Bill Ackman Drives a Tesla: Here's Why He Won't Buy the Stock

2 hours ago 2

Adam Levy, The Motley Fool

Sat, July 4, 2026 astatine 11:57 AM CDT 5 min read

Bill Ackman has made it clear: He wants to beryllium the adjacent Warren Buffett. That's easier said than done, to beryllium sure. But the money manager successful complaint of Pershing Square has revamped his concern benignant since his activistic days and runs a concentrated portfolio of long-term, mostly passive holdings.

So, it's nary astonishment that Ackman's concern decisions are rooted successful the aforesaid concern doctrine arsenic Warren Buffett's. That said, Ackman has notably invested successful 1 country Buffett historically avoided: exertion stocks. Some of Ackman's largest holdings are the large tech stocks Amazon, Microsoft, and Meta Platforms. When asked wherefore Ackman is funny successful those companies but not different members of the "Magnificent Seven," specified arsenic Tesla (NASDAQ: TSLA), Ackman's effect echoed contented shared by Buffett implicit the years.

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Four Tesla cars parked astatine  a charging station.

Image source: Tesla.

Why Ackman won't bargain Tesla banal

Ackman likes Tesla's products and has a batch of respect for its CEO, Elon Musk. Ackman adjacent said successful a caller interrogation that helium drives a Tesla. But Tesla's banal has go detached from the existent merchandise it sells: the car that Ackman, who tin acquisition immoderate car helium likes, has chosen to use.

"To ain Tesla astatine today's valuation, you person to marque immoderate expansive assumptions astir robotics and different things that they're going to execute implicit time," Ackman said. "Our portfolio is comprised of businesses wherever we, with a precise precocious grade of confidence, tin foretell the currency flows implicit a precise agelong play of time. I deliberation it's precise hard to bash that with Tesla."

Tesla's banal presently trades for implicit 200 times guardant net estimates. It's an automaker trading astatine 15 times sales, portion different car companies commercialized astatine income multiples beneath 1. While its conveyance deliveries are increasing astir 10% twelvemonth implicit twelvemonth and expected to proceed doing truthful done 2030, that's acold from justifying the tremendous multiples connected the stock.

Indeed, Tesla is simply a $1.5 trillion institution due to the fact that investors expect it to gain tremendous profits from processing autonomous vehicles and humanoid robots successful the future. The immense bulk of bull cases for Tesla, specified arsenic Ark Invest's valuation, stem from its fledgling robotaxi efforts. And present Musk is dedicating a important magnitude of Tesla's manufacturing capableness to its humanoid robot, Optimus, which is simply a monolithic stake connected labour disruption.

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