Tesla just reported a messy quarter with missed earnings and slowing growth, but you wouldn’t know it from listening to CEO Elon Musk. On the company’s earnings call, Musk completely ignored the real-world problems facing his company—slumping demand, the end of a key tax credit, and a tarnished brand—and instead launched into a familiar series of bold, futuristic promises about robotaxis and humanoid robots. The bizarre performance sent Tesla’s stock tumbling. Investors were clearly looking for answers about the here and now, not a sci-fi vision of the future.
“People just don’t appreciate the degree to which this will take off,” Musk said about his robotaxi plans, predicting a “shock wave” that will transform the world. He has been making these promises for years, but Tesla is still far behind rivals like Google’s Waymo, which already has a commercial robotaxi service up and running.
Musk then turned his attention to his Optimus humanoid robots, which are still in development. He repeated his claim that they have the “potential to be the biggest product of all time,” and then took it a step further, saying, “Optimus will be an incredible surgeon.”
At the end of the call, Musk even tied the future of his “robot army” to his own massive new pay package, which could be worth nearly $1 trillion. “If we build this robot army, do I have at least a strong influence over that robot army?” he asked, arguing he needs a bigger stake in the company.
While Musk was dreaming of a world with no poverty and robot surgeons, he said nothing about how Tesla plans to deal with its current sales slump or the growing competition. It was a strange and frustrating performance that left investors with more questions than answers.
