Elon Musk, the sole owner of companies like Twitter, Tesla, and SpaceX, and many other such assets, has once come up with a disclaimer about having been born with an 'emerald spoon' in his mouth and then raised generously to become one of the world's most successful entrepreneurs.
Elon, the world's second-richest person, Sunday took to Twitter to give his critics a glimpse of his financially-challenged childhood.
"I grew up in a lower, transitioning to upper, middle income situation, but did not have a happy childhood. Haven’t inherited anything ever from anyone, nor has anyone given me a large financial gift," Elon said in a tweet responding to a user's tweet.
The user in her tweet raised questions over Elon's statement
that he came to the US with "no money and graduated with over $100k in debt,
despite scholarships & working 2 jobs while at school."
The
user wrote, "I strongly support the community notes and all this work but
this time I don't understand it! Even having a wealthy family, a student can
have a lot of financial difficulties. On the other hand, the cited source is
not reliable at all."
He further wrote: "My father created a
small electrical/mechanical engineering company that was successful for 20
to 30 years, but it fell on hard times."
The billionaire added
that he had been essentially bankrupt for about 25 years, requiring
financial support from his brother and himself.
"That said, he does deserve credit for teaching me the
fundamentals of physics, engineering and construction, which is more
valuable than money, but did not support me financially after high school in
any meaningful way," he said in the same tweet.
"Our condition of
providing him financial support was that he not engage in bad behaviour.
Unfortunately, he nonetheless did. There are young children involved, so we
continued to provide financial support for their well-being."
Regarding
the so-called “emerald mine”, he said there was no objective evidence
whatsoever that this mine ever existed.
Elon said (his father)
told him that he owned a share in a mine in Zambia, and "I believed him for
a while, but nobody has ever seen the mine, nor are there any records of its
existence".
"If this mine was real, he would not require financial support
from my brother and me," Elon concluded his long post on it.
I strongly support the community notes and all this work but this time I don't understand it!
— Déborah (@dvorahfr) May 6, 2023
Even having a wealthy family, a student can have a lot of financial difficulties. On the other hand, the cited source is not reliable at all. https://t.co/Emec9MwErV
Elon, whose net worth is $178.2 billion, vehemently
denied he had inherited any asset or money that assisted him in laying down
the foundation of his business empire let alone receiving a largesse of any
kind from his father.
He is ferociously fighting to preserve his
status as a self-made man amid rumours and some really convincing ones that
Elon Musk's father, Errol Musk, holds and has been operating an emerald mine
in South Africa and has used its proceeds to fund his son's business
ventures.
Such rumours snowballed after the senior Musk said in an interview
that he used emeralds from an "under the table" mine in Zambia to finance
his son's escape from South Africa to America.
According to
Business Insider South Africa (BISA), Mr Errol Musk, had a casual attitude
towards the family’s considerable wealth, including the stones that came
from the Zambian emerald mine in which Errol owned a half share.
"Elon Musk, by his father’s recollection then probably 16 years old,
and his brother Kimbal, decided to sell emeralds to Tiffany & Co. on
Fifth Avenue in New York – one of the world's most famous jewellers – as his
father lay sleeping.
"They just walked into Tiffany’s and said,
‘Do you want to buy some emeralds?’" Errol recalled in an interview with
Business Insider South Africa. "And they sold two emeralds, one was for $800
and I think the other one was for $1,200."
"A few days later the
family returned to the store to find that Tiffany was selling the $800
emerald, now set in a ring, for $24,000 — a markup of 30 times the price
Elon had received for the gem," the Business Insider reported.
Errol, the publication contended, has used the story as an
object lesson in how retail works ever since.
“We were very
wealthy,” says Errol. “We had so much money at times we couldn't even close
our safe.”
With one person holding the money in place, another
other would slam the door.