Tesla, Inc. (TSLA)

NEW YORK, October 8, 2018 - The complaint charges that defendant Elon Musk ("Musk"), the Company's Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, and Tesla, violated the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 by issuing false and misleading statements regarding Musk taking the Company private. In particular, and importantly, at 12:48pm eastern standard time on August 7, 2018, Musk issued a statement via Twitter that "funding" for the deal had been "secured" ("Funding secured"). In reaction to Musk's Tweet, the price of Tesla's stock soared to an intra-day high of $387.46, $45.47 above the previous day's closing price, closing at $379.57 per share. Musk, however, was not telling the truth. Rather, he had Tweeted to decimate the Company's short-sellers who were forced to cover their positions over the succeeding days at artificially inflated prices. Indeed, the price of Tesla stock also remained inflated throughout the next day, August 8, 2018.