Sales of electric cars by the American company Tesla have fallen sharply in many key European markets due to consumer backlash against its owner Elon Musk's interference in European politics.
The world's largest electric vehicle manufacturer sold just 1.277 new cars in Germany in January, according to data from the German Federal Motor Transport Authority, a 59 percent drop compared to January last year.
Germany is home to Tesla's only production facility in Europe.
Sales of electric vehicles slowed sharply in Germany and France last year after government subsidies were withdrawn, but demand has recently started to recover, the Financial Times reports.
The German electric car market recorded an annual growth of 50 percent in January, reducing Tesla's market share from 14 to four percent.
In France, Tesla car sales fell by 63 percent, in Norway by 38 percent, and in the UK by eight percent compared to a year earlier.
Analyst Matthias Schmidt said that one of the reasons for the decline in Tesla car sales in Germany could be that consumers are waiting for the upgraded Model Y, which is due to hit the market in the first half of this year.
However, other experts also see the cause in a reaction to Musk's political meddling, after he supported the German far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party, ahead of the parliamentary elections on December 23.
The Financial Times writes that Musk, owner of the X network and "a key aide to US President Donald Trump", has thus become the richest and most powerful supporter of the AfD, "a party that German business leaders and mainstream political parties consider toxic".
According to polls, the AfD could win more than 20 percent of the vote and become the second-strongest party in the Bundestag.
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and his main rival, Christian Democratic Union leader Friedrich Merz, sharply criticized Musk for supporting a party that, among other things, called for mass deportations of migrants.
An entrepreneur from the southwestern state of Baden-Württemberg told German media that in just one weekend he received as many as 2.000 orders for a sticker he produced for Tesla owners that says: "I bought this before Elon went crazy."
Officials in Brussels have also stepped up their investigation into the role of the X network, seeking internal documents about the recommendation algorithm.
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