Good morning! It’s Monday October 14, 2024 and this is it The morning shiftyour daily overview of the most important car news from around the world, in one place. Here are the important stories you need to know.

1st gear: Tesla shares and Elon Musk’s wealth plummet

Tesla should be ranking high right now, the electric car manufacturer alone unveiled the autonomous car it promised for years, reinvented the bus and promised bringing humanoid robots to the market for the low, low price of $30,000. However, it is not and has instead seen its share price plummet and the CEO’s vast wealth drops by as much as $15 billion.

Tesla unveiled the Cybercab and Robovan concepts last weekwith big boss Elon Musk saying that the Cybercab could go on sale before 2027 for about $30,000. However, all that was not enough to keep Tesla shareholders happy. Many wished Musk had shared more concrete details about what it would take to build the cars, when they might launch and how Tesla will actually make its self-driving car technology work. .

As such, shares in the electric car maker began to fall soon after the event. In pre-trading on Friday, analysts said Tesla stock was down five percent and was down nine percent by the end of the day. reports Business insider. This sharp drop in Tesla’s stock price did nothing for Musk’s net worth:

Musk’s net worth — which is partly tied up in Tesla, as he owns about 13% of the company’s stock — goes up and down along with the company’s value. And on Friday, Tesla stock fell more than 9%, from $238.77 to $217.80 per share.

Musk’s net worth fell by $15 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, updated after the close of trading in New York. With a total fortune of $240 billion, Musk remains the richest man on earth.

Forbes reported in July that Musk faced a similar financial hit after the “We, Robot” event was postponed from its original date in August, and Tesla’s shares plunged about 7%. The company’s stock value had continued its downward trend until early August and then recovered in September, pushing Musk’s net worth higher than that of McDonald’s and Pepsi. However, Tesla shares had not yet returned to the year-to-date high they reached in July before shares plunged again this week.

Tesla’s stock price now sits at around $217 per share, down from the $240 it was valued at before Musk started unveiling his autonomous creations. Despite the sharp decline in Tesla’s valuation, Musk currently remains the richest person in the world. At the time of writing this, his fortune is estimated at over $245 billion. reports Forbes.

Now hopes for a rise in Tesla’s stock price will rest on the creations Musk has unveiled and how quickly he can bring them to market. Tesla’s CEO has a history of… over-promising and under-delivering when it comes to new products, the real test for its management will come if the automaker can actually bring a self-driving car to market in 2027, but we’re not holding our breath for that.

2nd gear: Boeing cuts 17,000 jobs due to strikes

Boeing has had a pretty bad year so far. The company had a whole range of them high-profile mechanical failures with its planes, was the subject of a federal investigation that came to light All kinds of shortcuts are being taken and aircraft deliveries have almost come to a standstill. Now the American aerospace giant is in the middle of one huge strike among workers.

More than 30,000 Boeing employees walked off their jobs on September 13which brought production to a standstill at some Boeing facilities. Now the US company is cutting jobs, will delay new products and has reported multi-billion dollar losses as the strike takes hold. reports Reuters:

CEO Kelly Ortberg said in a message to employees that the significant downsizing is necessary “to align with our financial realities” after an ongoing strike by 33,000 workers on the US West Coast halted production of the 737 MAX, 767 and 777 jets stopped.

“We have realigned our workforce to align with our financial realities and provide a more focused set of priorities. Over the coming months, we plan to reduce the size of our overall workforce by approximately 10%. These cuts will affect executives, managers and employees,” Ortberg’s message said.

The job losses will affect 17,000 workers at Boeing factories around the world and are among the first major changes that CEO Kelly Ortberg has implemented since stepping into the role in August. In addition to the job cuts, Boeing also announced that its next-generation 777X fighter jet has been delayed by a year.

Job losses and delays are part of that broader problems at the troubled aircraft manufacturerwhich is expected to report losses of $5 billion in the third quarter of 2024, Reuters adds. The company said it expects revenue for the period to be $17.8 billion, translating to a loss per share of $9.97.

3rd gear: Polestar thinks dealer sales can prevent declining deliveries

Boeing isn’t the only company currently struggling Swedish EV maker Polestar has also had a hard time in recent months. After the departure of CEO Thomas Ingenlath earlier this yearthe automaker has now revealed that sales are down 15 percent in the third quarter of 2024.

Fortunately, the EV maker has a smart plan in store to turn things around: it will start selling cars at dealers, reports Bloomberg. The automaker has historically only sold cars through its online retail platform, with a limited number of showrooms around the world offering customers the chance to see its cars in person before going online to order:

Although until recently customers could take a test drive at the Swedish manufacturer’s showrooms, they had to turn to the company’s website to purchase the cars.

CEO Michael Lohscheller said he has launched a review of Polestar’s operations and strategy as it moves “from showing to actively selling cars,” according to a statement Friday.

His comments came as Polestar reported a 15% drop in third-quarter deliveries to 11,900, joining a string of European manufacturers reporting big sales declines in the recent period.

The company said it expects sales for this year to be similar to 2023. It reaffirmed its target of reaching breakeven cash flow by the end of next year, but with lower volumes than previously targeted.

The drop in sales for the Swedish carmaker has been attributed to delays in the rollout of new models the Polestar 3 SUV being pushed back and the Polestar 4 has yet to be released owner’s driveways here in the US

Following the worrying drop in deliveries and revenues for the automaker, Polestar shares reportedly fell as much as 12.5 percent, having already fallen by more than a third in value so far this year.

4th gear: Fisker agrees to bankruptcy deal

We conclude our collection of bad news for companies that are having a hard time is Fiskerwhich ultimately agreed to a bankruptcy plan months after the bankruptcy. The failed EV manufacturer reportedly reached the deal after agreeing to technical support terms for the sale of its remaining stock of Ocean electric SUVs. reports Automotive News.

EV maker Fisker received approval for its bankruptcy liquidation plan on Friday after last-minute changes were made to try to preserve the company’s position. selling 3,000 Ocean SUVs worth about $46 million, reports Automotive News. The deal was nearly derailed after American Lease, which will buy the remaining stock, acquired the necessary intellectual property from Fisker to keep Oceans running:

Fisker ultimately chose to declare its operations bankrupt, sell its remaining fleet to buyer American Lease and transfer its intellectual property to creditors.

The sale of the fleet hit a last-minute snag this week after American Lease realized that Fisker would not be able to transfer essential data and support services to new servers controlled by the buyer.

Without the data transfer, the fleet would be cut off from essential services such as updating vehicle software, reviewing diagnostic data and allowing drivers to access their vehicles remotely.

American Lease resolved the dispute by agreeing to pay an additional $2.5 million over five years for future technical support services. The deal will also benefit other Fisker Ocean owners, who have similarly raised concerns about what would happen to their vehicles after Fisker’s servers were disabled, attorneys said in court Friday.

The deal was approved last week by U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Thomas Horan after a hearing in Wilmington, Delaware. The move paves the way for Fisker begins paying back creditors with his other possessions.

Fisker filed for bankruptcy in Juneafter failing to sell its cars around the world following negative reception from buyers and reviewers. The company attempted to partner with Nissan to produce its electric vehicles, but a deal was never struck and Fisker instead praised the workforce and halted production.

Reverse: speed of sound

On the radio: Oasis – ‘Supersonic’