Elon Musk slams rating agency after Tesla removed from ESG index
Elon Musk has accused a rating agency of being “phony social justice warriors” after it removed Tesla from its ethical investing index.
The S&P rating agency booted the EV giant from its ESG index on Tuesday, citing racism accusations at one of the factories and Tesla’s software malfunctions as the main reasons.
The serial entrepreneur did not take the news well and took it to Twitter to express his disbelief.
“S&P has lost their integrity,” he tweeted. “Exxon is rated top ten best in the world for environment, social and governance (ESG) by S&P 500, while Tesla didn’t make the list!
“ESG is a scam. It has been weaponised by phony social justice warriors.”
Musk then reinforced the message by posting a meme which stated that ESG scores are determined by “how compliant your business is with the leftist agenda.”
S&P rebutted saying the company lacked a carbon strategy and was more exposed to “controversial incident” compared with rivals.
“While Tesla may be playing its part in taking fuel-powered cars off the road, it has fallen behind its peers when examined through a wider [environmental, social and governance] lens,” S&P said.
The boot, which led to shared dipping more than 7 per cent, comes at a delicate time for Musk.
The chief executive has in fact paused his $44bn takeover of Twitter until the platform can prove less than 5 per cent of its accounts are fake.