Connect with us

Investor's Corner

Tesla spends $0 on ads, still tops automakers in organic engagement: report

(Credit: Harbles/Twitter)

Published

on

A recent report from competitive intelligence analysis firm BrandTotal recently determined that Tesla has the strongest organic engagement in social media among automakers. The electric car maker was able to accomplish this despite spending $0 in paid advertising campaigns on platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and Instagram.

For its report, the competitive intelligence firm analyzed all paid and organic social media campaigns initiated by major automotive brands over a 30 day period. These include companies such as Toyota, BMW, Ford, Audi, Honda, Nissan, Infiniti, Lexus, Cadillac, Porsche, and Tesla in the United States. Based on BrandTotal’s figures, it appears that veteran automakers are still investing a large portion of their budget on Facebook, despite the platform seeing a decline in users over the past years.

Toyota is among the automakers who spent the most on Facebook, allocating 62% of its advertising budget to the social media platform. Other carmakers such as BMW (46%), Ford (55%) and Infiniti (52%) also focused their campaigns on the platform. Alon Leibovich, co-founder & CEO of BrandTotal, noted that a plausible reason behind this is Facebook’s older audience, which fits more with the target demographic of the carmakers.

(Credit: BrandTotal)

“Facebook reigns supreme for paid campaigns among these four digital channels for major autos. Our data shows that when brands are looking to engage older audiences, they lean on Facebook to do so, while YouTube and Instagram are mostly used to reach younger audiences,” he said.

Other social media platforms that proved popular for advertising were YouTube, which took a third to almost half of the budget of brands like Honda, Cadillac, Porsche, and Audi. Instagram also proved very popular, with Porsche, BMW, and Infiniti spending 30-40% of their ad budget on the photo-sharing platform. Twitter takes the last place in BrandTotal’s list, with only BMW spending 20% of its budget on the site.

Advertisement

Standing in stark contrast from other carmakers is Tesla, which spent $0 in paid advertising on all social media platforms. Despite this, BrandTotal’s results point to the Silicon Valley-based electric car maker having the most organic engagements in social media. Tesla’s presence on Instagram was particularly prolific, with 55% of the company’s social activity happening on the photo-sharing site. Tesla also has a formidable presence on Twitter, with 11% of the company’s social media activity occurring on the platform. Of course, the presence of CEO Elon Musk’s personal Twitter account, which has over 26 million followers, augments Tesla’s social media presence further.

A company’s high organic engagement in social media happens when a brand attracts people that are highly engaged, according to Leibovich. This is particularly true for Tesla’s presence on Twitter, which sees daily activity from both the company’s supporters and skeptics. “Strong brands are able to command high engagement even without a robust digital ad spend. In Tesla’s case, we see their engagement numbers are high compared to other auto brands allocating spend in their digital campaigns. This may be a result of Tesla’s fans already being engaged and active users on Twitter and other platforms. The brand doesn’t feel the need to spend on paid social media marketing when their organic reach is so strong,” he said.

Tesla and Elon Musk’s strong online presence has proven to be a double-edged sword for the electric car maker. Musk’s Twitter account, for example, serves as one of Tesla’s most effective tools for the company to communicate with owners and enthusiasts, but it has also proven to be dangerous. The CEO’s Twitter account, for one, was a key reason behind the creation of safety features such as Sentry Mode, but at the same time, Musk’s tweets have also attracted the ire of regulators such as the Securities and Exchange Commission. The high interest garnered by Tesla and Elon Musk has also attracted an extraordinary amount of coverage from mainstream media, both negative and positive.

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.

Advertisement
Comments

Investor's Corner

Tesla gets tip of the hat from major Wall Street firm on self-driving prowess

“Tesla is at the forefront of autonomous driving, supported by a camera-only approach that is technically harder but much cheaper than the multi-sensor systems widely used in the industry. This strategy should allow Tesla to scale more profitably compared to Robotaxi competitors, helped by a growing data engine from its existing fleet,” BoA wrote.

Published

on

Credit: Tesla

Tesla received a tip of the hat from major Wall Street firm Bank of America on Wednesday, as it reinitiated coverage on Tesla shares with a bullish stance that comes with a ‘Buy’ rating and a $460 price target.

In a new note that marks a sharp reversal from its neutral position earlier in 2025, the bank declared Tesla’s Full Self-Driving (FSD) technology the “leading consumer autonomy solution.”

Analysts highlighted Tesla’s camera-only architecture, known as Tesla Vision, as a strategic masterstroke. While technically more challenging than the multi-sensor setups favored by rivals, the vision-based approach is dramatically cheaper to produce and maintain.

This cost edge, combined with Tesla’s rapidly expanding real-world data engine, positions the company to scale robotaxis far more profitably than competitors, BofA argues in the new note:

“Tesla is at the forefront of autonomous driving, supported by a camera-only approach that is technically harder but much cheaper than the multi-sensor systems widely used in the industry. This strategy should allow Tesla to scale more profitably compared to Robotaxi competitors, helped by a growing data engine from its existing fleet.”

The bank now attributes roughly 52% of Tesla’s total valuation to its Robotaxi ambitions. It also flagged meaningful upside from the Optimus humanoid robot program and the fast-growing energy storage business, suggesting the auto segment’s recent headwinds, including expired incentives, are being eclipsed by these higher-margin opportunities.

Tesla’s own data underscores exactly why Wall Street is waking up to FSD’s potential. According to Tesla’s official safety reporting page, the FSD Supervised fleet has now surpassed 8.4 billion cumulative miles driven.

Tesla FSD (Supervised) fleet passes 8.4 billion cumulative miles

That total ballooned from just 6 million miles in 2021 to 80 million in 2022, 670 million in 2023, 2.25 billion in 2024, and a staggering 4.25 billion in 2025 alone. In the first 50 days of 2026, owners added another 1 billion miles — averaging more than 20 million miles per day.

This avalanche of real-world, camera-captured footage, much of it on complex city streets, gives Tesla an unmatched training dataset. Every mile feeds its neural networks, accelerating improvement cycles that lidar-dependent rivals simply cannot match at scale.

Tesla owners themselves will tell you the suite gets better with every release, bringing new features and improvements to its self-driving project.

The $460 target implies roughly 15 percent upside from recent trading levels around $400. While regulatory and safety hurdles remain, BofA’s endorsement signals growing institutional conviction that Tesla’s data advantage is not hype; it’s a tangible moat already delivering billions of miles of proof.

Continue Reading

Elon Musk

SpaceX IPO could push Elon Musk’s net worth past $1 trillion: Polymarket

The estimates were shared by the official Polymarket Money account on social media platform X.

Published

on

Gage Skidmore, CC BY-SA 4.0 , via Wikimedia Commons

Recent projections have outlined how a potential $1.75 trillion SpaceX IPO could generate historic returns for early investors. The projections suggest the offering would not only become the largest IPO in history but could also result in unprecedented windfalls for some of the company’s key investors.

The estimates were shared by the official Polymarket Money account on social media platform X.

As noted in a Polymarket Money analysis, Elon Musk invested $100 million into SpaceX in 2002 and currently owns approximately 42% of the company. At a $1.75 trillion valuation following SpaceX’s potential $1.75 trillion IPO, that stake would be worth roughly $735 billion.

Such a figure would dramatically expand Musk’s net worth. When combined with his holdings in Tesla Inc. and other ventures, a public debut at that level could position him as the world’s first trillionaire, depending on market conditions at the time of listing.

Advertisement

The Bloomberg Billionaires Index currently lists Elon Musk with a net worth of $666 billion, though a notable portion of this is tied to his TSLA stock. Tesla currently holds a market cap of $1.51 trillion, and Elon Musk’s currently holds about 13% to 15% of the company’s outstanding common stock.

Founders Fund, co-founded by Peter Thiel, invested $20 million in SpaceX in 2008. Polymarket Money estimates the firm owns between 1.5% and 3% of the private space company. At a $1.75 trillion valuation, that range would translate to approximately $26.25 billion to $52.5 billion in value.

That return would represent one of the most significant venture capital outcomes in modern Silicon Valley history, with a growth of 131,150% to 262,400%.

Alphabet Inc., Google’s parent company, invested $900 million into SpaceX in 2015 and is estimated to hold between 6% and 7% of the private space firm. At the projected IPO valuation, that stake could be worth between $105 billion and $122.5 billion. That’s a growth of 11,566% to 14,455%.

Advertisement

Other major backers highlighted in the post include Fidelity Investments, Baillie Gifford, Valor Equity Partners, Bank of America, and Andreessen Horowitz, each potentially sitting on multibillion-dollar gains.

Continue Reading

Elon Musk

Elon Musk hints Tesla investors will be rewarded heavily

“Hold onto your Tesla stock. It’s going to be worth a lot, I think. That’s my bet,” Musk said.

Published

on

Credit: Grok

Elon Musk recently hinted that he believes Tesla investors will be rewarded heavily if they continue to hold onto their shares, and he reiterated that in a new interview that the company released on its social accounts this week.

Musk is one of the most successful CEOs in the modern era and has mammothed competitors on the Forbes Net Worth List over the past year as his holdings in his various companies have continued to swell.

Tesla investors, especially those who have been holding shares for several years, have also felt substantial gains in their portfolios. Over the past five years, the stock is up over 78 percent. Since February 2019, nearly seven years ago to the day, the stock is up over 1,800 percent.

Musk said in the interview:

“Hold onto your Tesla stock. It’s going to be worth a lot, I think. That’s my bet.”

It’s no secret Musk has been extremely bullish on his own companies, but Tesla in particular, because it is publicly traded.

However, the company has so many amazing projects that have an opportunity to revolutionize their respective industries. There is certainly a path to major growth on Wall Street for Tesla through its various future projects, including Optimus, Cybercab, Semi, and Unsupervised FSD.

  • Optimus (Tesla’s humanoid robot): Musk has discussed its potential for tasks like childcare, walking dogs, or assisting elderly parents, positioning it as a massive long-term driver of company value.
  • Cybercab (Tesla’s robotaxi/autonomous ride-hailing vehicle): a fully autonomous vehicle geared specifically for Tesla’s ride-sharing ambitions.
  • Semi (Tesla’s electric truck, with mentions of expansion, like in Europe): brings Tesla into the commercial logistics sector.
  • Unsupervised FSD (Full Self-Driving software achieving full autonomy without human supervision): turns every Tesla owner’s vehicle into a fully-autonomous vehicle upon release

These projects specifically are some of the highest-growth pillars Tesla has ever attempted to develop, especially in Musk’s eyes, as he has said Optimus will be the best-selling product of all-time.

Many analysts agree, but the bullish ones, like Cathie Wood of ARK Invest, are perhaps the one who believes Tesla has incredible potential on Wall Street, predicting a $2,600 price target for 2030, but this is not even including Optimus.

She told Bloomberg last March that she believes that the project will present a potential additive if Tesla can scale faster than anticipated.

Continue Reading