Tesla's Profits Are Not From Selling Cars

Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA) is a car company worth over $800 billion that has never turned a profit selling cars. Despite a cult following and intense brand loyalty, Tesla has been unable to wring any profits out of the half a million cars it now sells annually.

To be clear, Tesla did report a profit for 2020, under generally accepted accounting principles (GAAP), marking the company's first full year of profitability. But that profit did not come from the core business of manufacturing cars. Tesla booked a whopping $1.58 billion of revenue from selling regulatory credits last year, more than the previous three years combined. Tesla's net income of $721 million in 2020 turns into a substantial loss if those regulatory credit sales are backed out. READ MORE

Inside the Reddit army that's crushing Wall Street

Omar couldn't believe what was happening.

He should have been concentrating on the student he was tutoring in physics — a job he did during his free time while enrolled in a post-baccalaureate pre-med program — but Omar's eyes kept darting back to the Robinhood app open on his phone. READ MORE

5 ways to improve remote performance evaluations

As we enter the new year, organizations continue to adjust to the impacts of the COVID-19 outbreak, including an extension of work-from-home policies for many employees. As more time goes on between "what used to be" and "the new normal," the need to establish updated procedures for employee performance conversations becomes imperative. READ MORE

Who Will Control the Software That Powers the Internet?

AS THE INTERNET has evolved over its 35-year lifespan, control over its most important services has gradually shifted from open source protocols maintained by non-profit communities to proprietary services operated by large tech companies. As a result, billions of people got access to amazing, free technologies. But that shift also created serious problems.

Millions of users have had their private data misused or stolen. Creators and businesses that rely on internet platforms are subject to sudden rule changes that take away their audiences and profits. But there is a growing movement — emerging from the blockchain and cryptocurrency world — to build new internet services that combine the power of modern, centralized services with the community-led ethos of the original internet. We should embrace it. READ MORE

Hedge-Fund Titans Lose Billions to Reddit Traders Running Amok

For once, Main Street is beating Wall Street.

In a matter of weeks, two hedge-fund legends -- Steve Cohen and Dan Sundheim -- have suffered bruising losses as amateur traders banded together to take on some of the world’s most sophisticated investors. In Cohen’s case, he and Ken Griffin ended up rushing to the aid of a third, Gabe Plotkin, whose firm was getting beaten down. READ MORE

What to Do If Your Team Doesn’t Want to Return to the Office

As the pandemic continues, there are growing tensions at organizations where employees who have been working from home are now expected to come into reopened offices. Many knowledge workers—who have happily shed their commutes, decreased their interaction with difficult colleagues and let go of other frustrations of the office—relish the freedom, flexibility, and the increased productivity of working from home. But some senior leaders, who may not have confidence in their own ability to manage remote workers, aren't necessarily on the same page. READ MORE

Biden’s paid leave plan meets the nation's ‘messy’ policies

The word you often hear associated with the current system of paid leave in the United States is patchwork.

Research from employment law firm Seyfarth tracks the issue and lays out just how true that is. Some states, like Massachusetts and Arizona, have statewide sick and personal leave laws. Others, including Georgia to Iowa, have what’s described as anti-local leave laws to stop their cities from passing leave laws on their own. READ MORE

Elon Musk to offer $100 million prize for 'best' carbon capture tech

Tesla Inc chief and billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk on Thursday took to Twitter to promise a $100 million prize for development of the "best" technology to capture carbon dioxide emissions.

Capturing planet-warming emissions is becoming a critical part of many plans to keep climate change in check, but very little progress has been made on the technology to date, with efforts focused on cutting emissions rather than taking carbon out of the air. READ MORE

Fed-up executives plot a faster COVID-19 vaccine rollout

Executives from an industrial conglomerate, a health system and a professional sports ownership group met up this month in their Charlotte, N.C., neighborhood to walk and vent. The national rollout of Covid-19 vaccine doses, they agreed, wasn’t going fast enough. READ MORE

Why 2021 Will Be The Year Of Guided Selling

Sales teams have always needed to be agile. The marketplace is constantly changing, with new trends emerging among buyers all of the time. To stay ahead of the curve, sales organizations have to adjust to address buyers’ needs and expectations. Years ago, this meant opening new avenues for sales and experimenting with different kinds of demonstrations. Now, sales organizations are faced with a massive shift to remote selling strategies, digital experiences and virtual onboarding. READ MORE

He may hold the winning ticket in tech and Silicon Valley knows it

Between March and November last year, even as the coronavirus upended lives and devastated economies around the world, India's richest man was handed more than $27 billion to make a bet on the future of the internet.

More than half that eye-popping amount came from Silicon Valley. It started with $5.7 billion from Facebook in March, one of the biggest investments in the American company's history. Silver Lake Partners, the private equity firm based eight miles from Facebook's (FB) Menlo Park headquarters, followed with its own investment just weeks later, as did Palo Alto's General Atlantic and San Francisco-headquartered TPG Capital.

Smaller investments from Qualcomm (QCOM) and Intel (INTC) came next, before Google (GOOGL) swooped in with $4.5 billion to swell the impressive war chest. READ MORE

It's review season: Here's how to talk to your boss

It's that time of year again...review season.

Was that a groan? I get it, performance reviews are tough during normal times. And who really wants to look back at 2020?

While many companies are taking a different approach to evaluations this year, some experts say that having a one-on-one discussion with your boss about last year while also setting goals for the new year will help establish your priorities and continue your career growth. READ MORE

Businesses struggle to find qualified applicants despite record number of people looking for work

Talent scarcity has become a major concern for businesses worldwide despite record-high unemployment rates, according to a new report.

About 40% of human capital leaders say that their organization has been negatively impacted by talent scarcity, according to the 2021 Talent Trends Report from Randstad Sourceright. READ MORE

The 5 biggest issues for technology companies in 2021

After a year of startling growth, the tech industry faces a more vexing 2021.

The pandemic helped bring the world’s tech giants such as Amazon.com Inc. and Microsoft Corp. to new heights in 2020. The shift to online shopping and remote working accelerated at a pace that would have been inconceivable without the coronavirus. READ MORE

Middle market CFOs predict 'extraordinary' growth in 2021, survey finds

2021 will bring increased demand and opportunity for innovation across every industry, the CFOs predicted. Last year, the pandemic accelerated digital transformation at 39% of companies, and opened new expansion opportunities for products or services for 36% and geographies for 31%. READ MORE

Bill Gates becomes top US farmland owner in US

Microsoft founder Bill Gates is now the owner of the most farmland in the United States, according to Land Report.

The Land Report researchers concluded that Gates, now the fourth richest man in the world, and his wife, Melinda, own 242,000 acres of farmland. READ MORE

Prepare for a jobs boom in 2021

The US economy and labor market, still far from fully recovered, are now bracing for a terrible, virus-spreading winter. It is hard to feel optimistic, but help is on the way. A strong recovery in the second half of 2021 may lead the unemployment rate to return to its natural rate of about 4.2 to 4.5% in 2022. READ MORE

3 Lessons Learned By An Accidental Entrepreneur

Every entrepreneur starts with a dream of building a world-class product, creating a business, living by their own rules, changing the world and making millions–if not billions–in the process. Right?

Not me. I never dreamed of being a founder. I just ended up becoming one on some random day back in 2013. READ MORE

At a subdued CES, computers provide excitement

In a most unusual time, CES was diminished this year, with lots of companies including Google and Amazon not having a substantial presence and presenters mourning the lack of face-to-face contact. But one category was still on fire with new product announcements: Computers. READ MORE

Elizabeth Holmes' $4.5B fortune, luxury lifestyle 'created powerful motive' for fraud, prosecutors say

Prosecutors working the fraud case against blood-testing startup Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes have fired back at the defense’s claim that her wealth and social standing are not relevant to the crime scheme, arguing that her six-figure salary, billion-dollar stake in the company and jet-setting lifestyle were motivating factors behind the alleged lies, court papers show. READ MORE