Tesla CEO says he will spend ‘far more’ of his time running carmaker after putting cost-cutting team in place.
Tesla CEO Elon Musk has said he will scale back his work with the administration of United States President Donald Trump following a steep plunge in the electric carmaker’s first-quarter profits.
Musk, who leads Trump’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), said on Tuesday that he would allocate “far more” of his time to running Tesla and cut back his work in the government to one or two days per week from May.
“The large slog of work necessary to get the DOGE team in place and working with the government to get the financial house in order is mostly done,” Musk said in a conference call with Wall Street analysts.
Tesla shares, which have dropped more than 40 percent since the start of the year, rose 4.6 percent in after-hours trading following Musk’s remarks, which cheered investors concerned about the tech billionaire’s divided attention.
Musk’s comments came just hours after Tesla reported a 71 percent decline in net profit for January-March, with income of $409m compared with $1.39bn the previous year.
Tesla’s global sales fell 13 percent over the period amid a consumer backlash against Musk’s involvement in the Trump administration.
The electric carmaker has become a focal point for protests against Trump’s policies in recent months, with the company’s vehicles, dealerships and charging stations targeted in dozens of acts of vandalism and arson in several countries.
The company, which builds its cars for the US market in Texas and California but relies on parts from Mexico, is also facing the fallout of Trump’s 25 percent tariff on auto imports.
In his conference call, Musk, the world’s richest man, defended his work with DOGE, saying that his efforts were aimed at fighting fraud and waste and getting “the country back on the right track”.
“If the ship of America goes down, we all go down with it, including Tesla and everyone else,” he said.