Elon Musk materialy lied to Tesla (TSLA) shareholders – transcript and proof
Elon Musk just made public and material lies aimed at Tesla shareholders. Here’s the proof with the relevant transcript.
Now, let’s see if the SEC still has teeth or if the US has fully entered its scam era under the Trump administration.
Today, Musk made false statements aimed at Tesla shareholders and directly addressed the stock price.
Here’s the video, transcript, and relevant information that proves Musk was lying:
Tesla sales are strong everywhere but Europe
The CEO started the segment by claiming this:
Europe is our weakest market. We are strong everywhere else. Our sales are doing very well at this point. We don’t expect any meaningful sales shortfall.
Tesla’s weakest market is Europe, but sales are not “strong everywhere else.”
We have up-to-date data from China up to last week, and Tesla is having its worst performance in years in the critical EV market:
This is Tesla’s worst quarter start in the last two years based on the insurance registration data. It’s already confirmed that Q1 2025 sales were terrible everywhere, but up-to-date data in Europe and China confirm that Tesla is still struggling in China and Europe.
That’s also despite Tesla offering more incentives and discounts in China than ever. Model 3 and Model Y, representing over 95% of Tesla’s sales in China, are currently offered with 0% financing at Tesla’s cost.
When pressed about Tesla’s sales still being down in Europe, Musk answered:
Yes, that’s true of all manufacturers. There’s no exception. The European market is quite weak.
It’s a bummer that the host didn’t push back on this because it’s a blatant lie.
The European Automobile Manufacturers’ Association (ACEA) released the data a few weeks ago.
In the EU, EFTA, and the UK, Tesla’s sales were down 37% in Q1 2025. It’s true that other automakers were also down, but not “all manufacturers” and certainly plenty of “exceptions”:
As you can see, the Volkswagen Group was up 5% as a whole and the VW brand itself was more than 12% in the first quarter.
Renault and BMW were also up, as was SAIC.
The lie is even more blatant when you only look at the EV market, where Tesla operates. Battery electric car sales surged almost 24% in Europe in the first quarter, while Tesla’s sales dropped 37%.
Now, this was the last quarter. Maybe Musk could get away by claiming the turnaround is happening now or other automakers are now struggling in Q2.
However, this is also not true based on the latest up-to-date data.
Several European markets report daily vehicle registrations and based on this data, Tesla (left) is tracking way behind the same period last year and about the same as its terrible Q1 2025, while VW (right) is currently significantly outperforming right now compared to the last quarter or the same period in 2024:
This is also true of BMW, Ford, Hyundai-Kia, and several other automakers. So Musk’s claim of no exception is not even remotely true.
The stock market confirms Tesla is doing great
Musk used Tesla’s stock price as some sort of proof of what he is claiming:
Obviously, the stock market recognizes that since we are back now at over $1 trillion market cap. Clearly the market is aware of the situation. It’s already turned around.
This is a misleading statement. The stock price is in no way representative of Tesla’s sales. Musk has admitted that in the past. He said that “Tesla was worth nothing” if it didn’t solve self-driving.
The stock is completely disconnected from Tesla’s vehicle business.
More specifically, Musk is also wrong to claim that the market is “aware of the situation.”
Last quarter, Wall Street analysts were trying to track Tesla’s sales, but they missed badly.
For most of the quarter, Wall Street believed Tesla would deliver more than 400,000 vehicles and only started to update their estimates way down toward the second half of the quarter.
Even then, they still ended up overestimating Tesla’s deliveries by 40,000 units.
Therefore, it’s clear that the market is not well “aware” of Tesla’s current sales levels. The same thing is happening in Q2 2025. The current Wall Street consensus is that Tesla will deliver about 420,000 vehicles in Q2 2025 when the best data available show that Tesla is tracking below Q1 2025, when the automaker delivered 336,000 vehicles.
There’s still a month to go in the quarter, but it’s unlikely that Tesla will be able to accelerate deliveries enough to reach over 400,000 units.
Later on in the segment of the interview embedded above, Musk again referenced the stock price:
Again, you can just look at the stock price. If you want the best inside information, the stock market analysts have that and our stock wouldn’t be trading near all-time highs if things weren’t in good shape. They are fine. Don’t worry about it.
Again, we have clear data that show that “stock market analysts” are terrible at tracking Tesla’s sales, and the stock price is in no way representative of a company’s current performance.
It is simply representative of the demand for Tesla’s stock, which Musk himself admits is linked to Tesla’s autonomous driving effort.
Sales numbers are strong, no problem with demand
When pushed back on the demand front, Musk added:
The sales numbers are strong. And we see no problem with demand.
This is another lie. On top of the previously discussed declining sales, it’s worth mentioning that those declines are compared to 2024, a year when Tesla saw its first full-year decline in sales since starting volume vehicle production a decade ago.
In 2024 and now into 2025, Tesla has throttled down its production capacity to about 60% of its overall capacity due to low demand.
Even with fewer vehicles available, Tesla is now offering record discounts and subsidized financing rates at a great cost to the company – clear indicators of demand problems.
Where is the SEC?
These are clear, verifiable, and material lies aimed at Tesla shareholders. It’s a security violation that the SEC should be going after.
This will be a great test of how corrupt federal agencies are under the Trump administration.
The lies are verifiable right now, but I wouldn’t be surprised if they wait until Tesla reports its official deliveries for Q2 2025.
If they are significantly down versus Q2 2024, as expected, it would be easy to prove that Musk was misleading shareholders with these claims today.
What are the odds on the SEC actually going after this or letting it slide?
FTC: We use income earning auto affiliate links. More.
Credit where credit is due: in a massive, 32-car multinational independent test, Tesla’s Autopilot ADAS came out on top, the new affordable Tesla turns out to be a corner-cutting Model Y, and one of the company’s original founders compares the Cybertruck to a dumpster. All this and more on today’s episode of Quick Charge!
Today’s episode is brought to you by Retrospec – the makers of sleek, powerful e-bikes and outdoor gear built for everyday adventure! To that end, we’ve got a pair of Retrospec e-bike reviews followed up by a super cute, super affordable new EV from China with nearly 150 miles of range for less than $5,000 USD.
PLUS: listeners can get an extra 10% off by using code ELECTREK10 at retrospec.com!
Source Links
Prefer listening to your podcasts? Audio-only versions of Quick Charge are now available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, TuneIn, and our RSS feed for Overcast and other podcast players.
New episodes of Quick Charge are recorded, usually, Monday through Thursday (most weeks, anyway). We’ll be posting bonus audio content from time to time as well, so be sure to follow and subscribe so you don’t miss a minute of Electrek’s high-voltage daily news.
Got news? Let us know!
Drop us a line at tips@electrek.co. You can also rate us on Apple Podcasts and Spotify, or recommend us in Overcast to help more people discover the show.
If you’re considering going solar, it’s always a good idea to get quotes from a few installers. To make sure you find a trusted, reliable solar installer near you that offers competitive pricing, check out EnergySage, a free service that makes it easy for you to go solar. It has hundreds of pre-vetted solar installers competing for your business, ensuring you get high-quality solutions and save 20-30% compared to going it alone. Plus, it’s free to use, and you won’t get sales calls until you select an installer and share your phone number with them.
Your personalized solar quotes are easy to compare online and you’ll get access to unbiased Energy Advisors to help you every step of the way. Get started here.
FTC: We use income earning auto affiliate links. More.
Tesla is again teasing the new Roadster, which is now five years late, as “the last driver’s car” before self-driving takes over.
The chicken or the egg. Is Tesla delaying the Roadster to match the development of self-driving technology, or is it delaying the development of self-driving technology to match the delayed release of the Roadster?
The prototype for the next-generation Tesla Roadster was first unveiled in 2017, and it was initially scheduled to enter production in 2020; however, it has been delayed every year since then.
It was supposed to achieve a range of 620 miles (1,000 km) and accelerate from 0 to 60 mph in 1.9 seconds.
It has become a sort of running joke, and there are doubts that it will ever come to market despite Tesla’s promise of dozens of free new Roadsters to Tesla owners who participated in its referral program years ago.
Tesla used the promise of free Roadsters to help generate billions of dollars worth of sales, which Tesla owners delivered; however, the automaker never delivered on its part of the agreement.
Furthermore, many people placed deposits ranging from $50,000 to $250,000 to reserve the vehicle, which was initially scheduled to hit the market five years ago.
When unveiling the vehicle, CEO Elon Musk described it as a “halo car” that would deliver a “smack down” to gasoline vehicles.
That was almost eight years ago, and many electric hypercars have since launched and delivered this smackdown.
Tesla has partly blamed the delays on improving the next-gen Roadsters and added features like the “SpaceX package,” which is supposed to include cold air thrusters to enable the vehicle to fly – Musk has hinted.
Many people don’t believe any of it, as Tesla has said that it would launch the new Roadster every year for the last 5 years and never did.
Now, Lars Moravy, Tesla’s head of vehicle engineering, made a rare new comment about the next-generation Roadster during an interview at the X Takeover event, an annual gathering of Elon Musk cultists, last weekend.
He referred to Tesla’s next-gen Roadster as the “last best driver’s car” and said that the automaker did “some cool demos” for Musk last week:
We spent a lot of time in the last few years rethinking what we did, and why we did it, and what would make an awesome and exciting last best driver’s car. We’ve been making it better and better, and it is even a little bit more than a car. We showed Elon some cool demos last week and tech we’ve been working on, and he got a little excited.
The timing matches Musk’s recent claim that Tesla is going to have ‘the most epic demo ever, ’ but we heard that one before.
We suspected that the comment might be about the Tesla Roadster, as the CEO made the exact same comment about Roadster demos in 2019 and 2024. You will not be shocked to hear that these demos never happen.
Electrek’s Take
The “last best driver’s car” before computers are going to drive us everywhere. It’s a self-fulfilling prophecy if you continue to delay the car. It might literally be the last car ever made that way. How would we ever know?
The truth is that the Roadster was cool when it was unveiled in 2017, but that was a long time ago. Tesla would need to update the car quite a bit to make it cool in 2025, and I don’t know that cold air clusters are it. You will have extreme limitations using those.
The Roadster is almost entirely in the “put up or shut up” category for me at Tesla. They need to stop talking about it and make it happen; otherwise, I can’t believe a word.
FTC: We use income earning auto affiliate links. More.
The PV5 is already available in several markets, but will Kia launch it in the US? After Kia’s electric van was spotted testing in the US again, a US debut could be in the works.
Is Kia’s electric van coming to the US?
Kia launched the PV5, the first dedicated electric van from its new Platform Beyond vehicle (PBV) business, in South Korea and Europe earlier this year, promising it will roll out in “other global markets” in 2026.
Will that include the US? Earlier this year, Kia’s electric van was caught charging at a station in Indiana. Photos and a video sent to Electrek by Alex Nguyen confirmed it was, in fact, the PV5.
Kia has yet to say if it will sell the PV5 in the US, likely due to the Trump Administration’s new auto tariffs. All electric vans, or PBVs, including the PV5, will be built at Kia’s Hwaseong plant in South Korea, which means they will face a stiff 25% tariff as imports.
Following another sighting, a US debut cannot be ruled out. The PV5 Passenger model was spotted by Automotive Validation Engineer Chris Higa (@Chrisediting) while testing in Arizona.
There’s no denying that’s Kia’s electric van, but it doesn’t necessarily confirm it will launch in the US. But it could make sense.
Despite record first-half sales in the US, Kia’s EV sales have fallen significantly. Sales of the EV9 and EV6 are nearly 50% less than in the first half of 2024.
To be fair, part of it is due to the new model year changeover, but Kia is also doubling down on the US market by boosting local production. Earlier this year, Kia said the EV6 and EV9 are now in full-scale production at its West Point, GA, facility.
The PV5 Passenger (shown above) is available in Europe with two battery pack options: 51.5 kWh or 71.2 kWh, rated with WLTP ranges of 179 miles and 249 miles, respectively. The Cargo variant has the same battery options but offers a WLTP range of either 181 miles or 247 miles.
During its PV5 Tech Day event last week, Kia revealed plans for seven PV5 body types, including an Open Bed (similar to a pickup), a Light Camper, and even a luxury “Prime” passenger model.
Kia is set to begin deliveries of the PV5 Passenger and Cargo Long variants in South Korea next month, followed by Europe and other global markets, starting in Q4 2025. As for a US launch, we will have to wait for the official word from Kia.
Do you want Kia to bring its electric van to the US? Drop us a comment below and let us know your thoughts.
Source: Chris Higa, TheKoreanCarBlog
FTC: We use income earning auto affiliate links. More.
-
Sports3 years ago‘Storybook stuff’: Inside the night Bryce Harper sent the Phillies to the World Series
-
Sports1 year agoStory injured on diving stop, exits Red Sox game
-
Sports2 years agoGame 1 of WS least-watched in recorded history
-
Sports2 years agoMLB Rank 2023: Ranking baseball’s top 100 players
-
Sports4 years ago
Team Europe easily wins 4th straight Laver Cup
-
Sports2 years agoButton battles heat exhaustion in NASCAR debut
-
Environment2 years agoJapan and South Korea have a lot at stake in a free and open South China Sea
-
Environment2 years agoGame-changing Lectric XPedition launched as affordable electric cargo bike