Prominent short seller Jim Chanos challenges the viability of Tesla's Robotaxi/Cybercab efforts.
Source: [Short Seller Jim Chanos Slams Tesla Robotaxi Economics As 'Ridiculous,' Citing Dead Miles, Insurance Costs And Cleaning Expenses](https://finance.yahoo.com/news/short-seller-jim-chanos-slams-234908579.html)
This should come as no surprise to anyone, including Elon. Tesla's own internal report showed that it would like lose money and be hard to scale outside of the US market.
Source: [Elon Musk shut down internal Tesla analysis that showed Robotaxi would lose money](https://electrek.co/2025/04/16/elon-musk-shut-down-internal-tesla-analysis-that-showed-robotaxi-would-lose-money/)
What is omitted from all this is any mention of potential brand damage affecting these future ambitions of Tesla. If people aren't willing to buy their cars, why would they ride in their Robotaxis? The market for this tech is major cities. I don't need to show anyone a map to display that most cities in America are left-leaning. And everything "Tesla" is conspicuously Tesla. Consumers have lots of choices in getting a ride these days. Why would they pick a Cybercab over an Uber or Lyft?
Lastly, Elon is terrible at math. I don't care if he is talking about saving "trillions" of dollars with government cuts or producing "millions" of Cybercabs. He is always off by orders of magnitude. I highly question his education. If he indeed earned a physics degree, he would at least be able to make projections based on reality within an order of magnitude. And he is nothing close to an engineer (I am one). His long running statement of making "millions" of Cybercabs is not based in reality.
Elon's latest quote: "*I predict that there will be millions of Teslas operating fully autonomously in the second half of next year...*"
Source: [Tesla doubles down on robotaxi timeline; investors enthused - and skeptical](https://www.reuters.com/business/autos-transportation/tesla-doubles-down-robotaxi-timeline-investors-enthused-skeptical-2025-04-24/)
Uber, Lyft, and traditional taxis all combined have somewhere over 2 million active drivers in the US. To reach anything in the "millions", Tesla would have to capture almost the entire market share of all ride hailing services upon launch of their long delayed combined product and service. That is pure nonsense being put out into the Elon Reality Distortion Field (ERDF). Tesla would in fact lose money by making more Cybercabs than the market could possibly demand. The same concept would apply if they made a trillion cars without any buyers for them. Don't people even check the actual market potential for any of his over-inflated promises?
Tesla's current "testing" for their Robotaxi service is just their employees riding around in their cars. It's a PR stunt more than anything else. Meanwhile, Google's Waymo is providing actual rides to actual customer in multiple cities. Elon has criticized the Waymo's design and cost, yet his Robotaxi is nowhere to be seen on the roads. He also levels this public criticism when he needs to replace something like \~4 million computers in preexisting Tesla's just to get them to meet previously promised FSD capabilities (there goes a few hundred million at least). He gets more traction for talking trash about his competitors when his own company is way behind and has nothing to show other than puffery and recalls.
How long will it take for the markets to escape the ERDF and realize that Elon is the boy that cried "wolf" (of Wall Street) one too many times to keep his stock price inflated?
