Investor's Corner
Tesla board backs Elon Musk as he faces the ‘most painful’ year of his career
Elon Musk is known for managing multiple companies, but even those who have the gift of multitasking have a limit. Amidst the fallout of his tweets about having funding secured for Tesla’s possible privatization, Elon Musk is starting to feel a little burned out.
The Tesla and SpaceX CEO recently opened up in an interview with the New York Times. The publication noted that during the hourlong session, Musk acknowledged that he was getting exhausted, and that the past year had been incredibly difficult. Musk also admitted that the exhaustion, partly caused by 120-hour work weeks, was starting to take a toll on his physical health.
“This past year has been the most difficult and painful year of my career. It was excruciating. It’s not been great, actually. I’ve had friends come by who are really concerned. There were times when I didn’t leave the factory for three or four days — days when I didn’t go outside. This has really come at the expense of seeing my kids. And seeing friends,” he said.
Much like Tesla’s struggles with the Model 3 production ramp, a lot of the pressure Musk is currently feeling is caused by self-imposed goals. Elon Musk became Elon Musk due to his grit and determination, and he is never one to give up when faced with a seemingly insurmountable challenge. Musk’s relentless nature is one of the core reasons why SpaceX is currently working to conduct crewed demonstration flights of its Crew Dragon spacecraft as early as April 2019, and why the Model 3 is starting to make its presence known in the US auto market.
Jim Ambras, VP product development at Zip2, the first company that Elon and his brother, Kimbal, founded, recalls the insane amount of drive that fuels Musk. In a recent statement to WIRED, Ambras described how Musk would sleep on a bean bag close to his computer just to get work done. The former Zip2 executive also narrated that at one time, the Zip2 team invited Musk to go mountain biking. Unfortunately, the trail proved to be far more challenging than the team expected, even causing Elon’s athletic cousin Russ Rive to get sick when he reached the mountain’s top. Musk, who was not in any way conditioned to undertake such a physical task, was the last one to the summit. Musk finished the climb, but he pushed himself past his limits to do so.
“We’re all at the top waiting for him. We just assumed he turned around and went home. Then we see him coming up around the turn, and he was just completely red. Beet-red. He was riding his bike, he wasn’t walking his bike, and it was just clear that he was killing himself. He just looked like he was torturing himself,” Ambras said.
Well into 2018, Elon Musk is still doing much of the same thing. His hyper-aggressive targets for the Model 3, for one, ultimately caused delays in the vehicle’s production. Being a publicly-traded company, Tesla stock (NASDAQ:TSLA) felt these effects. Today, Tesla shares are known for their wild swings and overall volatility, as well as their penchant for attracting passionate short-sellers. Tesla is currently the most-shorted stock in the market, with more than 30 million shares being sold short. Musk has been affected by short-sellers’ activities, and in his recent interview with the NYT, he admitted that people betting against the company are giving him a lot of stress. Musk even noted that he expects the next few months to be even more difficult, as attacks against Tesla would likely increase.
“(I am) bracing for at least a few months of extreme torture from the short-sellers, who are desperately pushing a narrative that will possibly result in Tesla’s destruction. They’re not dumb guys, but they’re not supersmart. They’re O.K. They’re smartish,” Musk said.
True to Musk’s own predictions, the attacks against Tesla had only increased since talks about the company’s privatization emerged. Musk is currently facing an investigation from the SEC about his tweets, and reports from several media outlets suggest that Tesla’s board is trying to do damage control. In response to some of these reports, Tesla’s board issued a statement to the NYT expressing its full support for the embattled CEO.
“There have been many false and irresponsible rumors in the press about the discussions of the Tesla board. We would like to make clear that Elon’s commitment and dedication to Tesla is obvious. Over the past 15 years, Elon’s leadership of the Tesla team has caused Tesla to grow from a small start-up to having hundreds of thousands of cars on the road that customers love, employing tens of thousands of people around the world, and creating significant shareholder value in the process.”
For now, reports are emerging that Tesla is looking for a Chief Operating Officer that can support Elon Musk’s workload. SpaceX, after all, is pretty much working like a well-oiled machine, and a lot of it is due to the work and efforts of Gwynne Shotwell, the COO and President of the private space firm. Musk stated that to the best of his knowledge, there is no active search for a Tesla COO, though he did admit that a couple of years ago, the company approached Sheryl Sandberg, the second-highest executive of Facebook, about the position. Rounding out his recent interview, Elon Musk stated that he has no plans to let go of his position as Tesla’s CEO and Chairman, but he did state that if there is anyone that can “do a better job,” he is very much willing to hand over the reins of the company.
“If you have anyone who can do a better job, please let me know. They can have the job. Is there someone who can do the job better? They can have the reins right now,” Musk said.
Investor's Corner
Tesla Full Self-Driving statistic impresses Wall Street firm: ‘Very close to unsupervised’
The data shows there was a significant jump in miles traveled between interventions as Tesla transitioned drivers to v14.1 back in October. The FSD Community Tracker saw a jump from 441 miles to over 9,200 miles, the most significant improvement in four years.
Tesla Full Self-Driving performance and statistics continue to impress everyone, from retail investors to Wall Street firms. However, one analyst believes Tesla’s driving suite is “very close” to achieving unsupervised self-driving.
On Tuesday, Piper Sandler analyst Alexander Potter said that Tesla’s recent launch of Full Self-Driving version 14 increased the number of miles traveled between interventions by a drastic margin, based on data compiled by a Full Self-Driving Community Tracker.
🚨 Piper Sandler reiterated its Overweight rating and $500 PT on Tesla $TSLA stock
Analyst Alexander Potter said FSD is near full autonomy and latest versions showed the largest improvement in disengagements, from 440 miles to 9,200 miles between critical interventions pic.twitter.com/u4WCLfZcA9
— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) December 9, 2025
The data shows there was a significant jump in miles traveled between interventions as Tesla transitioned drivers to v14.1 back in October. The FSD Community Tracker saw a jump from 441 miles to over 9,200 miles, the most significant improvement in four years.
Interestingly, there was a slight dip in the miles traveled between interventions with the release of v14.2. Piper Sandler said investor interest in FSD has increased.
Full Self-Driving has displayed several improvements with v14, including the introduction of Arrival Options that allow specific parking situations to be chosen by the driver prior to arriving at the destination. Owners can choose from Street Parking, Parking Garages, Parking Lots, Chargers, and Driveways.
Additionally, the overall improvements in performance from v13 have been evident through smoother operation, fewer mistakes during routine operation, and a more refined decision-making process.
Early versions of v14 exhibited stuttering and brake stabbing, but Tesla did a great job of confronting the issue and eliminating it altogether with the release of v14.2.
Tesla CEO Elon Musk also recently stated that the current v14.2 FSD suite is also less restrictive with drivers looking at their phones, which has caused some controversy within the community.
Although we tested it and found there were fewer nudges by the driver monitoring system to push eyes back to the road, we still would not recommend it due to laws and regulations.
Tesla Full Self-Driving v14.2.1 texting and driving: we tested it
With that being said, FSD is improving significantly with each larger rollout, and Musk believes the final piece of the puzzle will be unveiled with FSD v14.3, which could come later this year or early in 2026.
Piper Sandler reaffirmed its $500 price target on Tesla shares, as well as its ‘Overweight’ rating.
Tesla received a price target boost from Morgan Stanley, according to a new note on Monday morning, but there is some considerable caution also being communicated over the next year or so.
Morgan Stanley analyst Andrew Percoco took over Tesla coverage for the firm from longtime bull Adam Jonas, who appears to be focusing on embodied AI stocks and no longer automotive.
Percoco took over and immediately adjusted the price target for Tesla from $410 to $425, and changed its rating on shares from ‘Overweight’ to ‘Equal Weight.’
Percoco said he believes Tesla is the leading company in terms of electric vehicles, manufacturing, renewable energy, and real-world AI, so it deserves a premium valuation. However, he admits the high expectations for the company could provide for a “choppy trading environment” for the next year.
He wrote:
“However, high expectations on the latter have brought the stock closer to fair valuation. While it is well understood that Tesla is more than an auto manufacturer, we expect a choppy trading environment for the TSLA shares over the next 12 months, as we see downside to estimates, while the catalysts for its non-auto businesses appear priced at current levels.”
Percoco also added that if market cap hurdles are achieved, Morgan Stanley would reduce its price target by 7 percent.
Perhaps the biggest change with Percoco taking over the analysis for Jonas is how he will determine the value of each individual project. For example, he believes Optimus is worth about $60 per share of equity value.
He went on to describe the potential value of Full Self-Driving, highlighting its importance to the Tesla valuation:
“Full Self Driving (FSD) is the crown jewel of Tesla’s auto business; we believe that its leading-edge personal autonomous driving offering is a real game changer, and will remain a significant competitive advantage over its EV and non-EV peers. As Tesla continues to improve its platform with increased levels of autonomy (i.e., hands-off, eyes-off), it will revolutionize the personal driving experience. It remains to be seen if others will be able to keep pace.”
Additionally, Percoco outlined both bear and bull cases for the stock. He believes $860 per share, “which could be in play in the next 12 months if Tesla manages through the EV-downturn,” while also scaling Robotaxi, executing on unsupervised FSD, and scaling Optimus, is in play for the bull case.
Will Tesla thrive without the EV tax credit? Five reasons why they might
Meanwhile, the bear case is placed at $145 per share, and “assumes greater competition and margin pressure across all business lines, embedding zero value for humanoids, slowing the growth curve for Tesla’s robotaxi fleet to reflect regulatory challenges in scaling a vision-only perception stack, and lowering market share and margin profile for the autos and energy businesses.”
Currently, Tesla shares are trading at around $441.
Tesla bear Michael Burry got blunt with his beliefs over the company’s valuation, which he called “ridiculously overvalued” in a newsletter to subscribers this past weekend.
“Tesla’s market capitalization is ridiculously overvalued today and has been for a good long time,” Burry, who was the inspiration for the movie The Big Short, and was portrayed by Christian Bale.
Burry went on to say, “As an aside, the Elon cult was all-in on electric cars until competition showed up, then all-in on autonomous driving until competition showed up, and now is all-in on robots — until competition shows up.”
Tesla bear Michael Burry ditches bet against $TSLA, says ‘media inflated’ the situation
For a long time, Burry has been skeptical of Tesla, its stock, and its CEO, Elon Musk, even placing a $530 million bet against shares several years ago. Eventually, Burry’s short position extended to other supporters of the company, including ARK Invest.
Tesla has long drawn skepticism from investors and more traditional analysts, who believe its valuation is overblown. However, the company is not traded as a traditional stock, something that other Wall Street firms have recognized.
While many believe the company has some serious pull as an automaker, an identity that helped it reach the valuation it has, Tesla has more than transformed into a robotics, AI, and self-driving play, pulling itself into the realm of some of the most recognizable stocks in tech.
Burry’s Scion Asset Management has put its money where its mouth is against Tesla stock on several occasions, but the firm has not yielded positive results, as shares have increased in value since 2020 by over 115 percent. The firm closed in May.
In 2020, it launched its short position, but by October 2021, it had ditched that position.
Tesla has had a tumultuous year on Wall Street, dipping significantly to around the $220 mark at one point. However, it rebounded significantly in September, climbing back up to the $400 region, as it currently trades at around $430.
It closed at $430.14 on Monday.
Tesla CEO Elon Musk confirms Robotaxi safety monitor removal in Austin: here’s when
SpaceX reportedly mulling IPO, eyeing largest of all time: report
