As Tesla's sales teeter, fingers point at the torrent of often-torrid tweets by out-there Elon

Is Elon Musk driving his once-burgeoning EV enterprise into the ditch?

That’s what sagging Tesla sales figures and analysts’ musings would appear to show, with much of the blame being attributed to the motor mogul’s increasingly right-wing assertions and online outbursts.

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First, the sales. In a statement Tuesday, the company said it delivered 387,000 cars worldwide in the first quarter of 2024, down 8.5% from 423,000 vehicles in the same period last year and the first time Tesla’s quarterly sales have fallen on a year-to-year basis since the Covid pandemic.

The slump, which has come with a slowdown in overall EV growth in the U.S., has been accompanied by a more-than 30% drop in the firm’s stock price this year — and a steep plunge after the sales figures were announced.

In addition, the arrival of cheaper — and attractive — electric cars from China’s BYD and others have cut into sales in Asia and Europe.

And then there are analysts’ crystal balls. As reported by the Denmark-based market intelligence firm Group Caliber, the brand’s “consideration score” — whether consumers would consider buying a Tesla — fell to 31% in February, less than half its high of 70% in November 2021.

Some of that decline, Caliber CEO Shahar Silbershatz told Reuters, can be attributed to Musk’s musings — especially on his social media platform X (formerly Twitter) — and increasingly out-there reputation. “It’s very likely that Musk himself is contributing to the reputational downfall,” he said, adding that his company’s survey shows 83% of Americans connect Musk with Tesla.

And, the outlet reports, while overall electric vehicle sales in the U.S. are forecast to increase 15% in the first quarter of this year, according to estimates by researcher Cox Automotive, Tesla sales are projected to increase only by 3%.

It may be time for Musk to go in for a retread.