In 2012, an then unknown Elon Musk challenged the automotive giants with the presentation of the Model S, a sporty electric sedan that aimed to become a breath of fresh air in a world where diesel and gasoline cars seemed to be the undisputed kings of the market. More than one must have taken it as a joke. Fourteen years later, the automotive world has changed a lot, and an important part of the shift has been, it must be acknowledged, the deafening success of the Model S and its twin brother in SUV format, the Tesla Model X.The case of the Model S and Model X are a true rara avis in a changing world, as the same platform or automotive base has been in use for fourteen long years in a unique and worthy-of-study case. And it is that during all these years Tesla has grown and gained fame and popularity on all five continents in a dazzling way, forcing conventional manufacturers to follow in its footsteps to avoid being left out of the game. However, recent years have been more full of shadows due to political adventures and Elon Musk's controversial statements, which have significantly lowered the brand's transgressive, ecological, and innovative image.The Model S and Model X have been manufactured at the Fremont plant (on the outskirts of San Jose, in the state of California) for the last fourteen years. This is a factory that began producing the Model S in 2012 with only about 1,000 employees on staff and has grown with new production lines and models to reach 22,000 employees today and far exceed half a million units manufactured each year. The recipe for keeping the two cars fresh and relevant on a commercial scale without suffering excessive wear in global sales has been to fill them with technological innovations, such as remote updates, the use of Grok (the proprietary AI system of Tesla and Elon Musk's other companies), and the Plaid versions with over 1,000 conventional HP.

Chinese manufacturer BYD sold 2.26 million electric cars during 2025, far surpassing the 1.66 million electric cars that Tesla sold during the last twelve months across five continents.

Tesla shareholders have approved paying the company's CEO, Elon Musk, a package of company shares valued at one trillion – that is, one million million or 10¹²—dollars. The electric car multinational's annual shareholders' meeting approved this payment as compensation to Musk—who is now the richest person in the world—but it will only materialize if the company reaches a series of sales and profit targets.

In Sweden, 65 car mechanics have been on strike for two years against the electric vehicle company Tesla, owned by the world's richest man, Elon Musk. The strike is the longest in the Nordic country in the last 100 years and represents the first and only strike in the world against a company owned by the billionaire who recently stepped down as Donald Trump's right-hand man in the White House.

Elon Musk has a plan to revive Tesla model sales, after the company has endured some of the darkest hours in its history as a result of its CEO's political adventures. Tesla's roadmap involves increasing sales of the Model Y, a car that in 2023 became the best-selling vehicle of the year and even surpassed traditional combustion vehicles.

The leading electric car manufacturer in Europe is no longer Tesla, due to the sharp drop in sales of Elon Musk's brand in recent months. The new leader is now Volkswagen, thanks to the good sales performance of its ID.2, ID.4, and ID.7 vehicles, which have sold more than 119,000 units during the first six months of the year in the European market, compared to 109,000 sold by Tesla.

It was an open secret, but Elon Musk has officially confirmed that he is giving up on the project. affordable $25,000 electric vehicle which should have been in production for several years to focus Tesla's efforts on a more economical version of the Model Y, its flagship SUV that shares the platform and mechanics with the Model 3.

Tesla is unable to recover. The American brand continues its free fall in Europe after seeing its sales fall by 52.6% in April compared to the same month in 2024: it sold only 5,475 cars in the Old Continent, compared to 11,540 twelve months earlier. The drama for the brand is enormous if we consider that the Model Y led the list of best-selling cars worldwide in 2023 and 2024, ahead of the Toyota Corolla and Toyota Rav4, which are not pure electric like Tesla.

Electrification marks the renewal of the vehicle fleet. In Catalonia, more than 10,100 electrified vehicles—plug-in hybrids and pure electrics—have been sold up to May, 60% more than in the same period last year. This growth contrasts with the 17% decrease in gasoline vehicle registrations during the same period (14,700), shared with diesel registrations (2,300), which was 23%, according to data from the employers' association Anfac.

Although the European automobile market is showing weakness due to two basic factors - the low growth of the major economies, especially Germany, and the change in technologies that creates doubts in buyers—, the electric car market escapes this dynamic and has grown at a good pace, reaching historic highs during the first quarter of this year. This growth has not slowed the punishment European consumers have for Tesla, the world leader in 100% electric cars, since its founder and CEO, Elon Musk, arrived in the White House and became involved in the Trump administration.

Tesla faces a new legal headache, this time due to alleged manipulation of its vehicle odometers. A group of the brand's California-based customers have filed a lawsuit over the alleged abnormal increase in their vehicles' mileage, as one of them points out.In a report from the American media The Street.

Net profits at Tesla, the car company founded by tycoon Elon Musk, fell 71% in the first quarter of the year to $409 million, after recording a 20% drop in revenue from the automotive sector. The Trump administration has been blamed for the cuts in the public sector; a fact that, among other things, could have ended up taking its toll on its business. The company posted revenues of $19.335 billion, 9% less than the same period the previous year. At the same time, the car manufacturer's operating expenses increased and margins shrank. The company announced that it had sold 13% fewer vehicles.However, the results, according to experts, are "worse" than analysts expected.

US President Donald Trump baptized as Liberation Day (Liberation Day) on April 2, when he signed the executive order to implement his new tariff policy that has turned global trade upside down. Liberation Day It has also marked a turning point for the Magnificent Seven, as the seven most powerful American companies are known: Alphabet (Google's parent company), Amazon, Apple, Meta (Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp's parent company), Microsoft, NVIDIA, and Tesla. The seven most valuable companies in the world seemed like a sure thing, but now they are faltering: are they no longer Magnificent?

Elon Musk is an atypical and somewhat impatient entrepreneur, and those close to him claim that he quickly loses interest in his existing projects and initiatives to take on new ones, in a relentless race that opens up new horizons, projects and business, personal and political challenges. In fact, Tesla seemed to be the apple of the South African entrepreneur's eye between 2017 and 2020, until his business priorities became the space company Space X and the social network Twitter, which he renamed X. It's no secret that over the past few months – largely explains the 43% drop in Tesla's stock market value during the last two months of trading. But there are more reasons behind this crisis.

Tension in the White House just as the United States begins its trade war with the world. Billionaire Elon Musk and Trade and Manufacturing advisor Peter Navarro, two of Donald Trump's closest advisors, have publicly aired their differences in a clash that has even involved insults. This is a new example of the South African magnate's disagreements with other members of the cabinet following the US president's economic policies and comes just days after the called into question his continuity in government from the US

Friends help each other. Tesla owner Elon Musk may have been grateful when Donald Trump said he would buy one of his electric vehicles on March 11. However, it was the least the president could do for his scourge-in-chief against bureaucracy. The day before, Trump had helped cause Tesla's stock price to drop more than 15% amid a broader sell-off triggered by his trade policies and his warning that the US economy was facing a "transition period." The Trumpian endorsement The subsequent fall was not enough to stem the decline in car sales and Tesla's stock price.

When we invest in the stock market we are taking a risk and we are aware that we can lose money, but we never like to see it. In the last two months, most of the world's stock markets have been bearish, with the rare exception of the Ibex 35, which, due to the weight of the banks, has been spared from the world's economic problems. Trump and his policies of fighting with everyone have caused instability in the markets.

A Chinese car, the MG ZS, has been the best-selling car in Spain in February, displacing the Dacia Sandero from the top spot on the podium. Car consumption is changing and, while Chinese cars are gaining market share in Europe as a whole, in Spain and Catalonia the great brand of electrification, Tesla, is losing ground and seeing its sales plummet just when its founder and CEO, Elon Musk, has gained all his political weight as the most trusted person of the President of the United States, Donald Trump.

Uncertainties cause insecurities. And insecurities encourage authoritarianism. In the first stage, it seems that there will be a congruence between the economic and power orientations of the White House and the court of business magnates who support it: the Magnificent Seven (The Magnificent Seven) of the new technological imperialism (Meta, Apple, Microsoft, Alphabet, Nvidia, Amazon, Tesla).