Electric Fraudsters

Is everything named after genius inventor Nikola Tesla a fraud?

Tesla’s fraudulence is well-known. Well, maybe not so-well-known, given it’s not much reported that Tesla doesn’t make money selling electric cars. It makes money selling “credits” to other car companies in exchange for not having to make the electric cars which the government mandates must be made.

Which accounts for the other half of Tesla’s fraud.

Which is based on people buying stock in a company whose value rests almost entirely on the mandates rather than the market; i.e., its power to rent-seek.

“Investors” buy Tesla stock because they see government forcing the manufacture of electric cars. When the government can force people to buy something, it’s a pretty safe bet you can make money on the transaction.

But at least Teslas can move under their own power.

Nikolas, on the other hand.

They roll under the power of gravity.

As in, roll them down a hill.

Then film the event and use it to sell people on the amazing new technology  . . . pioneered by Boy Scouts and the pinewood derby.

The Scouts, of course, never pretended their pinewood derby cars were powered by anything other than gravity. And they never sold stock in their enterprise – or gulled a major car company (GM) to “invest” in it, either.

The amazing thing is the media actually covered the fraud this time. There has been widespread coverage of the scandal – first revealed by Hindenburg Research, which apparently specializes in revealing disasters.

Oh, the humanity! 

Within days of HR’s revelation that a 2018 promo film of the Nikola One – the company’s make-believe electrically-powered semi – wasn’t electrically-driven at all but rather gravity-propelled, the company’s head fraudster, Trevor Milton, joined Joe Biden in the basement.

An SEC and DOJ investigation is now under way.

Milton isn’t broke, though. He still owns shares in Nikola worth $2.5 billion, according to Forbes. He will also remain a consultant – italicized for the obvious reasons – and retain a Nikola-provided security detail that will cost the marks (whoops., shareholders) $100,000.

And Nikola – the company – is still apparently worth an astounding $10 billion, in spite of the fact that it hasn’t sold a single vehicle.

Whoever said that crime doesn’t pay?

It also continues.

Nikola hasn’t folded, in part because GM hasn’t demanded a refund. In fact, a former GM executive named Stephen Girsky is the new chairman of the company and GM itself will actually build the “Nikola” Badger, which will presumably be able to go up hills as well as down them.

Hilariously, Nikola – the company – “paid” GM with stock, not cash, to build the Badger. Stock which has fallen in value by almost 20 percent since the Hindenburg revelations.

Get that great GM feeling – with nonexistent Nikola parts!

Part of the Nikola gyp was the company’s claim to have Miraculous Hydrogen Fuel Cell Technology in the works – with the promise (of the check’s in the mail variety) that this would fix the electric car’s fundamental functional gimp; i.e., its short range and being tethered to a power cord. Using hydrogen and electrolysis to make electricity being faster than plugging in, though not cheaper – the electric car (and truck’s) fundamental economic gimp.

Another gyp-in-the-works (assuming it ever runs) is Nikola’s plan to not sell electric trucks at all, but rather to lease them – along with a hydrogen fuel contract. With taxpayers gypped to “help” pay for the hydrogen fueling stations en route along public highways.

This gyp isn’t unique to Nikola, which followed what the others already have in the works.

Everyone (well, the not-economically-illiterate) knows that electric cars aren’t going anywhere – via the force of gravity or batteries  – unless their cost comes way down. This has been promised, check’s-in-the-mail style, for literally half a century. But yet to be delivered.

Another fraud, of a piece with the 100 MPG carburetor – for those who remember carburetors.

A fraud compounded by the idea of the free lunch – which all too many suckers are lining up to buy.

It is one thing – a possible thing – to make an affordable electric car if you forget about making it fast and forget making it into a truck. Performance – and weight – are the enemies of efficiency. Electric car batteries are extremely heavy. A Tesla 3’s battery weighs 1,000 pounds. And the Tesla 3 is a compact-sized car. The Nikola/GM Badger truck’s battery will probably weigh 1,500 pounds – about the same as an entire classic VW Beetle.

Which may not have gone very fast but at least could make it back up the hill after you rolled it down the hill.

. . .