Item 5.02 Departure of Directors or Principal Officers; Election of Directors; Appointment of Principal Officers.
As of August 4, 2023, Tesla, Inc. (“Tesla”) appointed Vaibhav Taneja as Chief Financial Officer in addition to his current role as Chief Accounting Officer, to succeed Zachary Kirkhorn. Mr. Kirkhorn stepped down as of August 4, after a thirteen-year tenure with the company, the last four years of which he has served as Master of Coin and Chief Financial Officer. During his tenure, Tesla has seen tremendous expansion and growth. Tesla thanks Mr. Kirkhorn for his significant contributions. Mr. Kirkhorn will continue to serve Tesla through the end of the year to support a seamless transition.
Prior to this appointment as CFO, Mr. Taneja, 45, served as Tesla’s Chief Accounting Officer since March 2019, as Corporate Controller from May 2018, and as Assistant Corporate Controller between February 2017 and May 2018. Mr. Taneja served in various finance and accounting roles at SolarCity Corporation from March 2016. Prior to that, Mr. Taneja was employed at PricewaterhouseCoopers in both India and the U.S. between July 1999 and March 2016.
Maybe more charitably stated, it's a fun title to break the monotony of common titles. Surely just because we disagree with musk on other decisions we don't have to denigrate some harmless fun.
I welcome the day where we treat business less seriously.
> I welcome the day where we treat business less seriously.
Teslas can and do kill people. Taking business "less seriously" is how you do things like remove lidar and label the hobbled driver assist as "full self-driving". I doubt people who have had family members killed by a Tesla think these titles are cute and "fun".
Uptight corporate environments are demoralizing and dehumanizing. It may be possible that by having some fun at work Tesla is able to make their cars safer.
No kidding. Musk isn’t a fun person to work for. So instead of flaming one tiny fun thing you could celebrate it or at least ignore it. Making Tesla more uptight isn’t going to improve working conditions.
You mean between not taking business seriously and making choices that put people's lives in danger? He was told by his team lidar was a better solution and on a whim he killed it, that's a pretty big connection!
I didn't say anything about titles. I said taking business less serious is how you make frivolous decisions like ripping out lidar. I'm hardly the only person who finds his moves suspect:
I don't trust the car to drive itself. I wouldn't trust a Musk car in any capacity! The problem is when some Musk fanboy plows through people because FSD goes haywire. That's not social darwinism, that's manslaughter.
I bet the people who've had family members saved by them appreciate the fun. I bet the people who's family members have died in accidents, that wouldn't have happened if the other driver were in a Tesla, also appreciate the work that Tesla is doing.
Personally i think it sounds more cringe than fun. Although i agree generally that it doesn't really matter and there are more than enough real things to care about that he has done.
It was more of an attempt to get another day of media attention, and to make some bucks during crypto/investment craze of COVID times, by presenting themselves as a “cool company”.
Whether the CFO leaving is a "canary" or not, I think there is ample evidence that Tesla's overall value proposition is grossly misaligned with its current valuation (futures priced-in). I would not blame people for using this as an excuse to weaken their positions on Tesla.
I am invested and have been for almost a decade, for the record.
How much of Tesla do you think is Musk?
For example, if Zuck choked Musk to death in a cage fight, what do you think would happen to the stock?
Obviously the odds of this happening are close to 0 but after investing heavily in Tesla I came to the conclusion (perhaps wrongly) that a good deal of the value in tesla stock is tied to Musk. He could get hit by a bus tomorrow.
So I sold and put it all in an index fund that still holds tesla but on a more diluted basis.
The more I see of Musk on Twitter the lower I judge his future impact at Tesla. Tesla going forward is going to have to grow its customer facing side and Musk seems unsuited to solving problems that involve humans and emotions. Could be completely wrong of course, often am. That said, I too divested myself 100%.
i don't buy it. TSLA still has a big city high tech slant and that's driving most of the sales, while Ford electric trucks are flying like hotcakes. he's going to have to do more to compete on features, on culture, and on reliability -- a big selling point for trucks, and something Tesla's terrible QA will struggle with.
The implication that truck drivers love bipolar douchebags is also vaguely offensive; if that was true the flyover states would be all about Kanye.
This isn't 4D chess, he's just off his rocker and morphing into 2000s Howard Hughes
The market for electric cars was primarily amongst "the liberals". You know, treehuggers, whale lovers, etc?
That was a key selling point for the vehicles -- save the planet!
I'm well aware of the market segmentation and where the big ticket items are, thank you very much. Yes, he'll likely get more cybertruck buyers due to fandom but there's a lot of non-truck buyers that are going to rethink giving money to him.
If the cyber truck burned tetraethtyl lead enriched diesel in a big barrel in the back it would bring in customers that musk has a personal fondness for. Damn I should work in marketing
> Tesla owners are majority white. 87% of individuals who own the three Tesla models identify as Caucasian, 8% identify as Hispanic, and 5% represent all other ethnicities, according to Hedges and Company. Tesla drivers appear to have higher incomes.
Typically more money means you are less in touch with the surrounding world.
True in the abstract, but both are saddled with a Musk project that will continue for years no matter what: Tesla is going to have a major flop and recall liability with Cybertruck. Starship is a space Spruce Goose.
Quick - name the CEO of Toyota. Can't do it? How about Volkswagen? Still no? These are the two largest car companies in the world.
Honestly, I think Tesla would be better off if Musk were to go away - at this point. Musk really is the perennial entrepreneur. He's a great idea man, and he can get a company built and make that idea come to life. But he can't run a business.
I think Musk has overstayed his welcome at Tesla. He did it - he took EV's from the niche that hardly anybody paid attention to and made them mainstream. Bravo! I never would have thought he could have done it - but he did. Now it's becoming clear it's time for him to step away and tackle another problem. Otherwise he risks interfering with his own success.
I test drove a Tesla in early 2022, and was set to buy one. I am no longer interested in a Tesla in the slightest. The reason why is Elon Musk's behavior. Not a single person in my friend group wants a Tesla now.
It feels weird not to drive a car because you don't like the CEO. Maybe that's just me though. Usually scummy CEOs lead obviously scummy companies (think Oracle), and I wouldn't want their products at all. Musk defies that: he is questionable in personality and ethics but SpaceX/Tesla are honestly great companies with good products.
Yes. It’s obviously anecdotal evidence. There has never been another time in my life where I was about to pull the trigger on $40k and walked it back. We aren’t talking about not buying bud light or Nike shoes here. A lost car sale to a competitor over unnecessary behavior from a CEO is absolutely wild. It has the potential of working out for Tesla if they pull in more Conservative Buyers… but the boys back in my rural hometown aren’t interested in a Cybertruck over a Ford (this is more anecdotal evidence).
Tesla's market cap is much larger than those two companies combined.
Tesla the company would probably be better off with a serious, responsible CEO. But it will be an ugly ripping the band-aid off moment for the stock, which is valued based on Elon's rosy promises (50% annual growth, real FSD, Optimus, etc) that no one believes his successor would achieve
Isn't the CEO of Nissan some Brazilian guy who escaped jail in Japan? Honestly, besides Tesla, Nissan is the only other company I can think of, and he is the ex-CEO, but almost as interesting (notorious?) as Musk so we actually remember who he is.
Tesla's valuation is mostly Musk. "Infinite demand", "full self-driving"... the SEC should have cracked down on him a long time ago but they seem unwilling to do so. Ultimately reality will win out and Tesla's stock will realign. That hasn't happened because Musk has an army of fanboys he can use to pump the stock, apparent ins at the SEC and a very aggressive call buying program on Tesla. I don't think anyone other than Musk could get away with pumping the stock like he has, so the valuation is mostly dependent on him.
You think it's all games ? when I see a panel of videos(sandy munroe may be fan boy, I dont know, his reviews seems to be detailed at least), there are regularly a few things that seems impressive.
Competition seems to have difficulties catching up, chargers are improving, single cast car body seems to be a big benefit for factory simplification, they still had the best engine (and the adaptive reluctance idea seemed to be, again, ahead of anything else on market). New models are said to now be designed to be robotics friendly from day 1 which would again reduce costs. The embedded computer is said to, again, be years ahead of other brands. The cars have a lot of defects (windshield, doors, seats) but on the EV side of things .. they seem to keep driving the market.
And I'm not much of a fanboy .. especially since musk started to push beta SDV on the roads (and the twitter shipwreck is not helping)
Yes, because I'm talking about the valuation which is completely divorced from fundamentals and entirely based on Musk's hype of non-existent products like robotaxis and the cyber truck. They're a small, boutique car manufacturer with a $769B market cap. To put things into perspective, GM has a market cap of $51.5B.
Cybertruck is literally in production. The idea that its 'not real' is some conspiracy theory nonsense. Yes it was late, but claiming it doesn't exist is just stupid.
They are not actually 'small' anymore, they are at a 2 million a year run rate and growing.
> GM has a market cap of $51.5B
Yes and have you considered why that is? Look at how many vehicles GM sold in 2008 and then now, it continues to go down. They are retreating from markets. Their EV division has been a complete failure with their ultium platform barley producing a few 1000 cars.
They are surviving because of ICE SUV/Pickups in the US market but have basically no chance to do much beyond that.
And that market is under massive attack over the next half decade.
> Cybertruck is literally in production. The idea that its 'not real' is some conspiracy theory nonsense.
It's not real. You can't buy it, it has no credible deadline for shipping.
> GM has a market cap of $51.5B
> Yes and have you considered why that is?
Yes, the fundamentals of their business dictate this market valuation. Unlike Tesla where the price is dictated by Elon's pumping (and occasional dumping).
Are the trucks in peoples possession? I think that is what OP is getting at. As a buyer who needs a car, do I know when one will show up to my door? That is literally what matters.
Apple Vision Pro "exists", but that's worthless until its in customers hands.
Their valuation is far beyond what can be justified by any company that makes and sells cars. IIRC they have (had?) a higher market cap than every other car company combined.
Their valuation is based on being a "tech company" like FAANG, and somehow making more money by offering robo-taxis or something than selling cars.
Musk is willing to make reckless decisions and avoid expensive complications like following the law. A normal car executive would never just break the law re direct sales etc.
I’d guess he’s becoming less valuable as the company is larger. Twitter is the textbook example of the downside of ruling by whim.
You’re right. VW, for example, would NEVER have broken the law by pushing for detection of emissions tests and changing the engine’s outputs when in this mode vs when it was on the road.
I have never let the existence of Elon swing my decision making too much one way or the other.
As others have pointed out, he has some qualities that making him a major asset and some that make him a liability.
Since you asked specifically about Elon, I think he is best at launching companies via the SV playbook, but not as well-suited for sustaining mid-to-latestage companies that aim to serve as industry cornerstones (with some exception allotted for SpaceX). The pattern I have seen is the underlying layers of the companies he spearheads early on typically erode due to rapid accumulation of both technical and cultural debt.
I could see it cutting both ways. Some people love Musk and assume Tesla is only supported by the sweat of his brow. Others view him as an impediment to making good business decisions. Hard to judge which camp is bigger.
On the gripping hand, I personally believe Tesla is over-valued and it only takes a watershed moment for investors to determine the emperor is wearing no clothes which could cause the stock to plummet.
Not good when a CFO abruptly resigns (or is fired). Usually companies project this quarters ahead to the public, with a soft notice that "XYZ will be retiring next year".
Yes, Kirkhorn "will continue to serve Tesla through the end of the year to support a seamless transition", but this reads as a rush notice.
> Yes, Kirkhorn "will continue to serve Tesla through the end of the year to support a seamless transition", but this reads as a rush notice.
I don't own any $TSLA (or one of their cars), but this is like the opposite of a rush notice. Heck, he will continue working for Tesla for almost half the year. Seems like typical HN "everything Elon does is bad" bandwagoning.
I mean, just earlier today the HP CFO resigned[1] and was replaced immediately.
Also not sure Tesla shareholders are going to want folks putting HP and Tesla in the same sentence.
HP is obviously misfiring so the CFO should be turning over based on historical data so its decidedly not newsworthy.
Tesla on the other hand is supposedly firing on all cylinders, so its abnormal for the CFO to exit just before what's expected to be hockey stick profitability given the heavy stock based compensation.
HP P/E is 12x. Tesla P/E is 70x. Tesla at HP's multiple would be a $40 stock.
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Do we know whether "the end of the year" is the fiscal year or calendar year? Given the context fiscal year seems very plausible, and that's less than 2 months away.
When the CEO makes a bunch of fraudulent statements, that is actually bad. It's one thing for people to change jobs, it's another when the guy who is the direct line of fire from Musk's lies leaves. The market can stay irrational for a long time, but at some point reality will enter the equation.
You can only keep the corruption going for so long. Maybe there's someone new at the SEC that will actually go after him, maybe the shareholder have finally had enough. It could be anything but the CFO headed for the door in a company notorious for fraud speaks to a potential reckoning.
Not the OP but we could mention that time where he called a hero a pedophile or when he bought twitter to promote free speech and then banned anyone who said negative things about him. No one human should have 260 billion dollars and be thought of as a good person unless they do a ton of philanthropy.
Now, I'm not saying this is the case for Musk, but surely if a person that rich was heavily investing in technological research that resulted in positive feedback loops that benefitted humankind then they would be a pretty good person, right? Who was really a better person: Mother Teresa or Norman Borlaug?
Because all the other humans throughout history that launched a car they built, on a rocket they built did it better, right?
To be fair, I am actually still annoyed about the whole x.com thing. They closed my account when they sold to Paypal 23 years ago now. Now it is just some message board.
> Because all the other humans throughout history that launched a car they built, on a rocket they built did it better, right?
Musk has never built a car or a rocket. He raises money and hypes things. He is not a builder. Hell, he tried to get Paypal to switch to Windows because he doesn't even understand Linux.
Just to put things in context, the average tenure of a CFO among S&P 500 companies is 3.5 years.
I don't think that's a big deal, but apparently people commenting here think a CFO departing is some kind of major signal of something. At any rate, it's at least worth knowing quantitatively that this happens once every 4 years or so.
agreed, it’s a signal, and in isolation it doesn’t signal much more than the passing of time.
there are any number of things that might cause one to make such a transition, many of which having nothing to do with the company being departed. and, yes, many that do.
it could be because he’s going to be 40 not all that long from now, perhaps a midlife crisis, or an attempt to avert one. or maybe he discovered his true passion in life, basket weaving. (mid-life crisis? mid-life catharsis!)
maybe musk didn’t like his dinner choice. maybe zach laughed when musk said he’d beat zuck in that fight. maybe he failed to laugh at the right time.
right now? who knows.
but a cfo departure with a few months of wind down isn’t conclusive of much more than the cfo leaving and providing a few months of transition time to their successor and the company.
This reminds me of some years ago when the General Counsel left after only two months on the job. Then his replacement left several months later. Nice. I enjoy reading the responses when news comes out of Telsa, no matter how troubling, it's usually something like "Everything is fine". No doubt, but quite a few folks really do not want to work there, no matter how much money is on the table. What is the company culture.
Per Musk admission, Tesla was indeed at the brink of bankruptcy at the time - so that many key people leaving was most probably not 'nothing'. Tesla was 'saved' in part thanks to Covid and the ensuing chips shortage, massively inflating car prices.
Things are coming back to earth now - and so do car prices, especially EVs as the competitions is catching up. Those absurd projections that Musk keep making, are quite hard to back up.
> especially EVs as the competitions is catching up.
I want to ask "are they though?".
A while ago Tesla slashed prices by close to 10% for some models, which caused quite a stir and weird statements from their competitors, like "we won't be doing the same because we care about resale value".
As it stands their offerings are roughly on par in pricing to non-premium brands offering the same(or less) features.
Their only real competition in terms of pricing are Chinese brands, who have ample capital to play the race-to-the-bottom game.
Bottom of the 8-K document says "Date: August 7, 2023". So possibly (I'm not familiar with SEC filings) filed late Friday after business hours Aug/4h and then it got published by SEC Monday Aug/7th at start of business day?
And robotaxis never happened, and the cybertruck (hideous as it is) is years behind schedule... So much of Tesla's valuation is built on nothing more than empty Musk promises. The CFO seems like someone who will be taking a lot of heat when reality comes to roost. No wonder he's leaving.
Dodgy in what way? This kind of thing is where none would do creative accounting. Accountants just propose a plan and get the auditor to sign off on it, or suggest modifications. In the auto business, if the CFO wants to hit a number for the CEO, warranty accounting is the place to play games.
Given the animosity Elon Musk has displayed towards former and current Xitter employees, it should surprise us more that people keep working with him. People leaving him is not surprising. Deciding to work with him is surprising.
Since you say it's a serious question, even though it's pretty unrelated to this thread, I'll give a serious answer.
First, 'xitter' isn't an official term related to x/twitter, so there's no official pronunciation.
'Xi' also doesn't occur in english much at all, so there's not much to draw on. My dictionary just has "Xiphoid", where the 'X' is pronounced as a 'Z'.
To my american-english mind, the obvious sound is "Z", like in "xenogenic" or "xenophobic". Or "xylophone". Basically, "x" at the beginning of a word is always a Z sound if a vowel sound follows, and an "ex" sound in exceptions like "X-Ray" and so on.
The only exception to the above is loanwords, notably chinese ones. In words like "Xian", for example, the "X" is pronounced close to the english soft "J" sound (like in Jacques)
So, summarizing, the majority of native english speakers, I believe, will read that as "Zitter", unless told it's a chinese word. There's no official pronunciation, so feel free to pick your own favorite though. This is english, pronunciations aren't wrong or right, they're just vibes.
Exactly. Since CFOs are in charge of the numbers and can be legally on the hook for them [1], their departure always gets people to perk up a bit. Even if there isn't crime involved, when they guy who knows the financials best decides he'd rather be elsewhere, it can be a sign that there's a coming plateau or downturn.
That's especially interesting in the case of Tesla, whose stock is down something like 40% from peak, and who is facing increasingly stiff competition from basically every automaker in the world.
The vast majority of the time it’s a big deal, which makes it newsworthy. As well, any well run company would announce at least a few quarters in advance that the CFO is leaving.
They don’t abruptly quit or get fired after 13 years without something brewing
Actually the vast majority of the time it's not at all a big deal. The average tenure of a CFO among the S&P 500 is 3.5 years. It's really not a big deal.
You must be new here. Many companies keep ex-C-levels nominally employed as 'consultants' so their stock can vest (which is typically the bulk of their compensation) and avoid any expensive/public lawsuits. It's paying them off to quietly go away without spending any cash.
This isn’t the own you think it is. C-level execs are often contractually obliged to serve out lengthy notice periods, a quarter and some change is nothing unusual.
Interesting, almost every case I know of where a fire alarm has gone off, no one really cared. I even remember a fire alarm going off in an actual movie theater and no one budged.
I'm going to maintain my position that a precondition for something always being a big deal is that it must always be meaningful. Fire alarms are sometimes a big deal, but sometimes they are just noise. I think the CFO of Tesla stepping down is also just noise as well, but you are welcome to think otherwise.
Got it. Still not a red flag though. CFO tenure is rather low. This thread points out more so how Musk has become a villain in the tech sphere and people are looking for reasons to vilify him and anything he’s associated with.
For context, C-Suite roles rarely change without an announcement far in advance or a complete change of leadership.
(I know nothing about Telsa's current affairs, but a CFO change this sudden without any other announcement is sure to cause investor concern and likely foreshadows some bigger press.)
That doesn't mean anything at the C level, the 6 months isn't his choice. They almost always transition out unless there is reputational damage involved, it's written into their contracts.
As of August 4, 2023, Tesla, Inc. (“Tesla”) appointed Vaibhav Taneja as Chief Financial Officer in addition to his current role as Chief Accounting Officer, to succeed Zachary Kirkhorn. Mr. Kirkhorn stepped down as of August 4, after a thirteen-year tenure with the company, the last four years of which he has served as Master of Coin and Chief Financial Officer. During his tenure, Tesla has seen tremendous expansion and growth. Tesla thanks Mr. Kirkhorn for his significant contributions. Mr. Kirkhorn will continue to serve Tesla through the end of the year to support a seamless transition.
Prior to this appointment as CFO, Mr. Taneja, 45, served as Tesla’s Chief Accounting Officer since March 2019, as Corporate Controller from May 2018, and as Assistant Corporate Controller between February 2017 and May 2018. Mr. Taneja served in various finance and accounting roles at SolarCity Corporation from March 2016. Prior to that, Mr. Taneja was employed at PricewaterhouseCoopers in both India and the U.S. between July 1999 and March 2016.