Elon Musk defiantly defends himself in Tesla trial Tweet

Elon Musk is back in federal court to defend himself against a class action lawsuit alleging he misled Tesla shareholders with a tweet about an aborted buyout, which the billionaire pointedly claimed on Tuesday he could have carried out if he wanted to.

Musk spent about three more hours on the podium during his third day of testimony before U.S. District Judge Edward Chen released him. It is unlikely that Musk, 51, will be called to testify again in a civil trial that is expected to be handed over to a nine-member jury in early February.

Musk, who also owns Twitter while still running Tesla, spent much of Tuesday posing as his own attorney, Alex Spiro, questioned him as an impeccably reliable business leader capable of raising all the money he needs to carry out his plans. He angrily quarreled with the shareholder’s lawyer, Nicholas Porritt, who had drawn his ire earlier in the trial.

On Tuesday, in two separate stages under mild pressure, Spiro Musk left no doubt about his disdain for Porritt, voicing doubt that the lawyer was looking out for the best interests of Tesla shareholders. The remarks caused a quick rebuke from the judge and were excluded from the protocol. “This is inappropriate,” Musk Chen once chided.

When Porritt challenged him, Musk deliberately looked away from the lawyer and gave his explanation, looking straight at the jurors seated a few feet to his right. On another occasion, Musk claimed, without elaborating, that Porritt’s question about whether he had ever caused losses to investors contained “lies.”

On the other hand, Spiro at one point mistakenly called Musk “your honor” when asking the billionaire how much money he made for investors over his career. The gaffe caused a moment of frivolity in a San Francisco courtroom filled with the media and others. viewers who came to listen to Musk, who became even more famous after he completed a $44 billion purchase of Twitter in October.

The current litigation hinges on whether a pair of tweets posted by Musk on August 7, 2018 hurt Tesla shareholders in the 10-day period leading up to his admission that the buyout he envisioned would not happen. The allegations led Musk and Tesla to reach a $40 million settlement without admitting any wrongdoing.

In the first of a 2018 tweet, Musk said “funding is secured” for a $72 billion buyout of Tesla – or $420 a share – at a time when the electric car maker was still struggling with production issues and costing far less than it does now. A few hours later, Musk posted another tweet saying a deal was imminent.

After these tweets, Musk stated that Tesla would remain public in a few weeks. A month after that, Musk and Tesla reached a $40 million settlement with securities regulators who claimed the tweets were misleading.

Musk has previously claimed to have entered into the settlement under duress and claimed he never wavered in his belief that he had the money to make the deal.

Musk spent most of Tuesday trying to convince jurors that there was nothing insidious about two tweets indicating he had raised money to take Tesla private as the electric car maker was struggling with production problems and costing much less than it does now. The judge has already said that the jury can consider the two tweets to be false, leaving it up to them to decide whether Musk intentionally defrauded investors and saddled their claims with losses.

While under Spiro’s guidance, Musk told jurors that he only stated that he was “considering” a Tesla buyout, but never promised a deal would be made. But Musk said he thinks it’s important to communicate to investors that Tesla may be poised to end its eight-year existence as a public company.

“I had no evil motives,” Musk said. “My goal was to make things right for all shareholders.”

The day before, when Porritt grilled it, Musk was at times belligerent, indignant and annoyed. Despite all this, Musk insisted that he had blocked financial support for what could have been a $72 billion buyout of Tesla during 2018 meetings with representatives of the Saudi Arabian Public Investment Fund, although the specific amount or price of the funding was not discussed.

When presented with texts and emails indicating that a Saudi fund spokesman had never promised the money for a full Tesla buyout, Musk claimed these were nothing more than the words of a man trying to backtrack on a previous promise made in private conversations.

Shortly after Porritt resumed his interrogations on Tuesday, Musk once again ridiculed the idea that his belief that he had Saudi Arabia’s financial backing wasn’t enough for him to tweet about a potential Tesla buyout.

“We are talking about the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia,” Musk testified. — They can buy Tesla several times more. It wasn’t a big amount of money for them.”

Musk also confirmed earlier testimony that he could finance the Tesla buyout by splitting some of his holdings in SpaceX, the privately held rocket ship company he also founded. It will be similar to what he did when he bought Twitter, which resulted in him selling about $23 billion of his Tesla shares.

That’s what Musk said Tuesday that he doesn’t want to do, but it shows he has the funds to shop for high-value deals. Musk’s ownership of Twitter has also proved unpopular with Tesla shareholders, who fear he will be sidetracked as the automaker faces increased competition. Tesla shares have lost about a third of their value since Musk took over Twitter.

Despite this decline, the stock is still worth about seven times what it was at the time of Musk’s tweets in 2018, after adjusting for two splits since. This gave Musk the opportunity to remind jurors on Tuesday that any investor who owned Tesla shares in August 2018 would have done “very good results” if they had simply held the shares.

“It would be the best investment in the stock market,” Musk said.