In This Story
The Tesla (TSLA-3.33%) board may have shot down reports of a leadership shake-up, but one analyst says the message was clear: Elon Musk isn’t untouchable. The report, Wedbush analysts led by Dan Ives said on Wednesday, was a clear “warning shot” from the board.
Ives said that blowback from Musk’s involvement with the Trump administration (and Tesla’s subsequent struggles) forced the board’s hand in exploring a change of CEO, but the board has backed off — at least for now. This means, the analyst said, that Musk is back in the “driver’s seat” at Tesla and the company’s immediate struggles are behind it.
“We believe that cooler heads have now prevailed and that the Board is now NOT actively looking to replace Musk as CEO and this code red situation is now in the rearview,” Ives wrote.
He and the other analysts also said they believe Musk will remain in the CEO role — where he’s been since 2008 — for at least five years: “We would be surprised if the Board was still heading down this search path as of today.”
The Wall Street Journal (NWSA-0.90%), citing unnamed sources familiar with the matter, reported late Wednesday that board members reached out to several executive search firms about a month ago to inquire about finding a new CEO. The outreach came as Tesla’s stock price cratered amid Musk’s controversial role heading the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) under President Donald Trump. Tesla had narrowed its focus to a major search firm, The Journal reported.
Robyn Denholm, the chair of Tesla’s board, denied the report early Thursday in a statement that Tesla posted on X — calling it “absolutely false” and saying that “the CEO of Tesla is Elon Musk and the Board is highly confident in his ability to continue executing on the exciting growth plan ahead.”
Musk also weighed in on X, claiming it was a “deliberately false article.” The Journal said that it reached out to Musk for the story but that he didn’t respond.
Musk, on a recent earnings call, said he’d be scaling back his time with DOGE and recommitting to his role as Tesla’s CEO. Wedbush analysts said the move will be big for the struggling company — a sign that Musk understands “that the time for politics is over” as he readies to “lead Tesla into its autonomous and robotics future.”
“We believe that at the end of the day, this was a game of high stakes poker between the Board and Musk,” Ives wrote. “This story will clearly create a ton of noise tomorrow but we believe Musk is back in the drivers seat at Tesla and it shows just how tense the situation got between the Board and Musk.”