Why would public opinion matter if your company wasn't public?

IMO it's a beautiful thing if your company can be aligned 100% with customers and not some random idiots that want participation in your company issues without even owning a Tesla let alone an EV. No earnings reports, no SEC wasting your time.

Only reason companies (unfortunately) need to go public is the need for upfront capital or early-stage capital that wants an exit.

The second part is very significant. Many people want to diversify their risk, and public companies allow that. Rather own 10% each of 10 companies than 100% of one risk-wise.

Note that taking 100% of a company has been one of Warren Buffet's activities for decades.

If you own literally all of the stock in Tesla... how could the stock crash? There's no stock being traded for its value to change.

Of note, there are examples in the past of companies going private without falling apart--Dell is the most notable example I can think of off the top of my head.

>If you own literally all of the stock in Tesla... how could the stock crash? There's no stock being traded for its value to change.

The price will plummet in the sense that nobody would bid to buy it for anywhere as much as they would before the event.

If nobody is bidding, there's no asks to cause the price to go down. More likely, someone buying all of the stock either a) intends to take it private, at which point there is no more stock anymore or b) intends to fold it into another company, at which point there is no more stock anymore. (Of course, the valuation would likely go down anyways, because people usually pay a premium to buy all of the stock.)