6mo ago

Why one of Europe's largest pension funds sold its entire $585 million stake in Tesla

www.businessinsider.com

A Dutch pension fund sold its entire stake in Tesla, reportedly worth $585 million

Summary

Dutch pension fund Stichting Pensioenfonds ABP sold its $585 million Tesla stake over concerns about Elon Musk's "controversial and exceptionally high" pay package and unspecified labor conditions.

ABP previously voted against Musk's performance-based compensation, which has faced shareholder lawsuits and judicial scrutiny.

A Delaware judge recently invalidated the pay package, citing insufficient shareholder approval.

While Tesla's Model Y remains popular in the Netherlands, European sales fell 15% in 2024.

ABP stated the divestment was not politically motivated despite Musk's ties to the Trump administration.

75 comments

Because it's massively over-valued, the board is a bunch of Musky Bro-hoes (also sometimes family...) signing off whatever the fuck Musk says; while it's being led by a Ketamine-addled Nazis with the emotional development of a child.
Why anyone still holds Tesla, is beyond me.
- Some people truly believe in Musk and the brand. Those people are dipshits, but if you excluded dipshits from your market predictions, you would always be wrong.
  But pension funds have a responsibility to go long, and while Tesla may rise or fall on Musk's digital bowel movements, volatility is the problem.
  
  Musk's digital bowel movements
  
  Even taking them into account, long term likely would never pay off. It's valued way over what they'd be worth if they took over the entire vehicle industry, and that's not going to happen. Sure, for gambling maybe it's worth it to speculate on, but for a long-term investment it's horrible.
  
  See I don't get I the value is based on some future that they think Tesla can get to. So what happens if it got there the stock would stay this price?
- There are people like my younger brother who believe that Musk is a pure genius, likes Bezos a lot, and is entirely sold on the idea that billionaire philanthropy is somehow a good and positive thing for regular people.
  
  christians in particular like to imagine that god blesses those who are "good" with wealth, and that therefore wealthy people must be "good" because otherwise they wouldn't be wealthy.
  This then gets absorbed into more secular thought with "well they're successful so they must be skilled".
  Truth is, his daughter-grooming daddy owned an emerald mine in Apartheid South Africa and got his seed-money from that. So he's neither "good" nor particularly "skilled."
  
  sold on the idea that billionaire philanthropy is somehow a good and positive thing for regular people.
  He's not wrong, but he's judging occasional donations to particular issues as neither ineffective, incomplete, nor completely toxic to direction of research, because he judges them in a vacuum and/or against a fake goal-post of 'no research funding' instead of 'broad research funding based on income tax that rich fucks would have paid in a world before Reagan dropped the bottom out '.
  The mating habits of cannabis-injected left-handed greater eastern blue potter's snails will get no money from rich fucks, DESPITE its follow-on application to cancer cure research based on the secretion rate inprovement and or testing options derived from massive population explosions with a kill switch.
- I don't understand why people mention the ketamine. If he truly did a lot of ketamine he'd be far nicer. It gives a dreamy feeling where your opinions on matters are much more down to earth. You don't overthink and live more in the moment. If anything, Muskyboi should do a lot more ketamine.
  
  That is complete nonsense, ket can make you a enraged, confused dumbass after chronic use, I've seen it happen.
  
  Drugs don't change people. Plenty of murderers smoke weed, and no sane person arguing in good faith would say weed makes you violent.
The only reason to hold Tesla right now is political. Do you believe Musk can continue sucking Trump's dick to profits? It's plausible...
Their cars are trash in the global market. China is owning everyone in the EV market. Domestically, they're not a bad buy used, but for their sticker price there's much more compelling options out there. The cybertruck is one of the worst products in automotive history. It'll be mentioned with the Pinto as far as engineering failures go.
- It's not necessarily political, wall street can be very clueless about technology. They all seem to believe they can judge the potential of just about any company, no matter how complex the industry, by merely watching a video of the CEO speaking and judging how smart they sound. Perceived potential can also be self-reinforcing because the more prominent a business figure gets, the more wall street reporters and influencers want to be associated with them - so they're careful to only praise them and not piss them off. So they can easily be duped by an Elizabeth Holmes/Adam Neumann type who has a strong voice and even stronger connections and promises the moon for a small investment.
  Musk's key innovation was taking that a step further and promising them Mars.
- Musk opposed Biden’s EV incentives because he wants to move everything to China
  Them being ahead is a reason to invest in Tesla
- Their cars are trash in the global market.
  Not true
  
  Ok their cars are trash no matter where they are. They have so many QC issues.
A Delaware judge recently invalidated the pay package, citing insufficient shareholder approval.
I don't know if this is the article (its pay walled), or AI since it's a summary, or maybe OP, but this is a terrible reporting of what happened.
The pay package was supposed to be independently created by the board, but it was found out that Elon had a heavy hand in proposing it, including the people helping him craft it. Now, I don't think this is bad per say, but then the board was supposed to independently vet it, but the board wasn't really deemed independent, and who they used had ties to Musk. Further, it wasn't properly disclosed what involvement Musk had in crafting the package in the first place.
The failure to properly disclose all of this made the shareholder vote void. Had they disclosed it, and had it been approved, it would have been okay.
It had nothing to do with not having insufficient shareholder approval.
- *per se
  
  TIL, thanks.
- One more problem was that the various milestones had projections for likelihood and time to completion, but what they presented to the shareholders was different than their internal projections.
  So not only did they think some of these milestones were likely, they lied to shareholders about how likely they were to make the package seem more difficult to achieve.
  
  I knew (but forgot) they thought the 1st one was likely and didn't disclose it, was it others as well?
- Paying someone a billion dollars or more at a company should require unanimous shareholder approval. One nay should strike it down. It's egregious and unnecessary.
  A billion dollars can buy you a hundred people at 10 million a piece, that's gonna get you a shitload of celebrity involvement and endorsement. The value of the shares in this asshole's pay package is over 100 billion as of early December.
  
  The shareholders chose to do it, it's their company, they can do whatever they want with it (as long as they weren't misled as the judge has ruled they were).
  Trying to control what the shareholders do with their company like that is not the way to solve a problem. And if you don't own any voting shares, then you have no reason to complain about what they decide to do.
  The payment comes out of their pocket, by the devaluation of their stock, when the options are issued and vested. They went into it knowing they'd make a shit load of money if he pulled it off, and he'd make a shit load of money too. The stock has 25x'd since the package was created.
  Edit: Just to be clear here - A better way would be through a high tax bracket that would eat the vast majority of that away forcing him to sell most of the shares (or I guess alternatively sell SpaceX shares, it'd be his choice), but keep in mind it'd be at the rate when each set vests, so it's not a tax bill on 55b, it's a series of tax bills on smaller amounts.
I sold all my shares 3-4 years ago.
There are just better ways to invest that money.
I am, in my complete nativity, hoping Tesla would fire Musk and just become a normal car manufacturer. But suppose this is a far cry. But one can hope
- Board of directors is not going to tank their Tesla stock by removing him. There is a reason Musk appointed people who are indebted to him.
https://www.marketbeat.com/stocks/NASDAQ/TSLA/short-interest/
Short positions are increasing.
- At the end of the day Tesla is a bubble that will pop at some point, Musk's latest antics are only going to accelerate that.
  A pension fund typically avoids risky investments, so this plus the shorting increase is a pretty strong signal that investors think the pop is imminent.
  
  You might be right, but as someone who used to short, the odds are stacked against you.
  First, inflation is always pushing stocks up. Second, it gives TSLA an opportunity to short squeeze. Third, you're tying up your money that could instead go into an always-increasing market.
  People have been trying to short Tesla for half a decade. Eventually someone will make money, but it's far from worth it
It’s just time to cash. Remember when he bought twitter and the Tesla stock crashed. Yeah they are afraid it will happen again because he’s too busy fucking up the US government.
- There's only one way the valuation can go, down.
  They make luxury cars in an economy that seems to be heading for a recession in a political climate full of people who would rather roll coal than buy an ev, and the pro-ev people have been completely alienated by the guy's politics.
  The writing is on the wall, it's just a matter of time before people see it. Dumpy may give the guy a pile of cash, but odds are that would be through SpaceX or another business, not Tesla.
Remember that for them to sell over half a billion dollars worth of stock, somebody (many people) bought it. Probably it was the other major stockholders that were ok with Musk's pay.
It's not always a good thing when the one sensible voice goes "fuckit. I'm out".
- Institutional investors like pension funds selling a stock is kind of a big deal though, as a) there are a lot of them for a stock as "big" as Tesla, b) they are far less risk averse then individual investors, and c) the managers of these funds tend to pay attention to what other funds with similar holdings are doing. If one this big sells, others will wonder if they should get out now as well.
  This could, in theory, be the start of a mass selloff of Tesla stock by institutional investors wanting to get out before the bubble bursts and they stop seeing gains from Tesla stock.
- They didn't want to be caught holding the hot potato when the music stops.
  The fact that someone else is willing to take that risk (or doesn't see that risk) doesn't mean too much in the big picture.
  
  So much depends upon a hot potato
- In the financial industry they call retail investors dumb money. Probably lots of dumb money bought the stock. Also they didn’t sell everything in one day. They probably spread it acrosss weeks so it wouldn’t affect the stock price too much
- Seems only a downside for those owning stock.
  
  They have more power now.
Go on Europe!
The Dutch see the writing on the wall. Scroll down...the topic went from Tesla, Musk Digital Bowel Movement to Ketamine...
Divested
The opposite of this is exactly what Meta and big tech companies depend on: as long as we are raking in money, the process doesn’t matter.
So someone bought it...
- Of course someone bought it... it wouldn't be worth anything if there weren't any buyers.
- maybe it's someone like saudi sovereign fund, they like burning piles of cash on overhyped failures like when they gave money to softbank
- Yeah people from the Elon cult.
- Likely sock-puppets for oligarchs trying to prop up the stock value under the weight of sell-offs.

75 comments