Elon Musk has refuted claims that the electric vehicle manufacturer Tesla is suffering as a result of his frequent usage of the social media site he owns, Twitter.
The car company released sales and profits for the period from October to December ahead of schedule.
Mr. Musk was questioned during an investor call if his “political influencing” on Twitter was damaging Tesla’s reputation.
“I think Twitter is actually an incredibly powerful tool for driving demand for Tesla,” Mr Musk said.
The 127 million people who follow him on social media, according to the billionaire who serves as Tesla’s CEO and product architect, “suggests that I’m reasonably popular.”
Following a tweet in 2018 suggesting he was thinking about taking Tesla private, Mr. Musk is currently involved in a legal dispute where he is accused of misleading investors. When a deal fell through, the firm’s share price rose briefly before dropping.
More recently, when he tweeted a peace plan to stop the Russia-Ukraine war, he sparked a backlash. One option was for Ukraine to hand over control of Crimea to Russia, which annexed it in 2014.
He told investors: “I would really encourage companies out there of all kinds, automotive or otherwise, to make more use of Twitter and to use their Twitter accounts in ways that are interesting and informative, entertaining, and it will help them drive sales just as it has with Tesla.”
Amid worries that the firm was losing its competitive edge, Tesla’s share price dropped by over two-thirds last year, and Elon Musk was getting more and more involved in Twitter’s drawn-out $44 billion (£35.5 billion) acquisition and subsequent reorganization.
Tesla reported on Wednesday that its sales for the last quarter of 2022 increased by 37% to $24.3 billion from the same time the previous year. The estimated increase in revenues was $24 billion.
Profits grew by 59% to $3.7 billion.
Lead equities analyst at Hargreaves Lansdown, Sophie Lund-Yates, commented on the findings saying: “Elon Musk’s foray into social media leadership through the Twitter takeover has threatened to unpick a lot of confidence as investors fretted about Elon’s ability to lead both companies.”
She added that the court case was “another distraction”.
“The last thing serious investors want is to see their chief executive in a witness stand. The worst of the damage is done but there’s likely to be little room for error or sentiment roulette for some time,” she said.
For the whole year, Tesla delivered a record 1.3 million cars to customers, a rise of 40%.
