Elon Musk’s business and legal woes appear to have taken their toll. The billionaire business magnate sports a fuller figure as he took his five sons on a trip to a pumpkin patch on Sunday afternoon.
Musk, 47, dressed all in black for the weekend family outing in Los Angeles with 14-year-old twins Griffin and Xavier and 12-year-old triplets Kai, Saxon and Damian.
The Tesla CEO, who was also accompanied by his pop star girlfriend Grimes, appeared to be attempting to go incognito in a black baseball cap and dark sunglasses.
Musk shares custody of his five sons with his ex-wife Justine. They divorced in 2008 after eight years of marriage.
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Elon Musk (pictured) showed off a fuller figure as he took his five sons on a trip to a pumpkin patch on Sunday afternoon
The billionaire business magnate accompanied his sons and girlfriend Grimes on the Sunday afternoon outing in Los Angeles
His appearance prompted some on Twitter to speculate about the reason for his apparent weight gain.
A Twitter user Photoshopped a burger over the Tesla logo onto Musk’s shirt, adding: ‘You want fries with that?’
‘When you sleep at the factory, you don’t get the cardio of walking to and from your car,’ one person replied.
Musk – who is worth $19.5 billion, according to Forbes – has rarely been seen in public since he settled fraud charges with the Securities and Exchange Commission last month.
The SEC charged Musk with securities fraud, alleging he misled investors when he tweeted on August 7 that he was going to take Tesla private at $420 a share, a substantial premium over its share price at the time.
Musk reached a settlement with the SEC that required him to pay a $20 million fine and step down as chairman, but which let him stay on as chief executive of the envelope-pushing electric automaker.
The SEC filed a lawsuit on September 27 charging fraud and seeking to bar Musk from serving as an executive at any public company. But Musk agreed to settle the case two days later in a resolution hailed by the agency.
The settlement includes a provision intended to rein in the Tesla chief’s much-criticized use of Twitter.
His appearance prompted some on Twitter to speculate about the reason for his apparent weight gain.
A Twitter user Photoshopped a burger over the Tesla logo onto Musk’s shirt, adding: ‘You want fries with that?’
‘Tesla will establish a new committee of independent directors and put in place additional controls and procedures to oversee Musk’s communications,’ according to an SEC summary of the settlement.
But two days after the settlement, Musk had already raised eyebrows by tweeting out the video for ‘OPP,’ a 1990s hip-hop tune by the group ‘Naughty by Nature,’ along with a winking emoji.
The song jokes about đâŻđual promiscuity, which Musk left open to interpretation by investors.
A few days later, Musk again derided the SEC on Twitter.
‘Just want to that the Shortseller Enrichment Commission is doing incredible work. And the name change is so on point!’ Musk said on Twitter on October 4.
Musk (pictured in 2015) has rarely been seen in public since he settled fraud charges with the Securities and Exchange Commission last month
The statement by the electric automaker’s CEO alludes to ‘shortsellers,’ investors who have bet that Tesla shares will fall and who are frequently the subject of Musk’s derision.
Musk has also become locked in an extraordinary dispute with one of British divers who helped rescue the youth football team and their coach who became trapped in a flooded cave in Thailand.
Vernon Unsworth, who lives in Thailand, had accused Musk of a ‘PR stunt’ after he built a small submarine and shipped it to Thailand to help with the rescue.
In response, Musk claimed the diver was a ‘pedo’ in a tweet to his more than 22 million followers – and is now being sued in a US court over the slur.
