Tesla's Elon Musk may be in contempt over tweet

The US financial regulator has asked a New York judge to hold Tesla boss Elon Musk in contempt for violating a settlement over social media comments.

The move by the Securities and Exchange Commission comes after he tweeted about the electric car company's production.

Last year, Mr Musk agreed that he would not make statements about Tesla's financial performance without prior agreement with the company.

That settlement followed his tweets in August about taking Tesla private.

There was no immediate comment from either Tesla or Mr Musk on the SEC's move.

Tesla's share price fell 5% in after-hours trading on Wall Street.

Last week Mr Musk posted an aerial picture of thousands of new Tesla vehicles, and said that he expected the firm to make 500,000 cars in 2019.

In court papers filed in New York on Monday, the SEC said the tweet was inaccurate and in breach of Mr Musk's agreement. The SEC noted that the tweet was disseminated to more than 24 million people.

“Musk has thus violated the Court's Final Judgment by engaging in the very conduct that the preapproval provision of the Final Judgment was designed to prevent,” wrote the SEC in its motion filed on Monday in federal court in Manhattan.

Following Mr Musk's tweet last year that he had funding to take Tesla private, a US judge in October approved a settlement between the billionaire, the company and the SEC.