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You are here: Home / Economics / C.R.E.A.M. / C.R.E.A.M. Open Thread: Who Owns Helped Musk Buy Twitter?

C.R.E.A.M. Open Thread: Who Owns Helped Musk Buy Twitter?

by | 170 Comments

This post is in: , , , ,

Now more than ever, a most interesting read:

… On a Twitter audio chat recently, Musk cited the company’s precarious financial position as a driver of his aggressive job cuts and drastic actions, adding “we have an emergency fire drill on our hands.”

That’s making at least some of his investors in the deal antsy, according to people familiar with the matter who spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of retribution. Last week, at least a couple of the original investors received letters from a Musk associate soliciting additional investments, according to two people familiar with the matter, although it was unclear if that would proceed.

Here’s who initially invested in the deal, and what we know about why:

Foreign Investors
Prince Alwaleed bin Talal al Saud
Estimated Contribution: $2 Billion…
The Qatar Investment Authority
Estimated Contribution: $375 Million

Binance
Estimated Contribution: $500 million
… The exchange’s executives have said they support Musk’s desire to curb the presence of bots on the platform. They have also said they see Twitter as an opportunity to research and develop crypto-related technology and services, including payments and authentication. The crypto company, founded in China, has no headquarters and has drawn the scrutiny of regulators in the United States, Britain and Japan.

What they get: As part of the deal, anyone who invested $250 million or more gets special access to confidential company information. But giving that privilege to foreign investors is raising flags with Biden and U.S. officials. Of particular interest is whether that includes access to personal data about Twitter’s users since several of the entities are entwined with governments that have a history of cracking down on dissidents on Twitter and other online platforms…

Venture Capitalists
Andreessen Horowitz
Estimated Contribution: $400 Million…
Sequoia Capital
Estimated Contribution: $800 Million…

Elon’s Buddies
Larry Ellison
Estimated Contribution: $ 1 Billion…
Jack Dorsey
Estimated Contribution: $1 billion

Morgan Stanley, Bank of America, Barclays
Estimated Contribution: $13 billion…
What they get: While these banks won’t hold the same type of sway over Twitter, they are a powerful weight on the billionaire, who will owe roughly $1 billion in interest a year. Musk has also at times last year put more than half of his Tesla shares down as collateral on loans, according to financial filings, worth tens of billions of dollars. But Tesla has slumped roughly 65 percent this year, highlighting both the risks facing tech companies in a downtrodden market and the danger of loading a slow-growth company like Twitter with too much debt. The banks helping to finance his Twitter deal would play a huge role if the company ever goes under…

Reader Interactions

170Comments

  1. 1.

    Kent

    What is the form of all of these investments?

    Are they structured as loans to Elon?  Or are they structured as ownership shares of Twitter?

    Anyone know?

  2. 2.

    Kent

    Referencing the Black Swan Twitter post above.  What exactly is a “Margin Call” and how do they work?

    My vague perception is that when the Tesla stock that Elon pledged as collateral for his Twitter financing loans from big banks falls below certain market value the banks can call for increased collateral from Elon or close the loans.  But I don’t have a sophisticated understanding of it.

  6. 6.

    MattF

    I’m pleased with the ‘crash and burn’ aspects of the Twitter/Tesla story, since Musk is such an asshole and the lack of a penalty for being an asshole is a real systemic problem. OTOH, Elon is a dull boy with a limited behavioral repertoire, and Mastodon has broken my Twitter habit, so there really isn’t much at stake for me. So, I won’t stand in the courtyard in front of a Musk-corporation headquarters yelling ‘JUMP YOU ASSHOLE’, although I’ll admit to being tempted.

  8. 8.

    Suzanne

    @Raoul Paste: I can’t imagine owning a Tesla now. Like, if I had one, I would be embarrassed to drive it. It’s the equivalent of having toilet paper stuck to one’s shoe or unironically wearing a fedora.

    Elon has done irreversible damage to his brand, and those associated with him.

  9. 9.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    What they get: As part of the deal, anyone who invested $250 million or more gets special access to confidential company information. But giving that privilege to foreign investors is raising flags with Biden and U.S. officials.

    I imagine the EU isn’t real thrilled either, seems to me they’re more willing to go after the tech bros. IANAL much less and international L but I would think this would pose some problems for the company, no?

  12. 12.

    Gin & Tonic

    @Kent: The Morgan Stanley (et al) billions are debt, not equity. That is, loans to Twitter. That’s why the company is faced with $1B in interest payments every year. Generally, debt has a claim on assets in bankruptcy and equity does not.

  14. 14.

    Another Scott

    One should keep in mind that Tesla’s biggest market (and the world’s biggest car market) is China. Fool.com from today:

    On Dec. 26, Reuters and The Wall Street Journal reported that Tesla will suspend for an eighth day its production at its Shanghai electric car plant, the largest in the world. Furthermore, Tesla told its employees it will not restart production in Shanghai until Jan. 2.

    Soon after this report came out, China’s Global Times reported a sort of non-denial denial from Tesla, calling reports of the suspension “inaccurate,” while at the same time confirming them by saying the Shanghai plant is indeed conducting “annual maintenance work.”

    So what’s really going on in China? Well, the economy is reopening as the government rolls back its zero-COVID policy for one thing. That’s apparently snarling supply chains again, however — and not just for Tesla. As CNBC reports today, Nio stock is also down today on reports that a breakout of COVID-19 is disrupting supplies of EV parts in China.

    […]

    If, however, you agree that supply chains in China will eventually right themselves and that Tesla’s sales will revive, then the continuing sell-off in Tesla shares may present a buying opportunity. At $115 and change, Tesla stock now trades at its lowest price in two and a half years. At less than 32.5 times trailing earnings, and long-term earnings growth rates projected at 35%, Tesla stock sports a price/earnings-to-growth (PEG) ratio of just 0.9 — noticeably below the value investor’s touchstone of a PEG of 1.

    If you’re brave enough to try to grasp a falling knife — that’s still falling — now could be a great time to buy Tesla stock.

    Yeah, no. [/Lumberg]

    On that margin call thing… NASDAQ.com (from 11/11):

    To magic up $4.6 billion, Elon Musk would have turned to his Tesla shares as a source of collateral. According to the electric vehicle (EV) maker’s latest proxy document, Musk has pledged around half his stake — 268 million shares — of which he can raise up to 25% of their market value as loans (or about $10.3 billion at current prices). It’s an easy source of liquidity in good times and plugs his funding gap with plenty of breathing room. Bloomberg’s Billionaire Index also agrees on $4.6 billion as the value of currently pledged Tesla shares.

    But as options investors all know, a portfolio’s market value is a tentative security at best. Today, every 10% decline in TSLA stock means over $1 billion of liquidity gets wiped off Musk’s credit facility. An additional $6.4 billion liability with pledged SpaceX shares adds to that risk. If the value of Musk’s holdings drop, so too does his ability to keep Twitter’s financing afloat.

    These problems are compounded by the terms of Twitter’s $13 billion of bank financing, which came with change-of-control protections. Under their terms, Elon Musk cannot sell his majority stake without potentially triggering a clause that forces Twitter to offer repurchasing all notes at 101% face value — a ruinous amount that would immediately sink the firm. The debt also limits Musk’s ability to raise additional secured capital; future rounds will involve unsecured junk bonds with strict financial covenants. In other words, Elon Musk can’t walk away from Twitter unless he deals with the $13 billion debt pile first.

    [ womp, womp ]

    TSLA closed at $195.97 on 11/11.

    He should have tried to own the libs by just setting his money on fire. Would have done less damage that way.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  15. 15.

    dmsilev

    @Suzanne: The real fun thing is that by any vaguely rational assessment, Tesla’s stock price is still overvalued by like a factor of three or four. The only thing propping it up is the myth of Elon Musk Super Genius, Now that it’s become clear even to the most obtuse that the myth is, well, a myth, expect further drops. And a corresponding increase in schadenfreude futures.

  17. 17.

    Ken

    @Kent: That is my understanding. Securities are pledged as the collateral for a loan. If the value of the securities drops below some trigger point, the borrower has to provide additional securitization or pay back part of the loan. If the borrower can’t or won’t do that, the lender can sell the securities.

    The “Black Swan” twitter post suggests that there may be multiple loans outstanding — not necessarily all to Musk, or for twitter — where Tesla stock is the security. If a bunch of those have the same trigger point, you would suddenly see a lot of selling.  This can cause feedback in the form of more margin calls, which can crash the price of the stock.

  18. 18.

    Suzanne

    @dnfree: I wanted a Tesla some years ago. Now I think they are gross and not cool.

    So much of Tesla’s brand is tied up with Musk’s.

  19. 19.

    dmsilev

    I just got a Today’s News email from Bloomberg News with the subject line ‘Tesla in a tailspin’:

    The Tesla nosedive accelerated Tuesday, its shares plummeting 11% in just one session. The terrible showing was the latest in a seven-day losing streak—Tesla’s longest since 2018—and knocked it out of the S&P 500 Index’s top 10 companies.

    So sad.

  20. 20.

    Gin & Tonic

    @Suzanne: By the way, if you are old enough, you can wear a fedora any way you like. That’s my story and I’m sticking with it.

  22. 22.

    Subsole

    Off-topic, but just wanted to let y’all know the Libs of TikTok lady was apparently at the J6 riot.

    She did a big face reveal on Tucker Carlson (and spouted some deranged garbage, natch). The good people of the interwebnet used her face and some jewelry she was wearing to pick her out in the mob of redcaps.

    This is interesting, because Twitter’s current owner gave her account a big, sloppy ‘Like’ recently.

    Just, y’know, in case you had any illusions about this guy or what he is.

  23. 23.

    Ken

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: I would think this [EU displeasure] would pose some problems for the company, no?

    If the “special access to confidential company information” includes any customer personal information covered by the GDPR, the EU countries can impose fines. The fine can be up to 4% of the company’s yearly revenue, and each of the 27 EU member nations can impose them separately, potentially totaling 108% of annual revenue.

  24. 24.

    Tom Levenson

    @dmsilev: I wonder how much stock options play a role in Tesla’s ability to attract top engineering talent. Which, up till very recently, they’ve been able to do. The bargain has been to work like hell (“hard core”) for a few years and then go on to a second job as the Space Marine of tech workers.

    But if what a really top engineering kid sees now is an absentee-managed company with a collapsing share price and a hugely different competitive landscape going forward than it’s enjoyed for the last decade–will they still sign up to suffer throughout their twenties?

    I genuinely don’t know.

  25. 25.

    dmsilev

    @Ken:

    The fine can be up to 4% of the company’s yearly revenue

    Dear Leader Musk has anticipated this by driving away all of the advertisers and hence reducing revenue to nearly zero. Checkmate, libs!

  26. 26.

    Ken

    @dmsilev: Tesla’s stock price is still overvalued by like a factor of three or four.

    It’s fallen another 1.7% (and counting) in after-hours trading, so it looks like others agree.

  27. 27.

    dmsilev

    @Tom Levenson: That bargain works for SpaceX (arguably the world leader in launchers and pushing hard to extend that lead), maybe Tesla, but not Twitter. Twitter’s startup days are long over, even without the narcissistic asshole in charge there wouldn’t be much prospect for massive growth, etc. OldTwitter got by just fine by being more or less a decent place to work, at least for the engineers, but Musk of course lit that on fire.

    Edit: Sorry, brain-fart; thought you were referring to Twitter, Tesla also isn’t a startup and is facing nasty headwinds in the marketplace, so even without the Musk Factor I wouldn’t bet on massive growth there.

  29. 29.

    UncleEbeneezer

    Magdi Jacobs has an interesting Twitter thread:

    I just had a conversation with two French tourists about French vs. American politics and it basically devolved into “Anti-immigration rhetoric is fascistic if it comes from your country; if it comes from the France region of France, it’s just sparkling ‘cultural preservation'”

  31. 31.

    dmsilev

    @Starfish: It looks like something out of a 3D video game circa 1996 or so back when the hardware could only deal with a few hundred or so polygons at a time.

  33. 33.

    cain

    @Captain C:

    Embracing a group of folks who don’t even want to buy Teslas – while insulting and pushing away all the people who actually want to Tesla – just a stupid shit.

    How the hell did he manage to keep this personality under wraps so long? I still think he’s fucking lost it because his ex-wife is seeing someone else. I reckon that he is the one who does the breaking up..

  35. 35.

    cain

    @MattF: ​
     
    I’m getting so much more engagement on Mastodon, but more than that – the kind of people who follow me and I follow them are almost all highly educated people working as researchers, engineers, doctors, activists and what not. All of them doing purposeful things.

    There is still lots to do to make Mastodon good and I kind of feel bad for Eugen who is getting all kinds of pressure from lots of folks.

  36. 36.

    Bill Arnold

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist:

    As part of the deal, anyone who invested $250 million or more gets special access to confidential company information.

    FWIW, full anonymity (to the extent technical possible, which is a lot) is possible with Twitter. That is one of its few remaining virtues.

  38. 38.

    cain

    @Suzanne: He has damaged the Tesla brand. It is untenable as a former Tesla owner to try to buy one – I wante to actually (a used one) and now I just can’t because I would be putting money in Elon Musk’s wallet.

    Imagine the poor sales people at Tesla stores in malls everywhere – they probably have to field questions about that man’s behavior.

  39. 39.

    Baud

    @cain:

    the kind of people who follow me and I follow them are almost all highly educated people working as researchers, engineers, doctors, activists and what not. All of them doing purposeful things.

     
    So you’re saying I shouldn’t join.

  41. 41.

    Poe Larity

    What are liberals going to drive now, Volvo makes some pretty cars but they’re Chinese now.

  42. 42.

    Chetan Murthy

    @UncleEbeneezer: I have some thoughts on this.  It was interesting, living in Europe in the early 90s, to see how difficult it was for Muslim immigrants to integrate, compared to the US.  In the US, Muslim immigrants integrate well, and esp. into the economy.  In Europe, it seems that that’s not the case.  Gosh, must be the immigrants then, right?  I don’t know why this is the case, but certainly Europe is making a mistake in not working hard to integrate their immigrants better, and this is a place where we’re doing a much better job.

    In 1994 when I was deciding between coming back to America, and staying in Europe, a big reason I decided to come back, was that I just didn’t know if Europeans would be able to deal with their immigrants.  I knew that we had our problems, but at least (I said to myself) we’ve got enough immigrants (like me, ha!) that we’re figuring it out, and the trajectory is somewhat well-understood.  [little did I realize what was in the offing, 20yr later, sigh]  But in Europe, even as France & Italy have the most immigrants, they really haven’t taken it all onboard.  And lots of European countries are pretty much monocultural, so even small numbers of immigrants are viewed as problematic.

    All of that told me: “go back home”.

    I will say this, though: the French people I still know aren’t like Ms. Jay’s interlocutors; they’re much more supportive of immigration and don’t have these views that Muslims are any sort of foreign element, or in any way problematic.

  43. 43.

    Dan B

    My partner was a huge Elon fan and still lbelieves he’s a genius since he now owns all the data about Twitter users and that is “worth billions”.  Friends and family think my partner is nuts.  Me too.

  44. 44.

    Geminid

    @Dan B: That woman may well be sued before too long, and someone could win a big judgement against her. Unfortunately, the successful plaintiff might be the survivor of a murder victim.

  45. 45.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Bill Arnold:

    FWIW, full anonymity (to the extent technical possible, which is a lot) is possible with Twitter. That is one of its few remaining virtues.

    I’m not that deep into it, but I’ve seen a lot of non-anonymous people express concern about Elon having access to their DMs

  46. 46.

    Subsole

     

     

    @Baud: Yep. Woke means treating everyone like people. That automatically expands your potential market. You sell to many tribes, instead of just one.

    You would think the massive, pulsating brains of the Interlectual Dim Web could grasp the idea that having many groups to draw on for support and supplies would make you more powerful.

    You would think.

    I often wonder at these people, the redpilled. The Thiels and Musks and Loomers and Carlsens of the world. The Putins and O’Reillys.

    They are so utterly, blissfully, confidently unaware of just how powerful, how fearsome, an opponent the multicultural, liberal, pluralistic democracies they despise are.

    If the little larval fascists actually lived in the world they think they want, we would gave ground their bones for our plants years ago.

  48. 48.

    geg6

    @Suzanne:

    Our campus’ chancellor has a Tesla.  But I noticed that, before I left for break, she had only driven it to campus once that week of finals.  She was driving an SUV of some sort the other days.  Could be shame or it could be a factor of the poor design and manufacturing we all hear so much about.

  50. 50.

    Suzanne

    @Bill Arnold: Eh. MAGA was alllllllways “downmarket”. It was never cool.

    It’s just astonishing. One thing you learn in marketing is that it is easy to take a brand identification from high-status to low-status. It is next to impossible to go the other way.

  51. 51.

    Subsole

    @Dan B: Sixty some incidents, I believe.

    I am given to understand she has a reputation among the LGBTQ community as the stochastic terrorist.

    I believe she inspired some wackanuts to send bomb threats to a childrens’ cancer center. Which is how I heard of her.

    Yeah. Genderbent socmedia Limbaugh, basically.

  54. 54.

    Geminid

    @Poe Larity: Volvo has a subsidiary that is producing electric cars under a stand alone brand (I forget the name). They are sold by Volvo dealers. Only 7-8000 of these cars sold in the U.S. this year but the plan is to begin producing the cars in a plant  in South Carolina by 2025.

  55. 55.

    Barbara

    @Kent: Buying on margin is when the broker allows you to finance the purchase of securities — when your account falls below a certain percentage of your debt, you have to come up with more money.  You buy on margin (if you can stomach the risk) when you think the market is rising in value — Let’s say you want to buy 1000 shares of Tesla at $100 a share, but you only have $20,000.  If you buy on margin and the shares double in value, your $80,000 loan can be paid off and your $20,000  has turned into $120,000.  Yeah!  Now, if it it goes down to $50, you could sell all the shares and still owe money.  You lose more than 100% of your original investment of $20,000. It’s what you call a magnifier of both upside potential and downside risk.

  57. 57.

    Suzanne

    @cain:

    I still think he’s fucking lost it because his ex-wife is seeing someone else. 

    Last I saw, Grimes is dating Chelsea Manning.
    The world is deeply weird.

  59. 59.

    MobiusKlein

    @Bill Arnold: ​
     
    As an employee of a FinTec company, we have categories of information that differentiates on a fine grained level the correct handling of customer and company data.
    From PIN info, credit card numbers, company payroll info, marketing plans, emails, etc.
    We distinguish company info from customer info for sure.

  67. 67.

    David ⛄ 🎅The Establishment🎄 🩌 🕎 Koch

    Telsa stock dropped 11.41% TODAY

    Over the last month it’s cratered 40.36%

    Not so funny now, huh Elmo

  68. 68.

    Shalimar

    @Ken: Are the EU fines based on a percentage of annual revenue before or after Elon pissed off almost all of their advertisers?

  70. 70.

    NotMax

    @Geminid

    FWIW Volvo is owned by the sprawling Chinese transportation concern Geely, who already markets electric models in their home country.

  72. 72.

    Geminid

    @Leslie: I think that what we know now about George Santos is the tip of an iceberg. One of his biggest campaign backers was the cousin of and reputed bagman for Russian oligarch Victor Vekselberg.

    Late last summer Mr. Vekselberg’s Long Island home was visited by FBI agents executing a search warrant. Reporters watched the agents carry a number of boxes out to their van. So it’s possible that federal prosecutors already had Santos on their radar before he became a big story ten days ago.

  74. 74.

    Shalimar

    @Omnes Omnibus: Her given name is Claire Boucher but she chooses to go by “Grimes”.  She also somehow had babies with Elon Musk, who I’m pretty sure is a silly putty golem.  I think deeply weird is a definite.

  76. 76.

    Leslie

    @Geminid: Too bad they couldn’t have wrapped him up before the election. If they do it now, the GOP will stamp its feet and scream that it’s political. Of course, they would have done that before the election, too, so maybe it doesn’t matter.

  78. 78.

    Frankensteinbeck

    @Another Scott:

    So if I’m reading that right, the banks wrote into the loan agreement that if Musk tanked Twitter, he would go down with the ship.  That was their real insurance on the loan, rigging things so that Musk couldn’t afford to unleash his inner jackass.  ‘Couldn’t afford’ in a literal, financial way.  But Narcissist Tru- sorry, Musk couldn’t accept that what makes him feel good isn’t genius business strategy, and he is now in far greater trouble than I knew.

    @Subsole:

    Just, y’know, in case you had any illusions about this guy or what he is.

    While he doesn’t spend all day screaming about it like Rowling, Musk made it pretty plain that he is seriously transphobic and Twitter treating trans people with any kind of respect and dignity was a major driver in his purchase.  That’s what the whole ‘comedy is now legal’ thing was about, the Babylon Bee getting suspended for transphobic ‘jokes’.  Reinstating the Babylon Bee was one of his first acts.

    @cain:

    I still think he’s fucking lost it because his ex-wife is seeing someone else.

    An acrimonious divorce is a tried-and-true method of turning a mediocre misogynist into a raging misogynist.

  81. 81.

    JaySinWA

    @Suzanne: Owning a Tesla now is a definite risk that it will not be repairable by normal processes in the future. It stands a real chance of being abandonware. It may even be bricked. There may be some enthusiast tinkerers that will maintain a few if Tesla leaves the market, but it will be expensive.

  83. 83.

    Ruckus

    @Another Scott:

    How big a pile would that actually be?

    He seems to be wealthy by the value of his stocks, a couple of which, thanks to him, seemed to have fallen off a cliff. It’s not often one sees stocks pushed over the side of a very tall mountain.

  86. 86.

    Geminid

    @Leslie: Santos looms large in Democrats’ minds right now but he may be a smaller fish to the feds. Vekselberg’s the big one. But if Santos was caught in their net, they aren’t going to throw him back. And he may lead them to other Republican fishes. Santos seemed tight with New York Representative Stephanik. I’m hoping that Vekselberg’s cousin slipped her and other Republicans some dirty money.

    So it may be just as well the feds did not drop the hammer on Santos this fall. I think they will before too long anyway. In the meantime House Republicans will begin the new Congress with a small minority and a big scandal that will still be developing.

  87. 87.

    Leslie

    @Gin & Tonic:

    @Suzanne:

    I like fedoras. They are one of the few styles of hat that do not make my head look even larger than it already is. I can’t wear baseball caps, knit caps, anything like that.

  88. 88.

    Miss Bianca

    @Frankensteinbeck: Plus, isn’t Grimes dating Chelsea Manning? Talk about a transphobic trigger! Not only did she leave Elon, she left Elon for Chelsea! That’s gotta hurt.

    ETA: I can’t believe I know this much about the personal life of a human pustule I despise.

  90. 90.

    Leslie

    @Geminid: Most GOP voters (who still identify as Republicans) don’t seem to care about scandals. But maybe there’ll be a drip-drip-drip effect. We can hope, anyway.

  91. 91.

    Stuart Frasier

    @Poe Larity: Huh?  Peugeots are sold on every continent, including North America.  I occasionally see new Peugeots with Mexican plates here in California.

  92. 92.

    Dan B

    @JaySinWA: There’s a Tesla repair shop a block from our barber.  It’s one of the few in the country not directly owned.  There are lots of roadsters there.

  94. 94.

    Geminid

    @Omnes Omnibus: Have you seen one yet? I’m not sure I’d notice one if I saw it. I read about Polestars in a Washington Post article and the one in the photo looked like just about every other new car I see.

  95. 95.

    Frankensteinbeck

    @Miss Bianca:

    I can’t believe I know this much about the personal life of a human pustule I despise.

    That he forces himself into our space is one of the reasons we despise him. In a very Republican trait, he has to make his ugliness your business.

  96. 96.

    frosty

    @Omnes Omnibus: So pretty much a daily driver considering his first choice was a Healey. Spoken as a previous owner/driver of 


    Nash Metropolitan

    Bugeye Sprite

    Triumph Tiger Cub (motorcycle)

    Triumph TR-3

    
 and my brother’s Big Healey and Spitfire.

  97. 97.

    Gin & Tonic

    @Geminid: My local Ford/Mazda/Volvo dealer had a Polestar 1 in the showroom last time I was there. It is a gorgeous car, and does *not* look like every other car you see. I was in lust, but it’s a little out of my price range.

  99. 99.

    MattF

    @NotMax: And the various trim levels always seem to involve some combination of the letters S, E, and/or X. Can’t imagine why— tradition of some sort, I guess.

  102. 102.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Leslie:

    Laura Rozen @lrozen. 22h (thread)

    did santos explain who was suddenly pouring money into his fake family company?

    And was it Russian-ish?

    DailyBeast: Santos “stood out to the WashPost earlier this year for his remarks in the aftermath of Russia’s bloody, unprovoked assault on Ukraine. ‘It’s not like Ukraine is a great democracy. It’s a totalitarian regime. They’re not a great bastion of freedom,’ he told paper

    “Starting in March 2021, Intrater and his wife began pouring tens of thousands of dollars into auxiliary committees backing Devolder-Santos: $20,000 directly to GADS PAC,
plus $12,100 to Devolder Santos Nassau Victory, a joint fundraising committee” with Nassau County GOP.

    Intrater is the cousin of the Russian oligarch Geminid mentions above

    These Santos campaign expenses all coming to $199.99 seems kind of dodgy. From hotel rooms, to meals and Ubers, each item listed as costing $199.99.

    is there some kind of red flag/trigger on a $200 campaign expense? Like when Carmela Soprano opened all those mutual fund accounts with $9,900 for every different company

    ETA: the links Rozen provides are mostly to a Daily Beast (paywalled) article, but I’m sure this will be coming to an accessible outlet near you

  106. 106.

    JeffH

    @Gin & Tonic: Their electric car is the Polestar 2 and it looks like a pretty generic sedan. The Polestar 1 was a limited edition sports car. Very different beasts.

  107. 107.

    Geminid

     

     

    @Leslie: As I think you are pointing out there are voters who vote Republican who identify as Republican. They will likely not be moved by the Santos story. But there are also voters, some of who might call themselves “independents,” who voted Republican in the 3rd CD who could well be moved and they can swing an election if they are sufficiently repelled by Santos. They might be if he gets indicted on multiple felony counts including fraud and money laundering.

    We may get to find out. If there is a special election in that district,  voters may take their disgust with Santos out on the candidate who Republicans nominate to take his place, no matter how clean he or she is.

    But I am getting ahead of myself here, because Santos has not resigned. Yet. My preference would be that he “slowly twists in the wind” for the next few months while his colleagues get tired of deflecting questions about George  Santos and whether he ought to resign.

  110. 110.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: ah, not paywalled, perhaps because it dates from November 30?

    But unreported until now is that by the time Devolder-Santos made these statements [about Ukraine, J, FL], his congressional ambitions had already received a $32,800 boost from a controversial figure linked to the uppermost echelons of the Russian regime—and that support would more than double in size during the months ahead.

    The cash came from Andrew Intrater and his wife, who variously listed her occupation as “homemaker” and “analyst” for Falcon AI, one of her husband’s subsidiary firms.

    Intrater’s main venture is today called Sparrow Capital, but it previously used the name Columbus Nova—and its primary function has long been to manage the investments of Intrater’s cousin, Viktor Vekselberg, one of Putin’s wealthiest and most influential courtiers.

  112. 112.

    frosty

    @NotMax: Exactly! And trunk access through the rear seat, 3-on-the-dash (not the steering column), and radio with vacuum tubes.

    First car I ever did a 4-wheel drift in. At what, 20 mph??

  113. 113.

    Geminid

    @Gin & Tonic: I believe you about the Polestar’s good looks because I am not very attentive when it comes to automobile styling. They all look better than my beat up Accord.

  114. 114.

    Jay

    @Omnes Omnibus:

    yeah, hate you too.

    Used to go over to Victoria, in the late 70’s early 80’s where there were a lot of retired Brits, to try to buy cool used cars. Best I ever got was a Jaguar MK2.

  115. 115.

    NotMax

    @frosty

    Grandmother had a (’57? ’58?) Oldsmobile Holiday 88 which I sort of lusted after, it being two-tone pink and white notwithstanding. Comfy riding land yachtlet.

  116. 116.

    frosty

    @Jay: Honestly, the best ride was the 1990 Miata. British fun, Japanese reliability. Got totaled in 2013, just under 25 years and a Moon Unit (238,000 miles).

    The Datsun 510 wasn’t bad either.

  118. 118.

    RSA

    @cain:  He has damaged the Tesla brand. It is untenable as a former Tesla owner to try to buy one – I want to actually (a used one) and now I just can’t because I would be putting money in Elon Musk’s wallet.

    Is that necessarily the case?  I don’t know what goes into maintaining a Tesla, but at least in the world of buying books, I’ve heard advice that if someone doesn’t like an author’s politics or other views or acts, buying used is the way to go—it benefits the seller but not the author, at least directly.  But maybe I’m misinterpreting the situation.

  119. 119.

    catclub

    @Suzanne: I can’t imagine owning a Tesla now.

     

    I certainly can if the price is right. Do we think every Ford owner is a nazi sympathizer? Or did they just buy a car.

     

    Wikipedia:

    Ford’s antisemitic views, which drew on a long tradition of false allegations against Jews, have been well-documented. He promoted antisemitic content, including The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, through his newspaper The Dearborn Independent, and his book, The International Jew. In July 1938, four months after the German annexation of Austria, Ford accepted the highest medal that Nazi Germany bestowed on a foreigner, the Grand Cross of the Order of the German Eagle.

  120. 120.

    frosty

    @Jay: I forgot my brother had a Lotus Elan too. Talk about making a Triumph look reliable!

    He also took a ragtop Spit and dropped a GT6 driveline into it. A bit more of a gearhead than me – and I did two engine rebuilds on the TR-3 in four years.

  122. 122.

    Jay

    @frosty:

    had a 4 door Datsun 510.

    Raced it at Westwood. Lowered, close ratio gearbox, roll cage, 4 point harnesses, Cortina rims, 60 series tires, Mazda 500 CFM carb on a custom manifold, daily driver.

    Fun, fun, fun.

    Mazda  Miata, started fun, stock, now can get sick in the positive way.

  123. 123.

    frosty

    @Jay: A friend had a 4-door 510, looked stock, put a turbo in it, enjoyed blowing off Porsches in Hollywood. Sometimes with 4 people in the car.

    The 510s we’re great little cars. I heard them called Baby BMWs. Too bad they all rusted out so fast.

  124. 124.

    Geminid

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: I think that $200 dollars is a threshold that bears upon reporting requirements. I’ve seen researchers like Liz Burgh complain that when campaigns brag about all the “small donor” contributions they are getting, some of that money from people giving say, $2500 dollars in 100 $25 dollar increments.

    That’s not so hard to do now that you can just hit a button instead of writing a check. Burgh claims that Saikat Chakrabarti tested this method out in 2015, apparantly trying to find out how multiple small donations get reported to the Federal Elections Commission.

    This was some months before Chakrabarti joined Mr. Sanders’ presidential campaign, and two years before he founded Justice Democrats. Chakrabarti had previously made a small fortune working at the automated payments company Stripe, which was owned by Peter Thiel.

  125. 125.

    Jay

    @frosty:

    Cousin had a Lotus Eclat, but then he also used to own a Chevelle 442.

    The closest I ever came to having a Lotus was sticking a Cogsworth 1600 twin cam in a Ford Pinto.

  126. 126.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    I can’t bring myself to watch Tulsi Gabbard filling in for Tucker C (because the writers are drunk again), but…

    Aaron Rupar @atrupar 19m

    These are blatant lies and it draws into question how your constituents and the American people can believe anything you may say on the floor of the House — Tulsi Gabbard actually did an impressive job grilling George Santos, who was clearly flustered

    I scrolled through the replies, I see no indication she asked him about money.

  127. 127.

    Sister Golden Bear

    @Suzanne:

    I can’t imagine owning a Tesla now. Like, if I had one, I would be embarrassed to drive it. It’s the equivalent of having toilet paper stuck to one’s shoe or unironically wearing a fedora.

    Pretty much. It’s pissing me off because I bought my Model 3 before Musk went completely Lex Luther because: 1) I wanted to move from an ICE car to do my small part to fight global warming, and 2) there weren’t many other choices at the time, and 3) Tesla’s charging network was the best choice for longer road trips, which was important for me.

    Never again. Unfortunately, the resale market is probably tanking, so I may be stuck with it for far too long.

  129. 129.

    Sister Golden Bear

    @Subsole:

    She did a big face reveal on Tucker Carlson (and spouted some deranged garbage, natch).

    Actually genocidal call-to-action would be a more accurate description. I wish I was exaggerating.

    She was arguing LGB, and especially T, people are intrinsically “evil” (her words) and cannot ever change. So something needs to be done about them.

  135. 135.

    Chetan Murthy

    @Sister Golden Bear: And Fascists *need* an internal enemy.  It was just bad luck that they chose LGBTQ folks; on another timeline they might have chose Black people, or some other minority group.

    But they *need* that scapegoat, that “pollution of the body politic” to give their lives and movement meaning.

  136. 136.

    Roger Moore

    @Miss Bianca:

    IIRC, one of Musk’s children from a previous relationship recently came out as trans and asked to be legally emancipated.  I can’t imagine that did anything good for his mental state or his attitude toward trans people.

    FWIW, Musk seems to be a member of a weird ultra-rich people analog to the quiverfull movement. It’s based around the idea rich people need to have as many children as possible in order to spread their superior genes.  Musk has apparently had a bunch of children by a number of different women, including his personal assistant at Neuralink.  That pregnancy was apparently almost exactly coincident with his second child with Grimes.  So yeah, his personal life is a serious ick.

  138. 138.

    Subsole

    @Leslie:

    I have no hope for committed GOPers.

    Now, squishy mushmiddle indies? Swing voters? They actually might respond to this stuff.

  140. 140.

    Gretchen

    @Sister Golden Bear: that’s right. She went on an on about a clinic for trans children at a Boston children’s hospital and insisting they were doing surgery on kids and somebody needs to do something about that. Somebody did, and they had a bunch of bomb threats and had to figure out how to protect kids in the ICU.

  142. 142.

    Subsole

    @Sister Golden Bear:

    Yeah. My introduction to her was her urging violence against childrens’ healthcare workers.

    So, she is a piece of work, to say the least. By which I mean she is a stochastic terrorist. She is straight up trying to do to LGBTQ people what Radio des Milles Colines did to the Tutsis.

    I really cannot say more about her because I cannot stand to listen to her bile. Just…I cannot imagine living my life consumed like that.

    Of course, given that everytime these vermin make an accusation it is a confession…the only real question is how many children she abused and for how long.

  143. 143.

    Sister Golden Bear

    @Gretchen: She’s also made numerous hysterical posts with the locations and dates of a number of drag shows and drag queen story hours, Pride celebrations, etc. Needless to say Proud Boys, Nazi and other deplorables have showed up, threatening violence and sometimes actually attacking people.

    @Subsole: It’s straight up Radio Rwanda stuff. She had a celebratory post after the Colorado Springs attack.

  144. 144.

    Subsole

    @Omnes Omnibus: She really is Bill O’Reilly.

    Just once I would like to see someone who actually matters to the American public ask one of these wealthy, well-connected, influential clowns why it’s always some chump sitting at home without any of their privilege who needs to go ‘do something’ about it?

    From Limbaugh to Loomer that’s always the refrain from these folks: somebody needs to go do something. Just once I’d like to see our media say “Well, asshole, you look like somebody. Go do something.”

    Just to watch the gutless little freaks squirm. They care enough to torment people, but not enough to throw their life away doing it. No, that’s for the gullible asshats that listen to them.

    Just vermin. All of ’em.

  145. 145.

    Subsole

     

     

    @Roger Moore: You would think their superior genes would let them grasp the fact that…um…genes don’t really work like that.

    You’re not mixing paint, bro. You’re not adding four parts smart to three parts pleb and getting a demi-savant.

    You’re jamming a bunch of logic gates made out of meat together and hoping they all line up just so.

  147. 147.

    Chetan Murthy

    @Subsole: The emphasis on “purity of the blood” in racists’ dogmas has always been the sign for me that they’re just straight-up patriarchal bigots, and that’s all.  B/c even if you were only concerned with the health of descendant generations, you’d want outbreeding, since it’s well-established that hybrids are typically more robust than purebreds.  But no, they want to keep the breeding in-group.

  148. 148.

    Gvg

    @Suzanne: My understanding is that car and driver gave lousy reviews of teslas and I know consumer reports did also. Those are 2 very different but valid views of cars and mean that they are lousy cars pretty much. This was before Musk revealed himself to most people in the twitter debacle. So, don’t buy a Tesla.

    Apparently Subaru just released their fist electric car. Coveloped with Toyota. Haven’t heard what people think yet. Mazda hasn’t. Most companies have though so Tesla better shape up or it’s going to go extinct. This is capitalism.

  149. 149.

    Darkrose

    @Suzanne: A year ago I thought Teslas were cool-looking cars, if overpriced. Now I look at them and think, “Sucker!” I tend to assume the worst of drivers of new Teslas.

  151. 151.

    danielx

    @cain:

    Imagine the poor sales people at Tesla stores in malls everywhere….

    Imagine yourself (as a Tesla sales person) looking yourself in the mirror before you go to work in the morning.

    No thank you.

  152. 152.

    Suzanne

    @Darkrose: I used to really want one. I still think they look fine. But the brand has been ruined for me and it’s no longer aspirational.

    I am not someone who enjoys driving, and I’m fairly practical anyway, but I can acknowledge that my car is a part of my self-concept. By that, I mean that there are some cars that I can feel like I would possibly envisage myself driving one, and there are others that I cannot. (And this has fuck-all to do with specifications or performance.) I drive a black Honda CR-V. When it was in the shop a few years ago, I was given a black Chevrolet Traverse. I abhorred it.

    I can never see myself owning a Tesla now. It would be like going to a Cracker Barrel.

  153. 153.

    Leslie

    @Geminid: Maybe those independents would vote against his replacement, but I doubt it. Not unless it could be well documented that the GOP was well aware of Santos’s issues and didn’t care, and perhaps not even then.

  155. 155.

    Another Scott

    @Ruckus: Made me look…..

    It looks like he sold around 20,000,000 shares of Tesla in 3 days (December 12, 13, 14) at roughly $160 ea, or raised about $3.2B.

    More from the 11/11 NASDAQ.com article pointed to above:

    Elon Musk’s problems are compounded by Twitter’s growing liabilities.

    His social media firm now consumes around $1 billion in interest payments, $853 million in cash burn (assuming trailing 12-month rates) and could potentially lose another $1.6 billion if ad revenues decline by 30% as advertisers flee the platform. All told, Elon’s $4.6 billion debt adventure could grow by $3.5 billion or more per year — a rate that would force the business magnate to sell an additional 4 million Tesla shares per quarter.

    Twitter is also becoming a legal risk. This week, both Chief Information Security Officer Lea Kissner and Chief Compliance Officer Marianne Fogarty resigned from the embattled firm just as Federal Trade Commission (FTC) compliance notices are coming due. The firm now risks billions in fines if it “so much as sneezes” without doing a privacy review beforehand.

    “I anticipate that all of you will be pressured by management into pushing out changes that will likely lead to major incidents,” a Twitter lawyer wrote in an internal message, as reported by The Verge.

    That means the tail ($44 billion Twitter) is now wagging the dog ($600 billion Tesla). Elon Musk’s problem isn’t a $4 million daily cash burn rate. It’s $13 billion in bonds, $3.5 billion in potential annual Twitter cash burn, potential billions in legal fines and no easy way out.

    [ womp, womp ]

    He seems to be cashing-out faster than that article expected.

    Not to worry though, I’m sure Super Double-Plus Blue Check (to be rolled out Real Soon Now) will take care of all the problems…

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  156. 156.

    Roger Moore

    @Subsole:

    It is very similar to a lot of the racist BS, but it’s even more exclusionary, since it’s really only rich white dudes who are good, not all white dudes.  My gut feeling is this kind of thinking has always animated a lot of our country’s racism.  The rich white people sell racism to poor white people, but where they think the poor people can’t hear them, they really lump everyone not in their very special club together.

    It’s why it’s no surprise to me the British Royal Family is a hotbed of racists.  Their whole reason for existence is the idea they’re somehow better than everyone else.  It’s no shock they’ve bought into every nasty theory about why.  It’s only amazing some of them haven’t.

  157. 157.

    Roger Moore

    @Another Scott:

    He seems to be cashing-out faster than that article expected.

    Some of that is that the stock price is cratering, so he needs to sell more to raise the same amount of money.  The other thing is Twitter isn’t his only cash sink.  Some of his other companies, like Neuralink and The Boring Company, are nowhere near profitability, so he has to pump money into them to keep them afloat.  And I assume his personal lifestyle is expensive, and he needs to finance that somehow.  IIRC, he’s done some of that by borrowing against his Tesla stock, which magnifies the problem.

  160. 160.

    Bupalos

    @Ken: factor of 3 or 4 I can’t agree with. While the extent of brand damage is unknown, PE or PEG ratios have it down in almost reasonable territory already. I’ll be kind of surprised by even another 50% haircut.

  161. 161.

    Chetan Murthy

    @Bupalos: You might be right.  I have to say, I disagree, but hey, we’ll find out in due course.  It’ll be interesting to watch.  I own no Tesla stock (and haven’t for years and years).  Be interesting to watch.

    ETA: I could adduce what I think is evidence that it has a good bit further down to go, but really, that would be useless: I’m sure you have evidence for your thesis that the price is almost reasonable now.

  164. 164.

    Ruckus

    @Another Scott:

    @Roger Moore:

    For someone supposed to be so smart, he sure seems like a fucking moron. It seems to me that a lot of the super wealthy got that way by them or their parents screwing over a lot of people, sometimes legally and sometimes likely not. And that money is often taken as a sign of smarts, which it just as often seems not to be.

  165. 165.

    Geminid

    @Leslie: Independents are a diverse bunch with all kinds of political beliefs and differing levels of engagement. Some consistently vote Republican but still do not identify as such. There is a comparable cohort on the liberal side but it may be smaller in number.

    There are some who actually are swing voters and this group seems to be swinging Democrat more and more lately as the Republicans have shifted from the Center-Right coalition to a Right party.

    Some of these seem to be contrarian and tend to vote against the party in power, like 19th century diplomats pursuing a “balance of power” policy. Regardless of ideation, these swing voters must exist or we would not have seen Vermont, Massachusetts amd Maryland voters elect Republican governors in the last decade, or Virginia elect one last year.

    Except in Vermont, those governors were elected in “off” years where the Republican dropoff from a Presidential year is typically lower than the Democrats’. That was the case in Virginia last year and was definitely the case this year in New York. So Santos’s vicory could be attributed to poor turnout by his opposition.

    But I think this result was multiply determined, like the Virginia election was. There was a component of Biden-to-Santos voters like there were Biden-to-Youngkin voters. These are the ones in the NY 3rd CD I think might punish another Republican for Santos’s misdeeds.

    But a bigger factor in a special election (if there is one) would probably be Democratic turnout. That was low last November; I think I read that 48% of New York’s registered Democrats voted versus ~64% of Republicans. This was similar to the Youngkin election in that Republicans were hungry in a way Democrats were not.

    This has a been a very long way around to the proposition that a special election for Santos’s seat would be unpredictable because the voting patterns could be different than those of last month.

  166. 166.

    Geminid

    @Leslie: How much did Republicans know about Santos’s bogus biography? I saw someone assert that when Republicans realized that some of New York’s Democratic Congressional seats were within reach, there was a flood of late money to several of their candidates but not to Santos. I would like to see confirmation of this because this would tend to confirm that word had gone out that Santos was toxic. This was at a time when Republicans thought they would pick up 20 seats or more, and a candidate with the baggage Santos had might be considered expendable.

    In the event, Republicans kind of got the worst of both worlds: a very slender majority along with the toxic Santos.

  167. 167.

    Chris Johnson

    @Leslie: Regarding drip-drip-drip of scandals, Clinton’s issues and exactly the same scenario led to literally a Russian-backed con man ‘running’ the country for years and wrecking as much as he could.

    What the Republicans are up to in the decline of their party is NOT BETTER in any sense than Clinton’s failings. They’re quite a lot worse. It could lead to lasting damage for Republicans. They can and will play it off as disloyal meanie pants business and it will work for them about as well as it worked for the Democrats.

    It’s always possible to just make an effort to be normal and non-horrible. Republicans are having real problems doing that anymore, and it adds up.

  168. 168.

    Chris Johnson

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: Regarding Tulsi Gabbard ‘grilling’ Santos, Russia buys people on opposite sides of a situation and then makes them play fight. That’s pretty known behavior. A recent BeauOTFC video mentioned that Russia got behind Black Lives Matter AND the right wing backlash, to make them fight.

  169. 169.

    Geminid

    @Chris Johnson: Have you seen the reporting on Santos’s connection with Mr. Intrator, cousin of and reputed “bagman” for Russian oligarch Viktor Vekselberg? This could be  a consequential story.

    Federal investigators may already be following it. Sometime around Labor Day a team of FBI agents with a search warrant visited Vekselberg’s Long Island home and carried away a number of boxes full of evidence.

  170. 170.

    GibberJack

    @Roger Moore:

    Quiverfull.

    Quiver. Full.

    Container. Full of Arrows.

    Cunt. Sperm.

    Womb. Babies.

    Breed the world full of muh superior white christian babiez.

    Woman as cum receptacle and baby incubator.

    ———

    These quiverfull people are so damn twisted.

    “The rich are different from you and me”

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