Geoffrey Smith 

Investing.com — Tesla stock (NASDAQ:), fell to its lowest level in 9 months Friday due to CEO Elon Musk’s continuing spat with the media. 

Tesla stock plunged as much as 5.3% at $671.54 (1500 GMT) by 11:00 AM ET (11:50 GMT). It is currently down about 46% from its October peak. But, the stock has still increased 18% since 2019, but it continues trading at valuations very few other stocks are able to sustain over extended periods. 

Musk vented his anger via Twitter over the report from Business Insider. This revived allegations that Musk was subject to sexual harassment by an employee SpaceX. SpaceX is Musk’s second most valuable venture. 

BI reported on Friday that SpaceX paid $250,000 for the settlement. Musk said that the “wild charges” against him were false and part of a leftist agenda. He claimed they are part of a scheme to discredit him. 

Musk stated that their only goal was to get in the way of Twitter’s acquisition. Musk claimed that Musk had written the story before they spoke to him. 

The BI story came in the same week that S&P Global dropped Tesla from a benchmark ESG-themed index due to repeated incidents of racial discrimination at the carmaker’s factories.

Owen Diaz worked nine months at the plant in 2015-2016. He said that other workers used racist slurs to talk with him and wrote swastikas on the bathroom walls.  

Tesla has been arguably the most prominent environmentally-themed stock anywhere in the world for the last decade, attracting billions of dollars from investors who have bought into its mission to cut vehicle carbon emissions. But, it’s weaknesses on two other pillars ESG platforms – social governance and governance – make Tesla vulnerable to being dropped from ESG indices. These indices now have trillions of dollar.