The Securities and Exchange Commission has sued Tesla CEO Elon Musk for securities fraud after his aborted attempt to take the company private earlier this summer. The complaint, filed in federal court in the Southern District of New York, shows that the SEC is seeking to ban Musk from being able to hold officer or director positions at publicly-traded companies, as well as any other damages the court feels are appropriate.
Musk originally announced that he was considering taking Tesla private in a tweet on August 7th, adding that he had “funding secured” to take on such an effort. In subsequent tweets, Musk made it seem that all it would take to de-list the company from the stock market, then, was the approval of its shareholders. Musk later claimed that Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund was in talks with Tesla to potentially fund the effort, but eventually abandoned the idea on August 24th. The SEC subpoenaed Tesla just one week after Musk’s original tweet…
