In September 2020, short-seller Hindenburg Research released a report accusing Nikola of misleading investors with an “intricate fraud.” The EV brand refuted those allegations, labeling them as false and misleading. Back then, Nikola was riding high on top of a partnership with GM that gave it an 11% stake in the upstart valued at roughly $2 billion. The company was also targeted about a 2018 demonstration to investors, where a Nikola One semi was shown “in motion,” but it was later discovered that the vehicle was not self-propelled and was instead moving downhill. Milton was simultaneously accused and subsequently charged over misleading claims regarding the company’s progress and landing investments worth hundreds of millions of dollars.
He was also lambasted for falsely claiming that the company had developed an in-house production capacity for hydrogen fuel tech at rates below the current market levels and that it got billions of dollars in investment for the same. General Motors soon backed out of its equity deal with Nikola, several projects were scaled down, and ambitious plans such as producing an electric motorboat were also put on ice. In October 2023, freshly unearthed regulatory documents revealed that Milton was told to pay the company $165 million in damages. A month later, Milton urged a federal court should avoid prison and instead be put on probation, claiming that his past actions had no “ill will.”
