- Unsupervised Tesla Cybercabs reportedly operating in Austin without occupants, steering wheels or pedals ahead of a Sept. 3 event
- Elon Musk outlined ambitious plans for Tesla and SpaceX to each build 100 GW of annual solar production capacity
- Analyst Gary Black warned that autonomous ride-hailing may become commoditized, challenging bullish Robotaxi valuations
Tesla shares edged up 0.3% heading into Monday after Cathie Wood and Chamath Palihapitiya cheered Elon Musk’s latest Cybercab and energy ambitions, even as Future Fund’s Gary Black warned that bulls may again be assigning the company an unrealistically dominant market position. TSLA stock is up 12% for the month despite snapping a three-week winning streak with a 4% decline last week.
The weekend excitement began after a Tesla influencer claimed Cybercabs were operating unsupervised in Austin without occupants, steering wheels or pedals. Wood replied: “Yes, let’s GO!”
Ashok Elluswamy, who leads Tesla’s AI and Autopilot efforts, shared footage of the vehicles and declared: “The streets won’t be the same anymore.” When another user asked whether Tesla was about to “flood Austin” with Cybercabs, Musk replied: “Yes.”
Patrick Moorhead, chief analyst at Moor Insights & Strategy, reported seeing a sharp increase in the vehicles downtown. “Tesla CyberTaxis all over downtown Austin today,” Moorhead said, adding that he saw as many of them as Waymo for the first time, potentially ahead of the Sept. 3 event.
Musk separately teased another driving improvement after an X user said he wanted his Tesla to avoid potholes. “Coming soon,” Musk replied, without providing a timeline.
The driving updates accompanied a sweeping forecast from Musk about the pace of AI. “AI will be able to do anything digital (that doesn’t require shaping atoms) at a superhuman level by the end of next year,” he said. The prediction underscores Musk’s effort to position Tesla as an AI, autonomy and robotics company rather than solely an EV manufacturer.
Billionaire venture capitalist Chamath Palihapitiya responded with a sun emoji after Musk outlined an ambitious energy buildout across Tesla and SpaceX. “SpaceX and Tesla are each building 100GW/year of solar production capacity as fast as possible,” Musk said.
Musk expects natural gas to supplement solar power for several years as electricity demand from AI data centers strains existing grids. “The limiting factor for nat gas turbine production is casting the blades & vanes,” Musk said, adding that in-house casting at SpaceX could accelerate natural gas turbines coming online by up to 18 months.
However, Black pushed back on X against the aggressive assumptions behind some bullish Tesla valuations. He said Wall Street expects Tesla to achieve unsupervised autonomy around the same time as several competitors and assumes autonomous ride-hailing will “quickly become a commodity.”
Black compared today’s Robotaxi enthusiasm with claims made five years ago that Tesla would sell 20 million electric vehicles annually by 2030. He called that assumption “absurd,” arguing it would have required Tesla to capture about 20% of the global EV market.
On Stocktwits, retail sentiment for TSLA slipped to ‘neutral’ from ‘bullish’ levels a day ago amid a 36% rise in 24-hour message volumes. One user said the Cybercab hype would push the stock above $355 this week, while another expected the event to tank the stock.
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