Tesla rallies on robotaxi hopes as fear over Musk-Trump feud subsides
Tesla CEO Elon Musk speaks alongside U.S. President Donald Trump to reporters in the Oval Office of the White House on May 30, 2025 in Washington, DC.
Kevin Dietsch | Getty Images
In the three trading days since Elon Musk’s war of words with President Donald Trump last week sank Tesla’s market cap by 14% in a single session, the stock has rallied almost all the way back.
Tesla shares rose 5.7% on Tuesday to close at $326.09 on Tuesday, leaving the stock about $6 short of where it was trading last Wednesday, before the Musk-Trump brouhaha exploded across social media.
The latest jump came after Musk shared a video on X showing that Tesla was testing driverless vehicles on the roads of Austin, Texas, without a human safety supervisor behind the wheel. The eight-second clip showed the latest version of the Model Y SUV, painted black with a white “Robotaxi” graffiti-style logo painted on it, navigating an intersection and pausing to allow pedestrians to traverse a crosswalk.
After years of delays and unfulfilled promises left Tesla well behind rivals like Alphabet’s Waymo in the robotaxi market, Musk’s company finally appears poised to put its autonomous driving technology on public streets, even if in a very limited capacity to start. Bloomberg previously reported that Tesla is expected to officially launch its “pilot” for a driverless ride-hailing service in Austin on June 12, though the company hasn’t confirmed the timing beyond saying that it’s coming in June.
Musk recently told CNBC’s David Faber that Tesla will start with a very small rollout, including about 10 to 20 of its robotaxis, with a new, “unsupervised” version of the company’s FSD or “Full Self-Driving” technology installed. The tests will involve the Model Y, not the futuristic looking CyberCab that Tesla plans to produce next year.
Musk said Tesla will “geofence” the service, limiting where the robotaxis can initially operate, and that employees will remotely monitor the fleet.
A Tesla automobile owned by President Trump (he does not drive it but some staffers do) is parked in a lot next to the White House fence in Washington, D.C. on June 05, 2025.
Michael S. Williamson | The Washington Post | Getty Images
Tesla is now listed as “testing” on an official website for the city of Austin, EV fan blog Teslarati first reported. The site shares information about autonomous vehicle companies operating in Austin.
Waymo, which operates a commercial fleet in the Texas capital, is the only autonomous vehicle maker listed with a “deployment” designation, rather than “mapping” or “testing” on the Austin site. The company also has commercial robotaxi services running in parts of the San Francisco Bay Area, Phoenix, and Los Angeles.
In Austin, Amazon’s Zoox is listed as testing, as is AVRide, a self-driving vehicle developer that spun out of Russian tech firm Yandex.
Sawyer Merritt, a Tesla promoter and fan, originally posted the clip of the Model Y operating on FSD-Unsupervised in Austin.
“BREAKING: First ever Tesla Model Y robotaxi with no-one in the drivers seat spotted testing on public roads in Austin, Texas!” Merritt wrote on X.
Last week’s spat
Musk shared the post, adding, “Beautifully simple design.” He later wrote, “These are unmodified Tesla cars coming straight from the factory, meaning that every Tesla coming out of our factories is capable of unsupervised self-driving!”
Musk, the world’s richest person, is coming off a bruising week. After his term running the Trump Administration’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) officially came to an end, Musk and the president began feuding, partly due to the contents of the spending bill that’s being debated in congress. The spat turned personal on Thursday, with both men hurling insults at each other from their respective social media platforms.
The stock was already getting hit but took a sharp turn lower after Trump said Musk had gone “CRAZY” and threatened to end government contracts and cut off subsidies for his companies. In addition to Tesla, Musk also runs defense contractor SpaceX, artificial intelligence startup xAI (which owns X), health tech company Neuralink and drilling venture The Boring Company.
While Trump said he “would assume” his relationship with Musk is over, the president is known to for his transactional approach. The stock bump early this week may be in part a reaction to a more contrite Musk, who has deleted some of the most pointed insults that he previously lobbed at Trump, and has appeared to endorse the president on other policy matters like immigration.
Tesla investors have been urging Musk to refocus his attention on the electric car maker after a brutal first quarter that saw automotive revenue plunge 20% due to increased competition from lower-cost EV makers in China and a consumer backlash to Musk’s political activities and rhetoric. In key markets throughout Europe and China, Tesla’s year-over-year sales declined in the first two months of the second quarter.
In a report to clients on Tuesday, analysts at Piper Sandler wrote, regarding driverless cars being spotted in Austin, that “a key component of our TSLA thesis has officially begun playing out.” The firm has a buy rating on the stock.
Philip Koopman, an auto safety researcher and associate professor of computer engineering, told CNBC that investors shouldn’t get too carried away at the sight of Tesla running driverless vehicles on public roads.
“We don’t know enough from the company, or from this clip, to know if these vehicles are going to be safe, how they operate and what it costs,” Koopman said, referring to the video shared by Musk. He said he expects Tesla to rely heavily on so-called “remote assistants,” or people who watch the company’s robotaxis from a computer in a service center, with the ability to take over control if needed.
Signage at eBay headquarters in San Jose, California, U.S.
David Paul Morris | Bloomberg | Getty Images
Shares of eBay popped 10% in extended trading on Wednesday after the online marketplace posted stronger-than-expected results for the second quarter, and offered an upbeat forecast for the current period.
Here’s how the company did in the second quarter compared to analyst estimates compiled by LSEG.
- Earnings per share: $1.37 adjusted vs. $1.30 expected
- Revenue: $2.73 billion vs. $2.64 billion expected
GMV, or the dollar value of items sold, grew 6% year over year to $19.5 billion. That topped analysts’ projected $18.9 billion, per StreetAccount estimates.
For the third quarter, eBay said revenue will land between $2.69 billion and $2.74 billion, above Wall Street expectations for $2.66 billion. The company also guided for adjusted earnings per share of $1.29 to $1.34. Analysts anticipated $1.31 per share.
EBay said third-quarter GMV would be in the range of $19.2 billion and $19.6 billion, which was higher than consensus estimates of $18.8 billion.
GMV guidance “contemplates potential disruptions from impending tariffs and the potential elimination of remaining de minimis exemptions,” eBay said.
Earlier on Wednesday, President Donald Trump signed an executive order ending the loophole for low-value packages shipped from all countries, effective Aug. 29. The provision enabled shipments valued below $800 to enter the U.S. duty free.
EBay CEO Jamie Iannone said in an interview following the earnings report that the company is “well suited” to navigate any further uncertainty generated by Trump’s tariff policies or changes to de minimis.
“When we look at what happened, for example, when de minimis was eliminated in China, it did have a deceleration in direct shipments, but a lot of the sellers started making their products available to buyers in other countries like the U.K. and Germany,” Iannone said.
He added that the company “forward deployed” about 75% of its inventory from China into the U.S. before the changes to de minimis policies.
“We feel comfortable with the guidance that we put out there,” Iannone said.
EBay faces robust competition from online retail rivals Amazon, Walmart and Etsy, along with upstarts like low-cost e-commerce platforms Temu and Shein. To keep buyers and sellers returning to its site, the company has embraced “enthusiast” shoppers and “focus categories,” such as collectible sneakers and trading cards, used luxury goods and auto parts.
The company in May named Peggy Alford, a former PayPal executive, as its new CFO, succeeding Steve Priest. EBay also announced a broader leadership restructuring that involved bringing its technology teams closer together, Iannone said.
The company has also implemented more artificial intelligence tools to help consumers find products on its site, including a shopping agent, which launched earlier this year.
“We’re already seeing really tangible benefits from generative AI on our P&L, and we think we’re only scratching the surface in terms of how to leverage our data,” Iannone said.
As of Wednesday’s close, eBay shares were up 25% for the year, while the Nasdaq has gained about 9%.
WATCH: EBay breakout is here
Dylan Field, co-founder and CEO of Figma, appears at the Bloomberg Technology Summit in San Francisco on May 9, 2024.
David Paul Morris | Bloomberg | Getty Images
Figma, the developer of design software that was supposed to get acquired by Adobe, priced its IPO on Wednesday at $33 per share, above its expected range.
The company’s stock will debut on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker symbol “FIG” on Thursday. The offering raised $1.2 billion, with most of the proceeds going to existing stockholders.
Figma is aiming to take advantage of a public market that has slowly reopened for tech IPOs. Stablecoin issuer Circle and artificial intelligence infrastructure provider CoreWeave have soared since their debuts earlier this year, while other companies including online banking firm Chime, and health-tech companies Hinge Health and Omada Health have also made it to market.
The offering values Figma at $19.3 billion. The company had agreed to be acquired by Adobe for $20 billion, but that deal fell apart in 2023 following objections from regulators. Adobe paid Figma a $1 billion termination fee.
On Monday, Figma said its expected price range was $30 to $32 per share.
Figma was founded in 2012 by CEO Dylan Field and Evan Wallace. The company is based in San Francisco, with offices in France, Germany, Japan, Singapore and the U.K.
Figma said in its updated prospectus that revenue for the quarter ended June rose to between $247 million and $250 million from $177.2 million a year earlier, representing growth of 40% at the middle of the range. As far as profits, the expected range for the quarter goes from an operating loss of up to $500,000 to an operating profit of $2.5 million, Figma said. That compared to a loss of $894.3 million a year earlier, due mostly to costs related to stock-based compensation.
For the March quarter, revenue rose 46% to $228.2 million, and net income tripled to $44.9 million.
Field is the company’s biggest investor, with 56.6 million shares ahead of the offering, along with voting control over another 26.7 million shares. Index Ventures is the leading institutional stakeholder, with 65.9 million shares, or 17 % of shares outstanding before the IPO. Greylock is second at 16%, followed by Kleiner Perkins at 14% and Sequoia Capital at 8.7%.
All of the top investors are selling a portion of their stake in the IPO.
Microsoft Chairman and CEO Satya Nadella speaks in front of the OpenAI logo at the Microsoft Build conference in Seattle, Washington, on May 19, 2025.
Jason Redmond | AFP | Getty Images
The $4 trillion club has a second member, at least based on after-hours trading.
Following a better-than-expected earnings report on Wednesday, Microsoft shares jumped 8%, lifting the software giant’s market cap to about $4.1 trillion. Should the rally stick on Thursday, Microsoft would join chipmaker Nvidia, which hit $4 trillion for the first time earlier this month.
Microsoft reported 18% revenue growth, its fastest rate of expansion in over three years, driven by its Azure cloud computing business. Microsoft disclosed Azure revenue in dollars for the first time, and said sales from Azure and other cloud services exceeded $75 billion in fiscal 2025, up 34% from the prior year.
As of the close on Wednesday, Microsoft shares were up 22% for the year, topping the S&P 500’s 8% gain. Microsoft hit a record close of $513.71 on July 25. The stock is above $553 in extended trading.
Nvidia and Microsoft, two of the biggest beneficiaries of the artificial intelligence boom, have zoomed past Apple on the market cap leaderboard. Apple is third at about $3.2 trillion, with its stock having fallen 17% this year as investors worry that the iPhone maker is getting left behind in AI. Apple reports quarterly results after the bell on Thursday.
Among tech’s megacaps, Nvidia has been the best performer in 2025, up 33%. The chipmaker’s graphics processing units (GPUs) are the backbone of the large language models being developed by Microsoft, OpenAI, Google, Meta and others, and they’re filling up data centers being built by those same companies.
Nvidia is scheduled to report results in late August.
-
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