The Tesla board has offered to make Elon Musk the planet's first trillionaire if he meets certain milestones in rocketing the automaker to new glory.

Did Musk show true brilliance the first time around? Yes, he did. Tesla's stock price rose 700% in 2020, making it more valuable than Toyota, Volkswagen, General Motors and Ford combined.

But there's another question. Who is going to buy his Teslas now?

Musk has burned many a bridge since he built up the company to a world force. Tesla was once the great green energy hope, offering an elegant way to replace planet-warming fossil fuels with cleaner electric power. Recall that the Obama administration extended the company a $465 million federal loan because Teslas had made electric vehicles cool.

But then Musk spent over a quarter-billion d

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