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It's kind of weird. Their bond rating is pretty bad, but yet their stock market cap seems super high - 5x last years revenue (with profits of -2B). Of course, if there is risk to the bonds, that means the equity is even riskier.

Are many sophisticated investors buying the stock or is it mainly retail investors who love the brand+man?

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TSLA has a ton of retail investors, which definitely helps prop up the price, but there are definitely institutional investors as well. Everything is expensive these days, so one of the few ways to generate alpha is to buy the right 'priced to perfection' companies, and for some reason (that I personally can't comprehend) TSLA has a lot of savvy investors going long.

That being said, the short interest on this stock is incredibly high, making it very pricy to bet against the company.

Traditional retail investors can't push a stock to $55 billion. Institutional holders have ~60% of the stock.

Fidelity, T Rowe Price, Vanguard, Blackrock, etc. Even the Bank of Montreal has a billion dollar position. Baillie Gifford of Edinburgh is sitting on a $4 billion position. Institutional holders picked up another ne three million shares last quarter.

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