Working with Goldman, Silver Lake, to take Tesla private: Musk
Elon Musk continued to drip-feed details of his controversial plan to take Tesla Inc. private, saying late Monday that he’s getting advice from Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and private-equity firm Silver Lake.
In a tweet late Monday California time, the electric-car maker’s chief executive officer said he’s also lined up legal advisers for the possible transaction. A Tesla spokesman said Musk’s tweet refers to his own advisers and attorneys. Tesla board members didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment.
Controversy has swirled around Musk’s plan since the moment he announced it in a tweet a week ago, with some investors and lawyers questioning his claim to have secured funding for the move. Musk’s tweet about taking Tesla private hadn’t been cleared ahead of time with the company’s board, the New York Times reported, and the Securities and Exchange Commission is scrutinizing his statements.
Elon Musk @elonmusk Replying to Tesla@Tesla I’m excited to work with Silver Lake and Goldman Sachs as financial advisers, plus Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz and Munger, Tolles & Olson as legal advisers, on the proposal to take Tesla private
Earlier Monday, Musk revealed that Saudi Arabia has long been interested in taking Tesla private, which gave him the confidence last week to tweet that he was considering the blockbuster deal. He also confirmed the country’s Public Investment Fund recently bought an almost 5 percent stake and is interested in helping take Tesla private, as Bloomberg News reported Sunday.
The posts prolong Musk’s piecemeal approach to explaining how he’ll pull off a privatization of his money-losing automaker at a more than $70 billion market capitalization. Since the 47-year-old dropped that bombshell, he’s used social media to sporadically update investors stuck in an information vacuum.
Adding to potential confusion over who’s doing what for whom, Reuters reported that Silver Lake is offering its assistance to Musk without compensation. Silver Lake hasn’t been hired as a financial adviser in an official capacity and isn’t currently discussing participating in the deal as an investor, Reuters said. A Goldman Sachs representative declined to comment, and Silver Lake representatives didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment.
Silver Lake, with California offices in Menlo Park, Cupertino and San Mateo, has plenty of experience of helping take companies private. It partnered with Michael Dell in 2013 on the $24.4 billion deal to acquire his namesake computer company, contributing $1 billion of cash to the transaction.
The technology-focused firm also participated in Dell Inc.’s $67 billion purchase of EMC Corp. in 2015. The same year, it agreed to take enterprise software maker SolarWinds Inc. private with Thoma Bravo in a deal valued at about $4.4 billion. Each of those transactions, however, involved the firm making an equity commitment to help fund the deal.
Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund first approached Musk in early 2017 about taking Tesla off the market, he said in a blog post Monday.
The Public Investment Fund is working to be part of any investor pool that emerges to take Tesla private, Bloomberg News reported on Sunday.
SYDNEY/SANFRANCISCO:
Leading commodity bourse MCX on Tuesday announced launching of the rubber futures from August 16 to provide hedging to the entire value chain in the rubber industry.
The MCX said it will offer four futures contracts in rubber with each ending September, October, November and December, respectively, an official statement said. Investors are allowed to trade in the rubber quality of ‘Ribbed Smoked Sheets 4 (RSS4)’ for a minimum lot size of one tonne with compulsory delivery option, it said.
The price to be quoted will be for 100kg as per the Ex-Kochi (Ernakulam) rates, exclusive of all sales/GST, it added.
Commenting on the new product, MCX CEO and managing director Mrugank Paranjape said India is one of the major consumers and producers of natural rubber. “With the launch of this new contract, we expect to provide transparent and fair benchmark prices that closely reflect supply and demand fundamentals in physical rubber market,” he said.
Indian Rubber Growers Association general secretary Sibi J Monippally said: “The rubber futures are absolutely necessary for price risk management and hedging for all the stakeholders of the rubber trade. Rubber futures will act as a domestic benchmark for price discovery.”
NEW DELHI: