Capital Economy, Business and Finance
On Friday, Reuters reported in a triple-sourced, triple-bylined exclusive that Tesla was ditching plans for a cheap Tesla in favour of a new push for self-driving Tesla taxis. On Saturday, Musk said Reuters was “lying”. Just another 24-hour news cycle in the life of a great news agency and a thin-skinned billionaire who hates not being in control of his own narrative? Maybe, but experience says it would be wiser to trust Reuters than Musk, in which case a dream he’s nurtured since 2006 is dead – and the dream of millions of would-be Tesla owners united by the possession of merely average incomes is probably dead too. They will have to buy Chinese instead. There are plenty of options, including models from BYD (Build Your Dream) that start a little north of $13,000 and worry western manufacturers to death as EV sales plateau pending a breakthrough in charging investment and battery tech. Speaking of which, whatever happened to Toyota’s solid state power pack that was going to double range and cut charging time to a few minutes? Hurry up. A whole new industry depends on it.