Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ: MSFT) co-founder Bill Gates praised Tesla Inc (NASDAQ: TSLA) and the contributions of its CEO Elon Musk in mitigating climate change in a New York Times Co (NYSE: NYT) podcast this week.
What happened: “Well, it’s important to say that what Elon did with Tesla is one of the biggest contributions to climate change that anyone has ever made,” said billionaire philanthropist in the podcast twice a week by NYT opinion writer Kara Swisher, “Sway” .
“Underestimating Elon is not a good idea,” added Gates.
Why it matters: Comments from the Microsoft co-founder follow Musk’s appearance on Joe Rogan’s podcast, where he expressed the belief that Gates had a short position in Tesla shares, Electrek reported.
“I also learned that at a certain point he had a big short position. I don’t know if this is true or not, but it seems strange, ”said Musk.
“People I know who know the situation very well, I asked them ‘are you sure?’ and they said ‘yes, he has a big short position at Tesla.’ This did not work very well. “
Last year, Gates had said that electric trucks would never be a “practical solution” for transporting heavy loads over long distances. Musk did not like Gates’ knowledge of electric vehicles and said “he has no idea”.
On a previous occasion, Musk expressed dissatisfaction with Gates’ purchase of a Porsche Taycan and described the talks with the former Microsoft executive as “not surprising”.
Share price: Tesla shares closed almost 2.4% lower at $ 796.22 on Tuesday and fell 0.6% in the after-hours session. On the same day, Microsoft shares closed almost 0.5% down at $ 243.70 and fell 0.18% in the after-hours session.
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