Zeus: Tesla's robotaxi gamble may already be too late

As Elon Musk bets the farm on autonomous vehicles, China is already well ahead of the U.S. market

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Baidu’s Apollo Go robotaxis.

(David Callaway is founder and Editor-in-Chief of Callaway Climate Insights. He is the former president of the World Editors Forum, Editor-in-Chief of USA Today and MarketWatch, and CEO of TheStreet Inc. His climate columns have appeared in USA Today, The Independent, and New Thinking magazine. His debut novel, Unregulated Militia, is available now on Amazon, at Barnes & Nobles and all major outlets).

NEW YORK (Callaway Climate Insights) — For Tesla shareholders, a few words of encouragement on social media from Elon Musk are usually enough to clear the highest hurdles a troubled EV market can throw at them. His optimism can be infectious.

Witness Tesla TSLA 0.00%↑ shares this week, which initially rose after it met everybody’s already poor expectations with a weak second quarter in which sales fell about 14% (but not the worst case 17%). The shares are down this year, but up since April, when Musk introduced Tesla new Cybercabs onto the streets of Austin, Texas to much fanfare.

Musk isn’t much worried about sales of Tesla’s aging fleet. The future is in autonomous vehicles, Musk argues, and Tesla will become the first car company to successfully morph into an AI-driven tech giant. He might be right. But if so, that future is already happening in China.