When someone who used to wear the same uniform issues a warning, it is more impactful. Carlos Tavares, who was in charge of Stellantis, the fourth-largest automaker in the world, until December 2024, expressed uncertainty about Tesla’s survival in ten years in an interview with the French newspaper Les Echos. This statement carried more weight than the typical analyst chatter. He doesn’t sell short. He doesn’t have a podcast. After managing Jeep, Ram, Peugeot, Fiat, and Chrysler under one roof for ten years, he now quietly lives on a Portuguese vineyard and produces port wine. This man claims that if Tesla’s market value declines, it will be “colossal.”
The headline is more dramatic than the argument itself. Bankruptcy was not anticipated by Tavares. He made the more bizarre and intriguing suggestion that Elon Musk might just give up on automobiles. “We can’t rule out,” he stated, that Musk chooses to shift his attention back to AI, SpaceX, or humanoid robots. Take a moment to consider that concept. The CEO of the most valuable automobile company in the world drifted toward the door, either because he was bored or because the math looked better elsewhere, rather than because the company failed. It’s a very Musk-like prospect.
Tavares is staring at real numbers. Earlier in 2025, BYD surpassed Tesla in global EV sales, relying on more affordable and efficient vehicles manufactured within a vertically integrated Chinese supply chain that has caused open concern among Western automakers for a year. Tesla’s market share in China has decreased from approximately 16% to about 5%. Last year, Musk himself referred to Chinese automakers as “the most competitive in the world,” which is the kind of praise you only offer when you’re already anxious. Revenue for the third quarter of $28 billion, up 12%, is truly impressive. However, the trajectory beneath it is more disorganized than the top line indicates.
The strange thing is that the stock has taken in all of this. Tesla was down almost 39% through March. By the end of October, it had increased by roughly 8.6% year over year. That’s the chart of a stock that people are trading based on belief, not the chart of a company valued on fundamentals. Tesla bulls aren’t actually funding the vehicles with robotaxis, Optimus humanoid robots, and fully autonomous software. They are footing the bill for what Musk claims will happen next. Tavares’s quiet point is that BYD’s “now” is already here, and “next” might not come in time.
Observing the Tesla trade these days gives me the impression that two stories are happening simultaneously. One is an automaker dealing with the same harsh reality that is plaguing Mercedes, Volkswagen, and Stellantis: declining Chinese market share, diminished subsidies, tariff uncertainty, and a worldwide EV market that expanded more slowly than anyone had anticipated. The other is a sort of speculative tech wager, led by a CEO who is genuinely conflicted. With its goal of a $8.5 trillion market capitalization, the $1 trillion compensation package scheduled for the November 6 shareholder vote almost seems to acknowledge that division. He is not paid by the board to oversee. He’s getting paid to stay.
Tavares might be mistaken. By his own admission, he frequently was; at one investor event, he bluntly said, “we were arrogant.” However, it’s noteworthy when a former competitor who is retired and has nothing left to sell refers to Tesla’s valuation as “stratospheric.” The next ten years might show him to be wildly inaccurate. As he suggests, it’s also possible that when the announcement is made one morning, Musk is just somewhere else, and the automobile company he founded subtly becomes someone else’s problem to solve.
