I blame the rise of internet stocks. There were a few companies, like Google, Amazon and Facebook/Meta, that if you got in on the ground floor of them you became insanely rich, you got so much money that economically it became a good idea to speculate on lots of little companies. It’s distorted a lot of economic realities.

Tesla has been in that mode for a long while, and it’s largely still there despite everything. And if Musk hadn’t blown his own company up, it might even have paid out in the end. Tesla was the only company seriously making electric cars for a good while, they had a strong lead on everyone else, and they had their charger network. That’s a lead that Musk’s recent actions has foolishly squandered—really, foolishly doesn’t seem like it’s a strong enough word. It’s an unforced error, it’s an own goal, it’s Musk just handing his company’s lead to his competitors.

Tesla’s implosion may be the beginning of a new age of sober realism in corporate governance. Imagine stockholder meetings where executives are asked, “You aren’t going to Musk this up, are you?”