It’s January 2019, and Tesla (TSLA) is enduring turmoil as a company as it sits on the brink of bankruptcy. CEO Elon Musk sends out an open letter to employees sharing that the company needs to reduce headcount by 7%, and increase Model 3 production rates significantly – with the added difficulty of losing Deepak Ahuja, longtime finance chief, and a major asset originally from Ford Motors.
Closest we got was about a month. The Model 3 ramp was extreme stress & pain for a long time — from mid 2017 to mid 2019. Production & logistics hell.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 3, 2020
According to Yahoo Finance, Zachary Kirkhorn, 36, would then step in as Ahuja’s replacement, in what could be called the critical moment for Tesla.
Since Kirkhorn stepped up, the company has made unbelievable gains, all influenced by Kirkhorn’s conservative forecasting approach, cost-cutting discipline, and a series of important capital gains – ultimately clinching the record-breaking 2020 for Tesla, topped off with a December entry into the S&P 500.
Tesla CFO Kirkhorn Zachary sold about $1M (1,250 shares) of Tesla stock on Jan 19th at $837.74/share. After the sale he still owns about $47.5M of $TSLA stock.
1/2 pic.twitter.com/BWco67cBTe
— Sawyer Merritt 📈🚀 (@SawyerMerritt) January 22, 2021
And yet, the average investor may have no idea who Kirkhorn is.
Gene Munster, a managing partner at Loup Ventures, said, “People still don’t really know who Zach is, but they know what he’s done.” Munster continued, “He’s a shy person, and I don’t think he likes to speak publicly. But it’s been a remarkable turnaround.”
Under Kirkhorn, Tesla’s shares have grown 1,300%, with the company’s market capitalization at just $53 billion on his first day. Today, Tesla’s market cap sits at $837.08 billion, and experts even speculate that the world’s first trillion-dollar market capitalization may be well on its way.
Tesla is set to announce its Q4 2020 earnings later today, and many are expecting some impressive numbers again from the EV company.
