Elon Musk‘s fortune came to approach the 500,000 million dollars in the hand of Donald Trump‘s victory in the presidential presidentials. They were the days of wine and roses, when both magnates seemed inseparable and the companies of the billionaire of South African origin were seen as great beneficiaries of their proximity to the president. This Thursday, after the explosive break between the two, truffled with personal attacks and threats, Elon Musk’s fortune was reduced 34,000 million dollars (about 30,000 million euros) in a single day for the stock market collapse of Tesla.
The actions of the electric car manufacturer fell by 14%, after a 3.5% setback the previous day, which was already the largest month and a half. Musk remains the richest man in the world, with a estate encrypted at 335,000 million dollars, according to the Bloomberg billionaire index. The fall of 34,000 million is the second largest on a day of all registered, only behind the one he suffered in November 2021 with bad Tesla results.
Investors began fearing that the confrontation with the president scares the potential Trumpist clients, aggravating the sales crisis caused by the involvement of the Tesla chief in politics. As the intensity of the confrontation grew, there is fear that Musk companies are subject to the reprisals of the white house vengeful.
Trump threatened Musk this Thursday: “The easiest way to save money in our budget, billions and billions of dollars is to put an end to Elon’s subsidies and government contracts. I have always been surprised that Biden did not do it!”, The president wrote in Truth, his social network.
Tesla does not have great contracts with the administration. The company benefits from the incentives to the electric car approved by the government of Joe Biden, which it fought so much, and that are at risk with the tax law promoted by Trump and disappeared by Musk.
The richest man in the world focuses his criticisms of the law, who described as “disgusting abomination”, on the increase in deficit and debt he represents. Trump, on the other hand, attributes his discomfort to that elimination of incentives that he describes with his usual contempt to the truth as “mandate of electric cars.” “Elon was ‘exhausted’, I asked him to leave, I took his term on the electric vehicles that forced everyone to buy electric cars that no one else wanted (he knew for months he was going to do it!), And he went crazy!”, Trump summed up his version in another message from his social network.
Beyond the incentives, Tesla depends on regulators on numerous fronts. The commitment that the Department of Transportation will advance towards the adoption of national standards for the autonomous car, in order to replace the Mosaic of state regulations, one of the Musk’s desires, started from the Trump government.
The Transport Department also announced that companies that develop autonomous cars may be exempt from certain federal safety standards in their tests and that will simplify the notification requirements of accidents related to the autonomous driving functions, which so many headaches have brought to Tesla, whose cars seem to disorient themselves in conditions of poor visibility, not having radars in their system.
Musk is, then, in Trump’s hands, and not only in Tesla. The loss of 34,000 million dollars in one day responds to the sharp drop in the stock market of electric cars. The biggest beneficiary of federal contracts, however, is the Spacex space company. After Trump’s threats, Musk announced that the firm would begin to dismantle its Dragon spacecraft, a fundamental link with the space for the United States, which depends on the billionaire company to transport load and astronauts to the International Space Station.
That firm does not quote on the stock market and Bloomberg uses the last available assessment, but it can be argued that the company’s market value – and the participation of Musk – has been reduced even more than that of Tesla itself. Also the value of other of its non -traded companies may have deteriorated, so that the decline in Musk’s fortune in one day could probably be estimated at more than 50,000 million dollars.
