Elon Musk, the CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, wrote a short cryptic tweet on Sunday stating he was’moving on,’ igniting a firestorm of speculation on social media.
He wrote, “Moving on…”
Musk then clarified that his remark was in reference to his Twitter spats with Bill Gates, Microsoft’s co-founder and billionaire.
In a follow-up tweet, he said, “(from making fun of Gates for shorting Tesla while claiming to support climate change action).”
Gates has yet to make a public statement in response to Musk’s tweets. Musk has previously declined a meeting with Gates to discuss climate change philanthropy because Gates admitted to still having a short position in Tesla stock.
According to a series of leaked text exchanges, Gates proposed a meeting with Musk “to discuss philanthropy opportunities,” but Musk declined after Gates acknowledged he had not yet closed down his Tesla short position.
“Sorry, but I cannot take your philanthropy on climate change seriously when you have a massive short position against Tesla, the company doing the most to solve climate change,” Musk replied to Gates, declining the invitation.
There were rumors that Gates held a short position on Tesla, but he never verified whether or not he owned any of the company’s stock.
Gates refused to discuss his position in a February 2021 interview with CNBC.
However, in an interview a few days later, Gates clarified his position, essentially confessing to shorting the stock.
Omar Qazi, the owner of @wholemarsblog, is a co-defendant in a libel and harassment lawsuit filed by Aaron Greenspan, the inventor of the public records database Plainsite, who has also shorted Tesla shares and has been a prominent critic of Elon Musk.
“Do you still have a half billion dollar short position against Tesla?” Musk asked Gates in the text exchange, which CNBC could not independently verify.
To which Gates replied: “Sorry to say I haven’t closed it out. I’d like to talk about philanthropic opportunities.”
Musk shot back: “Sorry, I cannot take your philanthropy on climate change seriously when you have a massive short position against Tesla, the company doing the most to solve climate change.”
Gates’ Tesla trades, as well as the text exchanges mentioned in @wholemarsblog’s tweet, have yet to be covered by the New York Times.