Tesla seeks £1.5bn boost

TESLA wants to raise £1.5bn from investors after a huge quarterly loss.

The Us electric car maker said it will seek nearly £500m through shares and about £1bn in debt which could be converted into stock, and that boss Elon Musk, 47, would be buying nearly £8m worth of new shares.

It came just a week after it posted a £540m loss for the first three months of 2019, after spending about £1.5bn.

Tesla is on course for further losses, with billionaire Musk admitting there was merit in raising fresh cash – a suggestion he had previously rejected.

‘I don’t think raising capital should be a substitute for making the company operate more effectively,’ he told analysts.