Tesla Is Facing US Criminal Probe Over Elon Musk Statements (bloomberg.com)

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Bloomberg: Tesla is under investigation by the Justice Department over public statements made by the company and Chief Executive Officer Elon Musk. The criminal probe is running alongside a previously reported civil inquiry by securities regulators. Federal prosecutors opened a fraud investigation after Musk tweeted last month that he was contemplating taking Tesla private and had "funding secured" for the deal. The tweet initially sent the company's shares higher. Tesla confirmed it has been contacted by the Justice Department. The investigation by the U.S. attorney's office in the Northern District of California follows a subpoena issued by the Securities and Exchange Commission seeking information from the electric-car maker about Musk's plans to go private, which he has since abandoned. Tesla said in a statement following Bloomberg's report: "Last month, following Elon's announcement that he was considering taking the company private, Tesla received a voluntary request for documents from the DOJ and has been cooperative in responding to it. We have not received a subpoena, a request for testimony, or any other formal process. We respect the DOJ's desire to get information about this and believe that the matter should be quickly resolved as they review the information they have received."

Comments

Elon, don't make announcements while high

[mykepredko]

It's a simple rule. Many people follow it and avoid being investigated by the DOJ.

Re:Elon, don't make announcements while high

[Anonymous Coward]

It's a simple rule. Many people follow it and avoid being investigated by the DOJ.

I think Musk should counter by citing blatant racism, as he is indeed an African-American.

don't make /. comments while simplistic and trite

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually if he were smoking marijuana he'd probably be able to de-stress and get needed rest, get better control of his emotions. It would be a strong net positive in his case compared to his stress-meth lashing out on Twitter.

Re:Tesla is irrelevant to EVs

[140Mandak262Jamuna]

Come on, Tesla Model 3 is the fifth best selling car by units and the number 1 selling car by revenue in August. Just Civic, Accord, Corolla and Camry sold more in August, but Model 3 raked in 900 million dollars, more than any one of them.

These are not ZEV credit market numbers. These are what a no-compromise EV can do. There is no special technology or patents with Tesla. All it needs is a will to let the ICEV sales by cannibalized by the EV divisions, the traditional car makers can all make cars like the Tesla.

Tesla is not selling Model 3 in negative gross margin and survives by ZEV credits. Three independent tear downs estimated positive gross margin for both the high end Model 3 above 50K and for the low end 35 K model. The most negative report came from UBS, that first gagged Monroe who did the teardown with a law suite, conceded 50 K model 3 has a gross margin of 9000$, then switched to net margin while talking about the 35 K version, while giving the impression it is still talking about gross margin. The German teardown priced it 28K per unit for the 50K car at 10,000 cars a week. Monroe admitted he is going eat crow and estimated 18% gross margin for the model 3.

Tesla is NOT selling cars at a loss hoping to sell ZEV credits.

I don't think there is a big conspiracy against Tesla, but it is an unfortunate confluence of click bait journalism, negative stories about Musk having better ratings play etc. And Musk shooting his mouth off and smoking pot on tv helps them a lot too.