zlacker

>>g-mork+(OP)
Just a neat bit of financial engineering. You can tell because Elon picked SpaceX instead of Tesla – which would have actually made sense at some level (Optimus Robots + AI). But Tesla is public and so he'd need to follow laws and reporting requirements.

>>paxys+39
does he need spacex/xai to prop up tesla or the other way around?

>>broken+D9
Tesla is still very profitable, as is SpaceX I assume. Twitter/X has been a $44 billion dollar failure, and xAI is a vanity project so Musk can go around saying he is a player in the AI space. Investors in both X and xAI need to be bailed out, hence this announcement.

>>paxys+rb
The $44B Twitter/X buyout was not a failure. For example Fidelity has its $19M investment in the buyout - now xAI common shares - marked at $62M (up over 3X) as of 12/31/25. It was certainly valued even higher on 1/31/26 after xAI had an oversubcribed fund raise in January. All before this merger announcement.

>>spikel+fi
The fact that it had to be successively bailed out by xAI (which itself was funded by Tesla) and now SpaceX shareholders is exactly what makes the acquisition a failure.

>>paxys+xj
A "bailout" is when a company rescued from bankruptcy. Common equity holders take large losses or are wiped out. This did not happen here.

We also know the Twitter buyout debt was sold at near par before the merger with xAI which is inconsistent with being near bankruptcy.