Tesla Motors CEO says NYT rift cost company millions
Tesla Motors CEO Elon Musk says the New York Times article on the company's Model S sedan cost Tesla Motors as much as $100 million, Ernst writes.
Elon Musk, center, CEO of Tesla Motors, raises his hand at the Nasdaq opening bell to celebrate the electric automaker鈥檚 initial public offering in 2009. Musk put a $100 million price tag on the damage done by a recent negative review of the Model S in The New York Times.
Mark Lennihan/AP/File
The strange and curious case of聽The New York Times聽versus Tesla just won鈥檛 seem to go away. What was supposed to be a tech piece on Tesla鈥檚 new聽, written by聽N.Y. Timesreporter John Broder, turned into聽聽for the range-anxiety bonfire when the electric聽聽reportedly left Broder stranded.
Tesla鈥檚 [NSDQ:TSLA]聽, denying that the facts were as Broder had presented them. The Tesla CEO soon backed up his allegation with聽, showing that all was not as the reporter had written.
Ultimately, neither side backed down, although an editor from聽The New York Times聽did admit that Broder鈥檚 data (scrawled in a leather-bound notebook) couldn鈥檛 match the accuracy of Tesla鈥檚 data (compiled in lurid detail by computer). In the end, both sides seemed to agree to disagree.
At least until Monday, when Musk put a price on the damage done by聽The New York Times听补谤迟颈肠濒别.听聽quotes Musk as saying, 鈥淚t probably affected us to the tune of tens of millions, to the order of $100 million.鈥澛�
By Monday, Tesla鈥檚 stock had dropped around 12-percent in value since聽The New York Times聽article ran. On February 8, a share was priced at $39.24, but by yesterday afternoon this had dropped to $34.38, reducing Tesla鈥檚 market capitalization by an estimated $553 million according to聽Bloomberg.
Musk also believes the article cost his company 鈥渁 few hundred鈥� Model S orders, which won鈥檛 help the electric automaker reach its stated goal of 20,000 sales in 2013. Each Tesla Model S delivered results in average incremental sales of two more cars, so a loss of聽聽sales is a potential loss of 600 total sales.
Musk still predicts that Tesla will be聽, so in the grand scheme of things perhaps聽The New York Times聽article wasn鈥檛 that damaging after all. For better or for worse, it鈥檚 kept the Tesla brand in the spotlight since February 8.