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Elon Musk’s net worth took a massive hit this week after he admitted Tesla was in long-term trouble due to Tesla Cybertruck production issues.
The admission came during Tesla’s Q3 earnings call on Wednesday (listen to it in full here) when the world’s wealthiest man admitted Tesla faces long-term challenges in scaling up production of the Tesla Cybertruck.
On the call, Elon Musk told investors “We dug our own grave with the Cybertruck.” Musk went on to add the Tesla Cybertruck is “one of those special products that comes along only once in a long while. And special products that come along once in a long while are just incredibly difficult to bring to market to reach volume, to be prosperous.”
It didn’t stop there. With the official launch date for the Tesla Cybertruck set for November 30th, Elon Musk said everyone would need to “temper expectations” surrounding the launch.
Elon still insisted, however, that this is all normal. He went on to say “I do want to emphasize that there will be enormous challenges in reaching volume production with the Cybertruck and then making the Cybertruck cashflow positive — this is simply normal.”
Wrapping it up, Elon Musk added “When you’ve got a product with a lot of new technology or any brand new vehicle program, especially one that is as different and advanced as the Cybertruck, you will have problems proportionate to how many new things you’re trying to solve at scale.”
Back in June, Ford CEO Jim Farley spoke with CNBC’s Jim Cramer and eviscerated the Tesla Cybertruck as a vanity truck that is not “for real people.”
Hearing all of that from the world’s wealthiest man, the market got spooked. Tesla shares plunged 9% on Thursday morning and the company’s largest shareholder lost $16.1 billion from his net worth, according to the latest movement on the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. Though, Forbes estimates that Elon actually lost a whopping $24 billion.
Ultimately, that’s a drop of water in the bucket for Elon Musk’s pile of cash. He is up $72.6 billion just in 2023. Musk also has a $55 billion lead over the world’s second-wealthiest individual, Bernard Arnault.
Interestingly, Arnault is the only person in the Bloomberg Billionaires Index Top 10 to have lost money this year. Arnault is down $6.8 billion in 2023. In terms of 2023 gains, Musk is only ahead of Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg who is up $67.8 billion this year.