I can still remember lying in bed going through my Twitter feed and seeing this tweet pop up from my hero Elon Musk.
I was startled and said so to dear wife. As in "what on earth is Elon doing making announcements this serious on Twitter for goodness sake!"
The subsequent jump in Tesla share price savaged Tesla short-sellers, who'd been bugging him. That alone would make the Tweet very dodgy.
Anyway, it turns out the SEC were not amused. They've just fined him and Tesla USD $20 million each. And Elon has to step down from Chairmanship.
That led to a 10% 14%* drop in the share price wiping $5 (US$ 7) billion from its value.
So, total it up and the tweet cost Tesla shareholders and Elon Musk $5.08 $7.08 billion or $565 $786 million for each of its nine words.
If there's a tweet that's cost more money I'd like to know it.
*[UPDATE 1 October: News that the drop in Tesla share price was actually 14% of its US$50 billion valuation]
*[UPDATE 1 October: News that the drop in Tesla share price was actually 14% of its US$50 billion valuation]
