Meet Elon Musk! The man who sets ambitious goals, then backtracks
Elon Musk, Chief Executive Officer, Tesla said he does not want to undertake another round of raising equity capital this year. After consecutive quarters of steep losses, Musk reiterated his commitment to swing back Tesla to profit by the third quarter. However, he has a history of setting ambitious goals only to backtrack or delay later on. Let's take a look at the timeline by Reuters:
July 2, 2017: Looks like we can reach 20,000 Model 3 cars per month in December
Oct. 2, 2017: Tesla reports it missed its Model 3 production goal for the third quarter, producing only 260 vehicles for the period compared with an earlier target of 1,500.
Nov. 1, 2017: We expect to achieve approximately 5,000 Model 3 vehicles per week by late Q1 2018, says Musk.
May 2, 2018: "Prior to a planned shutdown in mid-April to further increase production, we produced more than 2,000 Model 3 vehicles for three straight weeks, and we hit 2,270 in the last of those weeks."
Oct. 26, 2016: Musk tells analysts the company’s current plan “does not require any capital raise for the Model 3 at all.
Feb. 23, 2017: We are considering a number of options but I think it probably makes sense to raise capital to reduce risk, Musk says.
March 15, 2017: Tesla says it expects to raise about $1.15 billion from a stock and senior notes offering, as it entered pre-production of its upcoming Model 3 electric sedan.
Aug. 2, 2017: "But we are not, at this point, considering an equity raise. We are thinking about debt, but we are not thinking about an equity raise."
Aug. 7, 2017: Tesla says it plans to raise $1.5 billion in order to further strengthen its balance sheet during this period of rapid scaling with the launch of the Model 3, and for general corporate purposes.
Aug. 11, 2017: Tesla enlarges the Aug. 7 offering and sells $1.80 billion in aggregate principal amount of senior notes due in 2025.
May 2, 2018: In a conference call, Musk refuses to answer questions from analysts on Tesla`s capital requirements, saying "boring questions are not cool."