https://www.teslarati.com/tesla-short-seller-bets-against-tsla-q2/ Tesla short seller bets against $TSLA in Q2; deletes Twitter in Q3 Credit: Tesla Tesla short seller, Scott Burg, placed a multi-billion dollar bet against Tesla (TSLA) in the second quarter of 2022. He recently deleted his Twitter account. According to a report in Bloomberg, the Tesla short seller added puts on 4.8 million Tesla shares during the last quarter. In 2020, the Deer Park Road Management Co.’s chief investment officer wrongly predicted in 2020 that Tesla “will be squashed like a bug.” The tweet is no longer available since Burg deleted his Twitter account but the Internet lasts forever. You can view his tweet here. It seems ludicrous that someone would place that much money against a company that is as successful as Tesla. However, Tesla has always been a popular stock to short. Tesla’s short sellers most likely felt the pain in July, which was the most unprofitable month. According to an analysis by S3 Partners, Tesla short sellers were down by $1.55 billion within a 30-day period. A total of 24.98 million shares were shorted and the short sellers had to cover 2.09 million in that same period. Whether or not Deer Park lost big on that short bet is not yet known as the company didn’t disclose the strike prices or expiration dates for the options it purchased. Bloomberg suspects that the events taking place with Twitter and Elon Musk might have been the catalyst for Deer Park’s decision to place those put options. Along with the billion-dollar bet, Burg took to Twitter to make taunts about death spirals. “Do you know what a death spiral is? Coming…$TSLAQ” Burg often used the “$TSLAQ” in some of his Tesla-related tweets. The tag is a symbol that many of Tesla’s and Elon Musk’s rather extreme critics use. Many of these critics have harassed Tesla owners, supporters, and shareholders on Twitter as well as Elon Musk and his own family. When Bloomberg emailed Burg about the put options, he deleted his Twitter account and his company ghosted Bloomberg.
After stepping up criticism of Tesla and Musk on social media this year, Burg abruptly deleted his Twitter account Wednesday following an email inquiry from Bloomberg about the put options. Deer Park didn’t return messages seeking comment, nor did Tesla, which has disbanded its media relations department. Hahaha tit for tat or maybe it is tweet for tweet. Ask a friend: Is TSLA up this year currently? Even after a 35% move off lows. Hmmm?
Average short traders are not interesting. I want to read what Gate’s position, 500 million short according to Musk.
Musk can be polarizing but seems there's easier ways to make money than betting against smart individuals. Here's what a few had to say about Musk.
It was 500 million, it might be 1.5 billion now. It is just a hedge anyway against the long side of his portfolio. Not that interesting. Although i wonder what share of short position his wife got in the divorce. Hedge fund blowups are way more interesting from a risk management perspective.