Tesla (TSLA) and SolarCity (SCTY) ‘will not need to raise equity or debt before the end of the year’, says Musk

In a surprising follow-up after his announcement that Tesla will hold a product unveiling next week on the 17th, CEO Elon Musk said that Tesla nor SolarCity will need to raise equity or debt before the end of the year, and “probably not in Q1 2017 either”.

It’s surprising because Tesla and Musk himself disclosed on two recent occasions that the automaker is about to raise capital.

First, in a SEC filing released on August 31 for proposed merger with SolarCity, the company wrote:

“Tesla is currently planning to raise additional funds by the end of this year, including through potential equity or debt offerings, subject to market conditions and recognizing that Tesla cannot be certain that additional funds would be available to it on favorable terms or at all.”

And during the same week in a company-wide email, Musk wrote:

“Even more important, we will need to raise additional cash in Q4 to complete the Model 3 vehicle factory and the Gigafactory.”

Now in a Tweet today, Musk announced:

Would also like to correct expectations that Tesla/SolarCity will need to raise equity or corp debt in Q4. Won't be necessary for either.

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) October 9, 2016

He says that neither company will “need” to raise capital, but that doesn’t mean that they won’t since Tesla always retains the option to go to the public market if the conditions are good for the company to raise capital. It would certainly be playing with semantic, but it would still be an accurate comment.

I’m talking about that “they don’t need to raise capital, but they still might for future expansions.” It’s a possibility.

Tesla unveiled last week a ‘master plan’ for an important expansion of its Fremont factory ahead of Model 3 production. Something that would undoubtedly require a lot of capital.

Musk’s tweet could be interpreted more as an indication of Tesla’s last quarter putting the company in a better financial situation to support the company for the next two quarters – something he already hinted at recently.