Tesla's Elon Musk jabs at short sellers in court, calls the practice 'evil'

Tesla's Elon Musk jabs at short sellers in court, calls the practice 'evil'

During a trial on Friday, Elon Musk jokingly stated that the term "short seller" does not refer to "seller of small stature." The trial is the result of a shareholder lawsuit that alleges Musk manipulated Tesla's stock price through a tweet in 2018. Musk has previously expressed his dislike for shareholders and referred to the practice as "evil."

During his testimony in a shareholder lawsuit on Friday, Elon Musk took a jab at short sellers of Tesla stock. When asked by an attorney about their impact on the company, Musk quipped, "I think most people don't know what short seller means. Is it like medium and tall sellers? " He then went on to explain the meaning of short selling to the jury.

Elon Musk has a history of criticizing short sellers, who are investors who bet on a decrease in a company's stock value. In 2020, as Tesla's stock value was increasing, Musk sold red satin "short shorts" on the EV-maker's website as a form of sarcasm to mock the short sellers. He has previously expressed his opinion that the practice of short selling should be illegal.

During his testimony on Friday, Elon Musk referred to short selling as "a means for, in my opinion, bad people on Wall Street to steal money from small investors" and later characterized the practice as "evil." The trial, held in San Francisco, was a result of a shareholder lawsuit accusing Musk of manipulating Tesla's stock price in 2018 through a tweet in which he stated that he had "funding secured" to take Tesla private at $420 per share.

Musk's tweet caused a surge in Tesla's stock price, however the deal did not materialize. At the time of the "funding secured" tweet, Tesla's stock was one of the most-shorted stocks in the US, and some experts have suggested that Musk intentionally increased the stock price to harm short sellers.