Peter Thiel Reported To Me, Says Elon Musk, Calls PayPal Exit 'Palace Coup' Fueled By Board: 'There Was Nothing Anyone Could…'

2 months ago 53

Badar Shaikh

Sun, December 21, 2025 astatine 1:01 PM CST 3 min read

Tesla Inc. (NASDAQ:TSLA) and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk has called his exit from PayPal Holdings Inc. (NASDAQ:PYPL) a "palace coup" against the billionaire.

Responding to a station connected the societal media level X connected Friday by idiosyncratic @jasonlk, which had a video claiming that Palantir Technologies Inc. (NASDAQ:PLTR) co-founder Peter Thiel fired Musk, besides sharing that erstwhile SpaceX was going to unopen its doors, Musk went to the PayPal founder's money and was fixed his stock by Thiel "in an hour."

"Peter Thiel fired Elon Musk. Be — helium was benignant astir it. And helium near Elon with each his economics (12% of PayPal).

Be kind. He did what helium had to do, but helium was kind.

And past Elon went backmost to Peter, and Founders Fund got to put $20m to bargain 10% of SpaceX.

Perhaps the… pic.twitter.com/Hss7ENgTpP

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Responding to the post, Musk said that helium was the CEO and "Peter [Thiel] reported to me, truthful could not occurrence me." Musk besides added that his exit from the level was a "palace coup by astir (not all) of the exec squad and astir of the board," Musk said, adding that the determination came arsenic the institution was acrophobic astir Musk's decisions being "too risky."

Musk besides shared that helium was the "largest shareholder" successful PayPal and said that "there was thing anyone could person done" to instrumentality his shares distant from him, Musk said.

I was CEO and Peter reported to me, truthful could not occurrence me. It was a palace coup by astir (not all) of the exec squad and astir of the board, who were disquieted that my decisions were excessively risky.

I was the largest shareholder successful the company. There was thing anyone could person done to…

The quality comes arsenic Tesla precocious cemented its presumption arsenic the astir invaluable automaker connected the planet, with its marketplace capitalization surpassing the $1.58 trillion mark, which eclipses the combined marketplace capitalization of automakers similar Toyota Motor Corp. (NYSE:TM), BYD Co. Ltd. (OTC:BYDDY) (OTC:BYDDF), Ford Motor Co. (NYSE:F), General Motors Co. (NYSE:GM) and others.

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However, the surge successful valuation hasn't translated into improved income for the automaker, with Tesla income down 23% successful the U.S. during November amid a wider pullback successful EV demand. Despite this, the company's marketplace stock stood astatine 56% successful the U.S. EV sector.