-
Ross Gerber still doesn’t think the pain is over for Tesla.
-
Gerber’s firm dumped more of the stock last quarter, and he said he’ll keep selling.
-
The shares are up 52% from recent lows, but Gerber isn’t convinced by the latest rally.
Ross Gerber, a longtime Tesla investor who’s turned bearish, unloaded more shares of the electric vehicle maker in the first quarter.
The latest quarterly filing from Gerber’s firm, Gerber-Kawasaki Wealth and Investment Management, shows that the investor backed up his recent bearish views on Tesla with more sales, shedding more than 26,000 shares, or a little over 10% of its stake. It was the firm’s largest stock sale in the quarter, its 13F filing shows.
It’s unclear at which point in the quarter Gerber’s firm sold. However, following a 35% drop in the stock in the first three months of the year, shares have reversed course in the second quarter and are up 52% from their lows in April.
The move higher has been sparked by CEO Elon Musk’s announcement that he would step back from the Department of Government Efficiency. Shares have also jumped on a broader rally as tariff headwinds eased in recent weeks.
Shares of the carmaker are still down around 29% from their highs in late 2024.
In a recent interview, Gerber told Business Insider that he’s not moved by recent developments that have propped up Tesla’s share price.
Gerber said Elon Musk’s departure from DOGE and progress on US-China trade are positive forces, but neither of those things changes what he sees as the company’s fundamental issues.
Gerber said there are three problems:
-
Full self-driving “doesn’t work,” Gerber said, referring to some reports of user issues with the technology. Tesla has faced lawsuits related to its FSD tech.
-
People aren’t buying Teslas. In the first quarter, Tesla sold 128,100 vehicles in the US, down 8.6% from last year and 21% from the year prior. In European markets, sales have fallen by as much as 81% month over month.
-
Tesla faces stiff competition as it tries to roll out its robotaxi business. Tesla is due to launch its ride-hailing service sometime this summer, but Gerber thinks the firm will have a hard time competing with rivals like Waymo.
Gerber said he doubts Tesla can follow through with all the promises it’s made to investors.
“We certainly haven’t changed our view where we would start adding it again,” he told BI, referring to his firm’s holdings of the stock. “In fact, what I think is that this could be an extremely difficult time for them if they don’t pull off or at least convince people that they have a real robotaxi business on the way.”
Gerber correctly called a 50% decline in Tesla stock earlier this year, and his firm has offloaded more than 204,000 shares in the last two years. He added that he’s not convinced by the latest rally.
“I’ve thought it’s been overvalued for a while, and I certainly don’t care if it gets more overvalued. We own a lot of it and I can sell more,” he said.
Gerber said he thinks the company’s future is unclear. It’s possible Tesla could hire a new leader who “can sell cars,” or that Musk can somehow repair his image among disillusioned customers and fix some of the brand damage caused by his foray into politics.
Gerber previously told BI that he believed one of the few ways Tesla could move forward would be by getting a new CEO.
“I think the next six months will really be make or break for them, and we’ll see how they do,” he said.
Read the original article on Business Insider
