Investor's Corner
Tesla will raise nearly $1.4B after higher than expected investor demand
Expanding Capital Raise to Meet Demand
Tesla has upped it’s capital raise from $1.15B to $1.38B after investors indicated higher demand for the offering. The company initially planned to offer 968,993 common shares and increased that to 1,335,878 shares of stock, raising an additional $350M. In addition to an increase in the common stock offering, Tesla also raised $850M from a convertible debt sale with an additional $127.5M available to the underwriters. The company initially intended to offer $750M in debt and raised that by $100M to meet demand. We will know within 30 days whether the underwriters decide to exercise their options to purchase, which would net Tesla an additional ~$180M. If the underwriters exercise their options, then the total proceeds of the sale will net $1.38B. This capital raise is intended to “de-risk” the company’s financial condition as they focus on getting the Model 3 into production this year.
Tesla’s bond offering of $850M consisted of 2.375% Convertible Senior Notes due March 15, 2022. Compared to previous convertible bond offerings, Tesla increased the interest rate on the bonds while lowering the “conversion” premium. The conversion premium allows for the bond holder to exchange their bond for common stock, Tesla has set the price of that conversion at $327.50, which is roughly 25% above current market value. Previous convertible bond offerings had a conversion premium of 42.5% above their respective market values and interest rates of .25% and 1.25%. (This analysis does not look at the debt offering SolarCity had before the Tesla-SolarCity merger last fall.)
“Secret” Investor Call
On March 16, a user on the Tesla Subreddit revealed that Elon Musk and other company officials were holding a conference call with the investors directly involved in the sale of shares and bonds. Tesla did not announce the call on its Investors Relations page nor provide a transcript of the call.
According to reddit member electricmusk who was affiliated with the raise and attended the call, Elon Musk revealed that there would be no “beta” version of the Model 3. Instead, the company is going straight to an “early release candidate.” In the industry, that normally refers to cars built on the actual assembly line that will be used for normal production.
If true, that suggests the Model 3 production line is now complete and ready to start producing cars. Later in the conference call, Musk is heard saying “we will be driving it (the early release candidate) within a week or two.” Musk reportedly said that advanced analytical techniques are allowing the company to skip the usual beta phase. He promised the Model 3 will have higher initial quality than either the Model S or Model X because of those analytical tools.
The quick transition to early release candidate cars has some people on Reddit concerned. john_atx, a first day Model 3 reservation holder, explained it this way.
“No, it does mean something. Start of production is July, and they don’t have any cars to test now in the middle of March. So let’s say they can start driving their cars by April. If an issue comes up, they have weeks to get it resolved. Normally you have a fleet of production intent cars driving in all conditions to get data. Tesla won’t have enough time to find the problems and implement corrective actions before Start of Production.”
Those who were able to listen in on the conference call report one other interesting tidbit. At one point, Elon Musk is heard to say — albeit indistinctly — that Tesla will transition to the 2170 battery cells for the battery packs in its Model S and Model X cars “by the end of the year,” according to reddit user electricmusk. Tesla’s 2170 lithium ion cells are currently being manufactured at Gigafactory 1 and being used in its commercial and home energy storage systems. The cells will also be used in the upcoming mass market Model 3 sedan.
Come join the discussion on Model 3 as Tesla prepares to put the vehicle into mass production.
Elon Musk
Elon Musk will give ‘every kid in America’ a SpaceX share in 2027
Elon Musk said he is planning to give “every one of his SpaceX shares to every kid in America” in 2027, stating that “this will be the first of many.”
SpaceX went public earlier this year, and its stock price has been relatively stable since leveling off shortly after its IPO. Based on its current price, it’s a gift of just over $10 billion to children across the United States.
It appears to be closely related to President Donald Trump’s bank accounts for children, which were set up earlier this year as Trump Accounts.
Just hours earlier, Anthropic had announced the establishment of its Anthropic Public Benefit Fund, “a new wholly-owned entity dedicated entirely to public benefit.” Musk responded by stating he recommended “giving the shares directly to the public,” and that he would be doing it that way.
Just a little bit later, Musk said children across the U.S. would be getting a share from him:
Next year, I will give one of my SpaceX shares to every kid in America.
This will be the first of many.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) October 19, 2026
There are roughly 70 million children, meaning someone under the age of 18, in the United States, according to the Federal Interagency Forum on Child and Family Statistics. Musk’s ownership of SpaceX stock shows he has around 849 million Class A shares of SpaceX stock, according to filings with the SEC.
Investor's Corner
SpaceX’s biggest earnings test yet lands Tuesday, and Tesla shareholders should be watching
SpaceX reports earnings Tuesday as Wall Street watches AI spending, Starlink growth and Tesla merger
SpaceX reports third quarter results after the market closes Tuesday, with a webcast at 4:30 p.m. ET streamed on X, and Tesla follows a day later. Bloomberg consensus, cited by Pepperstone, calls for revenue of $12.89 billion, adjusted EBITDA of $6.62 billion and adjusted EPS near $0.15. That would be about 65% growth from the second quarter and SpaceX’s first profitable quarter since its IPO. Analysts expect roughly $6.4 billion from AI and $4.9 billion from Starlink, which is projected to reach 14.3 million consumer subscribers. Capital spending is forecast at $19.6 billion, leaving free cash flow near negative $11.6 billion.
The numbers matter because SpaceX has spent months trying to win over a skeptical market. It priced its record IPO at $135, spiked to $225.64, then sank near $105 in early August. Friday’s close of $146.03 sits about 28% below the June high. The Q2 report beat on revenue at $7.8 billion and put Starlink at 12 million subscribers, but $18.4 billion of capex hurt the stock. Since then SpaceX reached orbit on Starship Flight 14 with 26 Starlink V3 satellites, agreed to buy 800 MHz spectrum for about $8 billion as part of its Starlink Mobile push, and signed a fourth compute hosting deal in four months worth roughly $13 billion a year from December. Management is targeting more than 2 gigawatts of compute by year end and a $100 billion annualized revenue run rate. Evercore ISI, which raised its target to $275, said the quarter may be judged more on those targets than the reported figures
All of this sits under the Tesla merger question. Barclays analyst Dan Levy expects an all stock deal in which SpaceX buys Tesla at a premium, using reference values of $2.1 trillion and $1.5 trillion, and said an announcement would need to come by late October or early November to be voted on at Tesla’s December 6 annual meeting. Barclays estimates Musk would hold about 37% of the combined company and 56% of the votes. Musk said in July that combining companies cannot be discussed on an earnings call, but an investor question asking when SpaceX will merge with Tesla is sitting on SpaceX’s Q&A platform, and Teslarati has tracked how the Roadster demo revived the talk.
If a deal happens, Tuesday’s result would effectively set the price Tesla holders would receive. Their shares would convert into SpaceX stock, along with exposure to a company with a heavy investment on AI, while Tesla itself expects 2026 capex above $25 billion. A strong quarter and calmer spending would make that exchange easier to sell. Another round of heavy capex and a falling stock would make it harder.
Investor's Corner
Tesla’s flying Roadster just revealed something bigger than the car
Analysts say the Roadster demo puts a Tesla and SpaceX merger back on the table.
The Roadster unveiling near Waco ended Thursday night, and by Friday morning much of the investor reaction had less to do with the car than with who owns the rocket technology inside it.
Wedbush analyst Dan Ives said the event “puts the Tesla/SpaceX relationship on the table in a tangible way,” pointing to the propulsion, pressure vessel and control hardware sitting on a Tesla product. Gene Munster of Deepwater Asset Management called the demo “a ridiculous display of engineering” with “no commercial value” beyond embarrassing traditional automakers, though he said it showed Musk wants the two companies together.
The more specific forecast came a day earlier from Barclays. Analyst Dan Levy told clients a deal could be announced before Tesla’s annual meeting, which must happen by December 6, and that an announcement in late October or early November could make shareholder approval harder. Barclays expects SpaceX to be the buyer in an all stock deal, with Tesla holders receiving SpaceX shares at a premium, based on market values of roughly $2.1 trillion for SpaceX and $1.5 trillion for Tesla. If nothing lands around the meeting, the bank still sees an announcement within 6 to 12 months.
The Roadster demo just added more weight to merger speculations. Tesla’s demo used cold gas thrusters and pressure tanks of the kind SpaceX uses on Falcon 9, and Musk described the car as a collaboration between Tesla and SpaceX engineers, as we mentioned in our breakdown of the three Roadster configurations.
Musk has not publicly addressed a deal since the event, as far as we have seen. His most direct answer remains the one he gave at the All In Summit, when he said that with so much collaboration, “who can imagine what action one might take” without ruling anything out. Ives has held to a 2027 timeline since his March note, and Musk pushed back on the China piece of the speculation when ARK floated a year end announcement in August.
The next test is Tesla’s third quarter earnings call on October 21. However, we recall in July that Musk told analysts, “we can’t talk about combining companies and that kind of thing on an earnings call,” so a clear answer wouldn’t be expected.