In response to reports of a 10 percent global job cut, a source close to Tesla China was quoted as saying that no recent layoffs have taken place, and that Tesla China is still active in large-scale recruitment.

"Tesla's hiring in China is very strict and there remains a shortage of talent," the individual told Jiemian.com, a Shanghai-based financial media outlet.

According to Tesla China's official WeChat account for recruitment, there will be a special livestream held on Thursday at 7 pm (GT+8:00) for smart manufacturing roles.

Prior to this event, Tesla China on May 22 posted more than 100 job openings, covering vehicle software, hardware design engineering, power and energy engineering and other fields, mainly based in Shanghai's Lingang New Area and Beijing.

Shanghai Lingang is home to Tesla's Gigafactory, which delivered 484,100 vehicles in 2021, accounting for 51.7 percent of Tesla's global deliveries, with more than 160,000 exported.

On Saturday, Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla, tweeted that total headcount will increase, but salaried should remain fairly flat, replying a to a Tweet, which said that "Tesla's headcount would increase over the next 12 months."

This came after an e-mail sent to Tesla executives last Thursday, saying that Musk has a "super bad feeling" about the US economy and told executives to "pause all hiring worldwide," Reuters reported.

In another e-mail sent to employees, Musk said that Tesla has become "overstaffed in many areas." It needs to cut about 10 percent of salaried staff, but "hourly headcount will increase."

Tesla had 99,290 employees worldwide as of the end of 2021, according to its annual financial statement filed with the US Securities and Exchange Commission in February. That means that if Tesla cuts 10 percent of its workforce, the number of layoffs would be close to 10,000.

About 39 percent of Tesla's roughly 100,000 workers are "line employees," according to Tesla's annual report.

Musk's email also said the job cuts would not affect those who make cars, assemble batteries or install solar panels.

The job cut news triggered a sharp drop in Tesla shares on Friday. By Friday's close, Tesla's share price had fallen more than 9 percent, wiping out about $67.2 billion in market value.

Many believe that Musk's move is directly due to the difficult time facing the new-energy vehicle industry - Tesla is suffering from a parts shortage and ongoing supply chain instability. Investment bank analysts had already cut their second-quarter and full-year delivery estimates.

"Tesla's action is due to both internal and external factors. This includes not only the pessimistic expectation of the [US] economy, but also the blockage of the global supply chain and its own strategic adjustment," Wang Peng, an assistant professor at the Gaoling School of Artificial Intelligence at the Renmin University of China, told the Global Times on Monday.

Wang also pointed out that Tesla has been in a period of rapid growth over recent years. In this process, it will inevitably lead to the expansion of company headcount, and the entire production cost and sales cost to a certain extent.

"In this case, layoffs are also to reduce costs within the enterprise," said Wang.

Global Times