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Musk settles with SEC, pays fine, reduces control at Tesla for 3 years

Elon Musk and Tesla have negotiated a settlement with the SEC, agreeing to each pay a fine of $20 million while Musk reduces his role with the company for the next three years.

Musk and Palo Alto-based Tesla agreed to pay a total of $40 million to settle the case, and he will give up his chairmanship for at least three years. The electric-car maker also is required to install an independent chairman and two new board members, though Musk will remain on the board, according to terms of the settlement.

Musk and Tesla will each pay $20 million to settle the case; both reached the deal without admitting wrongdoing.

I suspect this will not reduce Musk’s influence on Tesla very much. To me, this whole kerfuffle was the SEC acting like a bunch of mobsters, pulling its weight against someone it apparently doesn’t like. “Nice business you have there, Elon. Sure would be a shame if something happened to it.”

Genesis cover

On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.

 

The print edition can be purchased at Amazon. from any other book seller, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.


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"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News

11 comments

  • Robert Pratt

    Agreed.

  • Des

    I am a huge fan of Elon Musk and Spacex. However, the tweet caused large swings in the Teska price and caused some people to gain and lose millions. I think the SEC action was appropriate.

    Elon has been worryingly erratic on Twitter recently.

  • wayne

    Optimistic And Wrong
    ft. Elon and Kira
    https://youtu.be/7ypJ5ByaYbg
    6:01

  • wodun

    The SEC tends to take a dim view on stock market manipulation. I doubt this had anything to do with personal animosity.

  • OM

    White South Africans are being oppressed in their country and in ours!

  • wayne

    OM:
    That’s brilliant! Good one.

  • wayne

    wodun–
    Might not be “personal,” but it is highly selective of them.

  • wayne

    If you are an average person, you commit roughly 3 felonies a day.

    “When Everything is a Crime”
    Harvey Silverglate on the Overregulation of Ordinary Life
    Reason TV, 2016
    https://youtu.be/SV9m9N8gP9c
    45:30
    [Silverglate is the co-founder of The Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE), author of “Three Felonies a Day: How the Feds Target the Innocent.]
    ————
    “The more corrupt the State, the more numerous the Laws.”
    -Tacitus
    ————
    “The Government doesn’t want their laws obeyed, they want them broken. There’s no way to Rule innocent people, the only power they have is to crack down on “criminal’s,” and when there aren’t enough of them to justify their insane budgets, they create them.”

  • Col Beausabre

    Wayne – It was also highly public , a bunch of investors have filed lawsuits (which means Musk may be on the hook for more $) and a bunch of Wall Street pros have lost all trust in him with this coupled with his erratic behavior. So don’t be a Musk Fanboy, the SEC had to take notice and compared to what could have happened, his punishment is mild – $20M is unimaginable to us, it’s pocket change to him.

  • wayne

    Col Beausabre-
    (highly enjoy your comments, btw)

    yes– predominately true, and I don’t necessarily disagree with you. but….

    (definitely not a fan-boy, I like his rockets, everything else– not so much. He has a crony-esque element to him, it’s not his main motivation by far, but he does take advantage.)

    Musk has talked about his bi-polar disorder in the past (unless I’m totally mistaken(?). I do think he’s “overworked” and has a hard time “turning his brain off.”

    Again, not a fan boy, and except for his recent (orbit the moon) press conference and his recent Joe Rogan interview, I have not really listened or watched him, in depth, at length.

    He does strike me as a creative & technical genius, with autistic spectrum traits, and if he does have bi-polar, (no matter how well controlled) it wouldn’t surprise me if he “thinks a LOT, about everything, all the time.” (and occasionally, “speaks out of turn”– I’d be surprised if he didn’t.)

    No love for the SEC. “Wall Street” is professional-money (“they” predominately hate-his-guts as it is) and they are big boys, if they can’t stand the heat….and all. And if they weren’t trying to trade by the millisecond and skim, coming & going, they wouldn’t be getting burned.

    It’s Risk & Ruin. Widows and Orphans don’t own Tesla stock, and if they do, they were ripped off by their regulated investment advisors.

    (of course, the minute big-money does lose or see an opening, they crawl to the Government and demand the contents of the federal cookie jar, or some sanction against their competitors, or… just because they can.)

  • Cotour

    I agreed with John Bachelor 100% the other night when Musk was brought in his interview of you. Seems that you were very defensively putting the cart way before the horse with your knee slap reaction about who and what was behind Musks fines and troubles.

    The SEC and anyone else was invited into to Musks world to screw with it………………………by Musk himself with his acting out, for what ever emotional or psychological reason. Musk must be stressed to the max and is doing things to somehow control or mitigated the crazy nature of the existence that he finds himself.

    Musk is Musks problem, not the SEC.

    (“Twitta”, classic tell that your from NYC)

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