“Big Short” investor Michael Burry appeared to jab at billionaire Elon Musk on Thursday after the Tesla CEO framed the birth of his twins with Neuralink executive Shivon Zilis as a response to falling US birth rates.
Burry, who has occasionally feuded with Musk after once taking a short position on Tesla shares, targeted his rival shortly after news surfaced that the billionaire secretly fathered twins with Zilis in late 2021.
Zilis, 36, is Musk’s subordinate at Neuralink and previously held a role at Tesla.
“Babies born in the US are at 1950 levels, but that doesn’t mean that bosses should sleep with subordinates to try to remedy the situation,” Burry tweeted.
“Bigger problem is nuclear families are at 1959 levels, and woke doctrine wants it lower. More babies in broken families not the way.”
Musk has yet to respond to Burry’s veiled remark. Burry frequently deletes his tweets shortly after posting them.
Earlier Thursday, Musk confirmed an Insider report after court documents revealed the twins were born last November and that he and Zilis had petitioned a judge in Austin, Texas to “have their father’s last name and contain their mother’s last name as part of their middle name.
“Doing my best to help the underpopulation crisis,” the Tesla CEO tweeted on Thursday. “A collapsing birth rate is the biggest danger civilization faces by far.”
Musk has frequently warned that population collapse poses an existential threat to humanity’s survival. In May, he asserted that Italy would eventually have “no people” if its current national birthrate was maintained.
Burry and Musky have had a frosty relationship in recent years.
Burry, the head of Scion Capital Management, took a short position on Tesla in late 2020 and then expanded the bet against the firm last year – once referring to the company’s valuation as “ridiculous.”
Burry had exited his short position by October 2021, though he continued jabbing Musk for selling off his Tesla shares as the stock plummeted last year. Musk responded by calling Burry a “broken clock.”
However, the hedge fund investor nevertheless spoke out in favor of Musk’s bid to acquire Twitter, arguing his involvement with the social media firm “would be good for America.”
Burry, who made a fortune betting against the subprime mortgage market during the Great Recession, has emerged as a prominent voice warning investors about the economy’s cold streak in recent months.
Earlier this week, Burry predicted that “long-term inflation” that would have a higher “floor” in the months ahead due to supply chain upheaval and geopolitical tensions.
[Written in collaboration with other media outlets with information from the following sources]
