Were it the case that Musk was all vision and no commercial sense, the calculator wielders might have a better point. However Musk has already delivered some stylish vehicles, which are in high demand – so high that Tesla’s current production problems with a new, cheaper model are frustrating many potential customers. 

Musk is frustrated because market folk are focused on the share price and possibly dividend income, while he is focused on the long term and believes that what can be created in this longer term should not be at the mercy of those whose sole interest is short-term gain. 

This struggle between the interests of shareholders and the companies they invest in is hardly new and manifests itself in a number of ways. 

One of the most damaging is the pressure that shareholders exert for bigger dividend payments, payments that deprive corporations of the cash they need for investment. In this context, it should be noted that Japanese companies, which became world famous, traditionally offered minimal dividends on the grounds that money earned needed to be ploughed back into new products. They were fortunate that Japanese investors fully appreciated this point of view and were vindicated over time. 

Nowadays stock markets are gripped by the conflicting pressures of excessive excitement over hi-tech shares and unrealistic expectations of easy money flowing from their investments. Unsurprisingly, the casualty rate among hi-tech stocks is high, but then again, so is share price appreciation. 

Somewhere in all this the old adage of “high risk, high reward” has been forgotten and investors seem to be expecting low risk for high reward. That ain’t going to happen. 

Why the US stock market has become a drag on bullish sentiment

Further, precisely because they are public entities, this entails giving equity holders rights and a legitimate interest in the way their companies are run. 

The problem comes when that interest is limited to no more than the share price and dividend payments. 

Who’s winning the self-driving car race?

No wonder Musk is frustrated. His bigger picture is one where patience needs to be exercised but where, at least as he sees it, every setback is seized upon without any recognition that pioneering forms of endeavour inevitably encounter problems. 

Many entrepreneurs shun stock markets because they do not want to be beholden to the whims of shareholders and, although this sounds paradoxical, they have less interest in the financials than they do in the products. I have known many entrepreneurs who take the view that the financials will sort themselves out in the long run as long as their products can be successfully developed. Sometimes, this relaxed attitude to the bottom line can prove to be fatal. 

But the bottom line is of widespread concern in stock markets and the markets can be cruel in dishing out judgment and punishing companies that fail to meet expectations generated by the kind of analysts who encountered Musk’s wrath last week. 

Musk might be better off heeding the advice of a veteran company boss who told me that he was every bit as “enamoured” by the “wise” thoughts of market analysts as they were by his caution but never felt the inclination to mention this when meeting them. 

Stephen Vines runs companies in the food sector and moonlights as a journalist and a broadcaster