Latest Tesla executive departure hints at “impending problems”, says Jim Chanos

More problems are just around the corner for Tesla Inc. (NASDAQ:TSLA), according to billionaire short-seller Jim Chanos.

Tesla has repeatedly struggled to hit production targets, while it has also been burning through cash at a rate of almost US$500,000 an hour.

READ: Tesla lost US$500,000 every hour in final quarter of 2017

Adding to its problems has been the relatively high turnover of executives amid a fierce industry war to tie down the best talent.

Tesla’s former president of global sales, Jon McNeill, departed for Lyft back in February, while top finance executives Eric Branderiz and Susan Repo left a month later.

Now the company’s Autopilot chief and well-respected chip architect Jim Keller has stepped down from his role to join Intel Corporation (NASDAQ:INTC).

Pete Bannon, who has been at Tesla since 2016, will now lead the division while Andrej Karpathy, the firm’s director of AI and Autopilot Vision, will have responsibility for Autopilot software.

READ: Another senior Tesla exec jumps ship

Billionaire short-seller Jim Chanos thinks the recent string of executive departures hints at trouble within Tesla’s upper ranks.

“One of the things that’s just sort of stunning…is the accelerating rate of executive departures,” Chanos, who has been short Tesla for four years, told CNBC.

One of the things I’ve learned in my zillion years of selling short is that probably the number one sign of impending problems is mass executive departures

“This is becoming a torrent at Tesla and we keep this Tesla executive departure list is now at two pages, single-spaced for the last 18 months.”

Tesla shares were down 1% to US$277.95 in early deals on Thursday.

Story by ProactiveInvestors