Elon Musk Is Furious, Calls The US Securities And Exchange Commission A Scumbag, This Is The Reason

, Elon Musk, made a strong critique of US securities regulators. (photo: twitter @elonmusk)

JAKARTA – Tesla Inc CEO, Elon Musk, on Thursday, April 15 made a strong criticism of the US securities regulator. He called Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) officials "assholes" for filing fraud charges against him over tweets in 2018 about his desire to take Tesla private.

Last Thursday, Musk also made big headlines by unveiling a $43 billion cash takeover offer on social media company Twitter Inc. Musk also made his complaint to the SEC during his remarks at the TED Conference in Vancouver, some time ago.

Musk, the world's richest person according to Forbes magazine, said funding to take his electric car company privately was actually secured at the time he posted his tweet, but the SEC "remains an active public investigation."

"So I was forced to illegally surrender to the SEC. Those bastards," Musk told the audience.

Musk said he felt compelled to settle matters with the SEC because the bank threatened to stop providing capital if he didn't, which would bankrupt Tesla immediately.

"So it's like putting a gun to your child's head," Musk said.

"I'm forced to admit that I lied to save Tesla's life and that's the only reason," Musk added.

Musk and Tesla each paid $20 million in civil fines due to SEC sanctions. Musk was forced to step down as Tesla chairman — to settle the SEC's claim that Musk defrauded investors on August 7, 2018, by posting on Twitter that he had "earned funds" to take the company private.

The SEC said at the time that tweets about its funding were "in fact lacking sufficient grounds."

Another SEC decision also requires Musk to get permission from Tesla's attorneys before making tweets and other public statements, which could be material to Tesla.

An SEC spokesman did not immediately respond to requests for comment from the media on Musk's remarks last Thursday.

Musk himself also rejected an invitation to join Twitter's board last week after he disclosed his ownership of more than 9% stake in Twitter.

In launching the Twitter takeover bid, Musk said he made the offer because he believed it was "very important (for Twitter) to be an inclusive arena for free speech."

Musk said he believes Twitter's algorithm should be open-source and suggested the code behind it should be available on Github, Microsoft's platform for sharing code in software development.

Asked if he had the funds to do the deal, Musk said: "I have enough assets. I can do it if possible." But he did not offer further details.