SpaceX founder Elon Musk speaks to members of the media during a press conference announcing new developments for the Crew Dragon reusable spacecraft at SpaceX headquarters in Hawthorne, California, October 10, 2019.
Philip Pacheco | AFP | Getty Images
It’s been a tough week for Elon Musk.
tesla The stock has fallen 18% this week, closing at $313.03 on Friday, its worst weekly decline since 2022. SpaceX also continued to fall, dropping 7.2% in five days to close Friday at $115.07, its lowest since the company’s record initial public offering last month.
The drop in both stocks wiped out about $130 billion of Musk’s fortune, just weeks after he became the world’s first millionaire. “(Former) millionaire,” Musk wrote in a post on X on Friday.
Tesla’s slump was fueled by lower-than-expected revenue when the electric car maker released second-quarter results late Wednesday. The company turned cash flow negative as spending soared on futuristic projects such as robotaxis, humanoid robots and giant chip factories.
“We expect this to result in no near-term shareholder returns, pressure on free cash flow and slower earnings growth,” Argus Research analysts, who have a hold rating on the stock, said in a note on Friday. “We believe it is nearly impossible for Tesla to generate consistent profit growth in the short term.”
Tesla stock is currently down 30% since the beginning of the year, making it by far the worst performer among tech megacaps.
Meanwhile, SpaceX stock has been on a steady decline over the past month, following a spike when the company went public. The stock has fallen in four of the past five weeks, and is down about 43% from its June 16 closing high.
On Friday night, SpaceX will once again attempt the 13th test flight of Starship, the largest rocket ever built or flown. The company plans to fly a new version of its rocket, the Starship V3, from its own cities and its Starbase, Texas, launch facility. The rocket is designed to be fully reusable and is considered critical to SpaceX’s short-term goal of significantly expanding its Starlink satellite network.
In a post on X, which is owned by SpaceX, the company said a test flight scheduled for Thursday was delayed “due to weather.” A SpaceX employee said during a livestream of the event that the company halted a test flight last week after the rocket’s booster caused a hold and “killed the engine just before ignition began.”
A successful launch of Starship V3, an upgraded version of the nearly 400-foot-tall rocket, would be the company’s first since its IPO.
SpaceX plans to use Starship to return U.S. astronauts to the moon, and Musk hopes to eventually send humans to Mars using rockets.
Musk made a public appearance this week, giving a controversial interview with The Economist.
Zanny Minton Beddoes, the magazine’s editor-in-chief, asked Musk about his support for “not just the populist right, but the far right, parties that are actually very marginal in some countries.”
In addition to being a financial and vocal supporter of President Donald Trump, including during his second administration, Musk also supports Germany’s AfD, an extremely anti-immigration party, and Britain’s Restore Britain, founded by Rupert Lowe, which also advocates for a “reversal of mass immigration.”
“Just a normal person!” Musk replied. He accused Beddoes and the “traditional media” of “absurd characterizations of the far right.”
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