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Trucking veteran Navistar looks to outnumber Tesla Semi by 2025

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Trucking veteran Navistar International Corp. says it will launch more electric trucks on the roads than Tesla by 2025. In a statement to Trucks.com, Navistar CEO Troy Clarke declared that his firm’s electric trucks would outnumber the Tesla Semi on the roads, and cites the company’s experience as reason for its future success.

In a lot of ways, Clarke’s words towards its Elon Musk-led rival are not empty. Navistar, after all, commands a pretty large part of the trucking industry, with the brand holding 11 percent of the market in the Class 8 segment, the heaviest weight classification in the business. According to the Navistar CEO, it would be quite easy for the trucking veteran to eclipse the Tesla Semi because the firm has a lot of experience and a solid, proven reputation.

“Customers know us, and they know that when we give them a truck, it gives them a guarantee that this truck is going to serve their needs, because we understand how our customers make money.”

Quite interestingly, Navistar, just like Tesla, has not started manufacturing its electric big rigs yet. The CEO did state, however, that the veteran firm’s electric truck will be ready for a roll-out sometime in late 2019 or early 2020.

In order to bring its electric truck to life, Navistar would be collaborating with Volkswagen Truck & Bus, which is also an established, formidable presence in the long-haul industry. VW Truck & Bus currently owns 17 percent of Navistar, which allows both firms to work together on vehicle development and design, from the exterior to the motors of the upcoming truck.

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While it seems quite ironic to see Navistar, which does not have an electric truck yet, challenge the Tesla Semi, Stephens Inc. transport analyst Brad Delco believes that the veteran truckmaker is well grounded in its declaration. According to the analyst, it all comes down to dealerships and service centers available to customers — something that Tesla is still in the process of achieving.

“(Navistar) has an established network of dealers nationwide to service the product… With established brands such as International, Peterbilt, Kenworth, and Freightliner, if something goes astray, those trucks get pulled into their dealerships to get fixed immediately, particularly when under warranty.”

Despite these reservations, however, Tesla continues to grow at a rate that is nigh-unprecedented in the auto industry. UPS has recently become the largest Tesla Semi customer to date, putting in 125 pre-orders and joining other large fleet owners such as PepsiCo, J.B. Hunt, Anheuser-Busch, Walmart, and Sysco with semi-truck reservations.

While Tesla might not have the infrastructure to rival legacy trucking firms such as Navistar head-on currently, the California-based electric carmaker has the advantage of momentum. Thus, it might only be a matter of time before Tesla catches up to the most formidable brands in the auto industry.

Apart from this, the Tesla Semi is also designed with quality and durability in mind, with CEO Elon Musk emphasizing that the massive vehicles would come with a 1 million-mile warranty. Coupled with a drivetrain that’s powered by four electric motors and Tesla’s formidable software suite that will allow for Convoy Mode, the Silicon Valley-based carmaker’s lack of facilities across the nation might ultimately end up as a non-issue.

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Simon is an experienced automotive reporter with a passion for electric cars and clean energy. Fascinated by the world envisioned by Elon Musk, he hopes to make it to Mars (at least as a tourist) someday. For stories or tips--or even to just say a simple hello--send a message to his email, simon@teslarati.com or his handle on X, @ResidentSponge.

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Investor's Corner

Tesla gets its latest short from Michael Burry: ‘Happy it jumped back to this level’

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Credit: MarcoRP | X

Tesla short seller Michael Burry, the subject of the film “The Big Short,” where he was portrayed by Steve Carell, has revealed he has opened a new bet against the stock.

In a new update to his Substack newsletter in a post titled “Trading Post June 30, 2026,” Burry revealed a new set of bets against Tesla, Caterpillar, NVIDIA, Applied Materials Inc., and the iShares Semiconductor ETF.

In regard to Tesla, Burry wrote:

“And finally I shorted Tesla at 416.22. Happy it jumped back to this level.”

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This means Burry likely opened his new short position after the company’s recent rally on Wall Street, which saw Tesla shares sink in mid-May, only to recover to well over the $400 mark. Currently, shares trade at around $427.

The company saw a big Tuesday as shares climbed considerably, over 10 percent. The size of the Tesla short was not provided, nor did Burry give any information on the position’s structure, the number of shares, dollar value, or whether options were used in the short.

The Tesla and SpaceX merger everyone is talking about is quietly building

Over the years, Burry has been one of the more vocal critics of Tesla, calling its share price “media inflated,” and saying it was “ridiculously overvalued” as recently as December.

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The company has largely transitioned away from being known as an automotive company and instead is much more widely regarded as an AI play, mostly due to its Full Self-Driving efforts, Optimus robot development, and data collection related to both.

This has not pulled those skeptics away from being vocal about their distaste for how Tesla is valued, but there’s no denying that the company is a global force in many things, including sustainable energy, automotive, and AI.

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Investor's Corner

SpaceX gets initial stock coverage from Tesla’s biggest bull

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SpaceX Starship V3 flight 12
SpaceX Starship V3 flight 12 (Credit: SpaceX)

Wedbush Securities is initiating stock coverage on SpaceX (NASDAQ: SPCX), marking the first comments on the company since it went public several weeks ago. Wedbush and its analyst handling coverage, Dan Ives, are widely bullish on fellow Musk company Tesla (NASDAQ: TSLA).

Ives wrote his first note initiating coverage of SpaceX shares on Wednesday with a $190 price target and an ‘Outperform’ rating. The firm believes the company is well positioned off of its IPO because of its wide array of projects, including AI compute power and infrastructure, connectivity projects, and launches.

“We view SpaceX as one of the most differentiated assets within the tech market with a strong footprint across its three core markets, with Starlink driving success with connectivity,” Ives wrote, “Starship launches leading to a demand flywheel and increasing deal flow for its Colossus clusters.”

Elon Musk called it Epic: The full story of SpaceX’s Starship Flight 12

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Wedbush leans heavily on Starlink, which they say is the “profitability driver given the strength of its recurring revenue base of ~12 million subscribers as of June 5th.” Ives believes Starlink is still in the “early innings” of penetrating the global telecommunications and broadband market, as it only holds less than a 1 percent share. However, this number is sure to increase over time.

It also highlights the importance of Starship, which it says is an “essential layer” of SpaceX’s overall success. SpaceX developing and displaying the ability to reuse rockets is a major cost and reliability advantage “as it reduces the necessary hardware launch costs while generating a feedback loop for future flights to improve their launch flight rate without accelerating capex spend.”

Finally, SpaceX’s recent AI/Compute projects are also very elementary, Ives writes. It is worth mentioning Wedbush said its $190 price target is derived from a valuation forecast that sees the company yielding roughly $2.48 trillion of implied enterprise value.

There are also some factors that Wedbush did not take into account with its initial coverage. The firm wrote in the note:

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“We note that there is optional value coming from Starship’s accelerating scale towards sub-$200/kg unit economics, orbital data centers, and enterprise AI monetization as these factors could drive meaningful upside but these face major hurdles, so we do not take that into account with our valuation.”

SpaceX shares are down just over 2 percent today, trading at around $167 at the time of publication.

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Elon Musk

Tesla Phone? Not quite, but close: analyst

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elon musk phone
Photo: Boss Hunting.com.au

For years, there have been images and videos across social media platforms that have reminded me of when I was a 15-year-old kid teased by “Xbox 720” videos on YouTube. These videos are of the supposed “Tesla Phone” that Elon Musk was secretly developing in between leading Tesla with its electric cars and SpaceX with its reusable rockets.

Although Musk has put those rumors to bed several times, it was never completely out of the realm that he could get involved in cell phones in some capacity. Think outside the box and more macro-level, though. Instead of reinventing the computer, Musk reinvented connectivity by developing Starlink with SpaceX.

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It could be something similar, TD Cowen analyst Gregory Williams said in a note last week, where he hinted SpaceX could be gathering some steam to acquire T-Mobile.

Williams said it would be the “clear choice” for SpaceX if it decided to go through with a network acquisition. He also suggested AT&T.

The move would be possible through selling more of its own stock, which would help SpaceX raise the money to purchase T-Mobile, which would cost roughly $300 billion. It could be one of the moves SpaceX makes post-IPO in terms of an acquisition: it already acquired Cursor AI for $60 billion.

Other analysts, like Dan Ives of Wedbush, believe SpaceX and Tesla will eventually merge into one anyway, and that conglomeration could come as soon as this year, some have said.

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The implications of SpaceX purchasing T-Mobile are massive. A combined entity would create a truly ubiquitous network: T-Mobile’s terrestrial 5G towers and Starlink’s growing constellation of Direct-to-Cell satellites. This would essentially eliminate dead zones across the U.S. and potentially globally.

SpaceX would instantly become a full-scale facilities-based carrier with satellite differentiation; a huge advantage. This would pressure AT&T and Verizon heavily.

There are also concerns like a potential reduction in long-term competition, and of course, a deal of that size would face intense scrutiny from government agencies.

The strategic fit is compelling due to the existing Starlink–T-Mobile partnership and complementary technologies (space + terrestrial). It could create a dominant integrated communications player. However, the regulatory, financial, and execution hurdles are enormous — this remains highly speculative with no indication SpaceX is actively pursuing it right now.

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