you, Thank you.
Speaker 3 (26:44):
Always a pleasure.
Speaker 2 (26:52):
This episode was produced by Stacey Wong me and We
Shaven and Rayhan Hermanchi are our senior editors. The idea
for this very show came from Rayhan. Like Maple's handles
engineering and we get special editing assistants from Jeff crocott.
Our supervising producer is Magnus Hendrickson. The Elon Inc. Theme
is written and performed by Taka Yazazawa and Alex Sigira.
(27:13):
Sage Bauman is the head of Bloomberg Podcast and our
executive producer. I'm Joe Webber covering for David pop Douglass.
If you have a minute, please rate and review our show.
It'll help other listeners find us. Also, let us know
what you think of Tesla Bingo. See you next week.
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