Elon Musk Has Lost Billions And SNL Might Be The Cause
After hosting Saturday Night Live, Elon Musk saw his net worth drop by billions of dollars this week. Was the comedic gig to blame?
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What’s $20 billion to a person when they have an estimated net worth of nearly $166 billion? Well, Elon Musk probably isn’t too concerned that his estimated wealth dropped that much after his controversial guest-host performance on Saturday Night Live. Could SNL be the reason for this precipitous drop?
By all accounts, Musk’s performance was not bad. The show drew an estimated average of 7.3 million viewers which put the controversial Elon Mush guest-host appearance as the third most-watched SNL of the season so far, coming in behind the shows hosted by Dave Chappelle and Chris Rock.
However, during the show’s live broadcast, Elon Musk saw his financial numbers began to dip. Cryptocurrencies fell the most and within 24 hours, they dropped 30%. Throughout the week, Tesla’s numbers also started falling and by Thursday, they had dropped by 15%.
While $20 billion represents a huge number, Musk still sits as the third most wealthy person on the planet, ahead of Bill Gates, whose fortune sits at nearly $128 billion. Gates’ fortune may take a plummet soon as he and soon-to-be ex-wife Melinda recently announced their divorce.
Perhaps the reason for such a dip in cryptocurrency was due to Musk’s apparent shots he took at Dogecoin, the cryptocurrency Musk had been highly promoting just weeks earlier. During his opening monologue, Musk had an exchange with his mother where he told her she’d be receiving Dogecoin as her Mother’s Day gift.
Also, during SNL’s Weekly Update, Elon Musk appeared as fake financial analyst Lloyd Ostertag. In the skit, “Ostertag” gives a crazy description of Dogecoin being the future of currency, which prompts SNL anchor Michael Che to call it a “hustle.” Musk responds to Che’s remark with, “Yeah, it’s a hustle.” From there, numbers began their downward spiral. By the time the show was an hour old, Dogecoin had dropped 23%.
Another thing of note came from Musk’s opening monologue. The controversial 49-year-old billionaire confirmed that he has Asperger’s syndrome. “I don’t always have a lot of intonation or variation in how I speak, which I’m told makes for great comedy,” he said via NME. “I’m actually making history tonight as the first person with Asperger’s to host SNL.” Asperger’s is classified as a developmental disorder that affects one’s ability to effectively socialize and communicate.
The announcement that Elon Musk was going to be the guest host of Saturday Night Live, with musical guest Miley Cyrus, was not met with overall joy. The surprise, though, was the cast members who came out, apparently displeased with Musk’s selection.
First was Aidy Bryant, a cast member since 2012, who made what appeared to be a subtle dig at Musk hosting. On her Instagram story, Bryant shared a Bernie Sanders tweet concerning income inequality. It read: “The 50 wealthiest people in America today own more wealth than the bottom half of our people. Let me repeat that, because it is almost too absurd to believe: the 50 wealthiest people in this country own more wealth than some 165 MILLION Americans. That is a moral obscenity.” Bryant’s posting of Sanders’ outrage led many to speculate that she was taking a direct shot at Elon Musk.
Not to be outdone, one of SNL’s newcomers Bowen Yang (first appearing in 2019), started by sharing the unhappy face emoji on his Instagram, leading some to believe he was unhappy with Elon Musk appearing that evening. Then, the following day, Yang went right at it. He posted a screenshot of a Musk tweet that read: “Let’s find out just how live Saturday Night Live really is.” With it, Musk included the devil emoji. In response, Yang countered with, “What the f*ck does this even mean.”
There were others who were opposed to Musk appearing on SNL, some who were even able to take a shot at both Musk and former President Donald Trump (imagine that). Joshua Benton, the Neiman Lab writer, tweeted out, “Having Elon Musk host SNL seriously feels like the show’s biggest misstep since having Trump host.”
Of course, Elon Musk hasn’t helped his cause one bit (pun intended). After famously backing dogecoin and saying that Tesla would accept Bitcoin as payment for its vehicles, he announced on Twitter that he is suspending indefinitely Bitcoin as payment over concern for the “rapidly increasing use of fossil fuels for Bitcoin mining and transactions.”
This didn’t sit well with Wall Street analysts as they are now saying Musk’s latest reversals are causing great confusion amongst crypto investors as well as causing more volatility for Musk’s Tesla stock. So, the 30% dip in cryptocurrency and 15% for Tesla seems to be warranted.
How this affects Musk and his enormous wealth in the near future is anyone’s guess. But knowing how Elon Musk handles his business, he’ll recoup that lost $20 billion in no time, much to Bernie Sanders chagrin.
