Wall Street legend investor Ron Baron doubles down on Elon Musk: After making $12 billion, he's ready to bet big for another decade.

November 14, 2025, Lincoln Center, New York.

The opening theme of the 32nd Baron Investment Conference was just four words: Changing Lives.

The most anticipated segment of the day was a dialogue.

On one side was 82 - year - old legendary investor Ron Baron. He had bet around 40% of his personal assets on Tesla, 25% on SpaceX, and also invested in xAI. In total, nearly 65% of his wealth was tied to Elon Musk.

On the other end of the screen was the person he had been heavily investing in for over a decade: Elon Musk.

Baron estimated in an interview with CNBC that since he bought into Tesla in 2014, this Musk - related investment had earned him and his clients over $12 billion. Of this, $8 billion came from Tesla, $4 billion from SpaceX, and the returns from new projects like xAI were still in the early stages.

But what was most unexpected was not this return, but what he said next:

I think in the next 10 years, we can make five times as much on this money.

In his eyes, Musk's business landscape was no longer just about electric vehicles and rockets. It was a fully coordinated system consisting of car factories, aerospace, AI factories, humanoid robots, chips, and space power stations.

What he valued was not the specific products Musk made, but how he personally built the infrastructure for the AI era.

Section 1 | What exactly is Baron betting on?

At this conference in New York, Baron had only one core point:

He's not betting on companies; I'm betting on people.

This is the starting point for understanding all his investment logic.

There's a widely - circulated story: The first time he met Musk was in 2009. At that time, Tesla had just faced a funding crisis. Baron asked Musk:

"Will you still continue?"

Musk's answer was simple: Yes. This thing is worth it.

Baron later said that at that moment, he realized that this man wasn't just building a company; he was pouring his whole self into it.

1. He's betting on execution ability

Baron is not a technology expert. He admits himself: I don't understand electric vehicles, rockets, or AI. What I understand is who can turn a difficult task into reality.

What he saw was Musk's determination to keep moving forward:

When Tesla was on the verge of bankruptcy, he mortgaged his house to pay employees' salaries.

After the first three rocket explosions at SpaceX, he said that one more failure would mean bankruptcy.

Just 18 months after the establishment of xAI, it was able to release the roadmap for Grok 5.

When everyone said that robots were still a long way off, he had already put Optimus into factory testing.

Everything Musk does is so difficult that others can't keep going. But he can persevere.

He's betting on people who can overcome difficulties.

2. He's betting on long - term planning ability

Baron's style is to wait. He has publicly said: When I invest, I can wait for more than a decade.

He gave an example: In 2012, Tesla only had one Model S, and its annual sales were less than 30,000 units. Many investors doubted whether the company could survive, but he kept increasing his position.

His reason was simple: Musk wasn't just making cars; he was planning for the future.

Looking back from 2012, these plans of Tesla didn't seem valuable. But in 2025, the underlying logic became clear.

Baron said: You can't just look at one year; you need to look at ten years. His rhythm of doing things isn't about making money tomorrow; it's about making the future possible.

3. He's betting on combination ability

Baron said at the conference: Every project Musk undertakes seems unrelated, but he's making each thing make the other stronger.

As early as 15 years ago, Musk told Baron: "The machine that makes machines" is the most important. At that time, most investors were still focused on how many cars were sold, while he was already thinking about how to integrate different businesses.

Baron said: Others are just doing business; he's building an ecosystem.

What he's investing in is not business lines but combination ability.

4. He's betting on stress - resistance ability

Baron once said on CNBC: I like it when he gets criticized because the stock price will become cheaper.

When others are panicking, he's more willing to increase his position.

But what best reflects his confidence is a commitment. Around 2020, Tesla's stock price rose from $10 - $15 to $220. Clients started to get nervous, worried about having too heavy a position. Baron reduced the clients' positions by 25 - 30%.

But he didn't sell a single share himself. He promised the board of directors: I'll be the last one to sell. Before the clients completely exit, I won't sell a single share of my own. He said: For the rest of my life, I won't sell my shares in Tesla or SpaceX.

He explained the reason: Most people will shrink back when facing difficulties, but Musk won't. Every time he falls, he can get back up.

He found a person who can turn visions into reality and move forward even in the face of difficulties.

In his words: I see a future in him that I can't see in others.

Section 2 | Why does he say that Grok is the most important step?

When Ron Baron invested in Tesla, he was waiting for a car to become an opportunity;

When he invested in SpaceX, he was waiting for a launch to become an industry;

And this time, when he invests in xAI, he's waiting to see who will truly control AI.

1. He sees that Musk has mastered the three key elements for an AI company's success

Musk clearly stated in the dialogue that the success of an AI company depends on three things:

Whether it can attract the best talents

Whether it can invest in the largest amount of AI hardware and get GPUs online as quickly as possible

Whether it has unique data acquisition

And xAI has achieved all three points, and it has built everything from the ground up: The data for training comes from the X platform, the world's best real - time data source; the computing power for operation comes from SpaceX's self - built data centers and chip clusters; the platforms for release are its own app, its own cars, and its own robots.

In terms of hardware, even Jensen Huang himself said: I'm shocked by the speed at which they built the data center in such a short time. There's only one person on Earth who can do this.

Others are using AI, while Musk is building AI with his own hands.

More importantly: The stronger AI becomes, the one who controls it can set the rules. And Musk holds a complete technology stack and is not restricted by others.

2. He sees that Musk is changing the way AI is used

Today, we use search engines, web pages, and browsers. These are the old entrances. What Musk wants to do is create an assistant that can directly help you understand, analyze, and complete tasks.

Grok is the first version of this new entrance:

1. It can read PDFs, read code, modify pictures, and generate videos
2. It has its own tone, attitude, and can ask rhetorical questions, make jokes, and show emotions
3. It's not just for dialogue but can complete tasks with you, such as writing copy, checking contracts, and planning driving routes.

For investors, this means that AI has changed from just chatting to actual execution.

The Grok 5 that Musk is currently training has increased its parameter scale from 3 trillion in Grok 4 to 6 trillion, and it has added video understanding, image recognition, tool invocation, and real - time multi - modal processing capabilities. Musk used a word to describe it: It's like a study group having a meeting in your mind.

More importantly, his judgment is: With Grok 5, for the first time, I think we might really be able to achieve Artificial General Intelligence (AGI). Although there's only a 10% chance, this is a feeling I've never had before.

3. He believes that Musk's understanding of AI is earlier than others

He's not someone who joined the AI craze halfway. He started planning long before ChatGPT emerged.

The reason why Musk founded OpenAI was based on a conversation with Larry Page, the co - founder of Google. Page told him that he was a speciesist, favoring computers over humans.

Musk said:

"Which side are you on, the computer's? I have to join the human team."

So he founded OpenAI. The word "Open" means open - source. He provided all the startup funds, recruited key figures like Ilya Sutskever, and even helped OpenAI reach a cooperation with Microsoft. But he refused stock options: It's wrong to take stock options in a non - profit organization.

But when OpenAI became closed - source, he turned around and founded xAI.

He's not being pushed by the AI wave; he's the starting point of this AI wave.

Baron is betting on xAI not because of how strong it is now, but because Musk is not chasing trends; he's defining them.

Section 3 | He's bet everything on the part that no one understands

If Ron Baron bet on Tesla because it could go faster and earn more; then he's betting on robots, chips, and satellites because he believes that Musk has the ability to build the foundation for the future.

To most people, these projects are either too far - fetched or too costly. But in Baron's eyes, these are precisely the infrastructure for the real implementation of AI.

1. Optimus is not just a robot; it's accessible labor for everyone

Musk clearly stated: We're not making a dancing robot; we're making a working robot.

Behind this statement is a change in the positioning of Optimus:

1. From a laboratory concept machine to a product that can be mass - produced
2. From an image - display tool to a tool that can replace basic labor

Optimus V3 can already perform the following actions:

• Walk autonomously, bypass obstacles, and recharge itself
• Imitate human hand movements, such as screwing screws and clamping circuit boards
• Its hand has 50 driving elements and can handle delicate tasks
• More importantly, the cost target is set at less than $20,000.

Musk believes that in the future, everyone will want their own Optimus to take care of family members, cook, do housework, and keep them company.

The application scenarios described by Musk are far beyond housework: Imagine a world where everyone can have access to the best surgeons. Optimus will have super - human precision and be able to perform very complex medical procedures, even surgeries that humans can't do.

Even more astonishing is that through the combination of Neuralink's brain - machine interface, people who have lost their legs can replace them with Optimus' legs. Neuralink captures signals from the motor cortex and sends them to Optimus' legs, with a cost of about $60,000.

This is not just about making a product; it's about reconstructing the supply of labor. From housework to surgeries, from companionship to medical care, all can be done by robots.

And Musk has the ability to keep the cost down to $20,000 and make it truly popular.

2. Chips are not just for technology demonstration; they're affordable "brains"

Musk repeatedly emphasized:

Most of our AI computing tasks and resources will be concentrated on video processing, not text.

What does this mean?

He's not training an AI to write papers; he's training an AI that can understand pictures and human actions. This means:

• The chips must be highly efficient
• They must be compressed quickly
• They can't rely on servers to operate but should be able to be installed in cars, robots, and even spaceships

So, he got personally involved in promoting the latest chip project called AI5.

Musk admitted at the conference:

"There are problems with this chip project. Its design is too advanced, and the progress is not going smoothly."

So he merged the AI 5 and Dojo projects, made everyone focus on AI 5, and got personally involved.

He said: I spent the whole weekend staring at the design drawings of this chip, looking at the data and the flow of current... Now I have a complete layout of the chip in my mind and can imagine every detail.

Because NVIDIA's chips are not optimized for low - power AI inference in robots and cars. The chips he wants to build must have extremely low power consumption, super - strong performance, and cost only one - tenth of NVIDIA's chips.

What does this mean? If successful, the cost of using AI will no longer be hundreds of thousands of dollars per month but only a few hundred dollars.

Musk is not competing in AI capabilities; he's reducing AI costs.

3. Starlink is not just about internet connection; it's an aerial computing power station

Most people only know that Starlink is Musk's satellite internet, but in this dialogue, he revealed a bolder plan:

We will use solar power to move the entire AI data center into space.

This is their real plan. What Musk wants to do is:

• Set up the data center in space orbit
• Power it with solar energy without the need to build a factory on the ground
• Use Starlink for transmission, distribute it globally, and form a distributed brain
• The goal is to provide 100 gigawatts of AI power per year

You know, the average power consumption in the United States is 160 gigawatts. This means that the space data center Musk wants to build will have a power equivalent to about 1/4 of the total power output in the United States.

Musk said: The electricity on Earth will only get more expensive. For AI to become popular, it has to go into space.

This solves the ultimate bottleneck for the popularization of AI: electricity.

Baron has heavily invested in these hard - to - understand parts because he knows that Musk doesn't just live on ideas; he makes things happen through production lines and his own efforts.

Section 4 | Why does Baron want to bet for another 10 years?

Baron said that he can make five times as much in the next 10 years. Many people think this is crazy talk. However, he firmly believes in it because the AI era has just begun.

1. The time window he sees: The AI infrastructure hasn't been built yet

Baron mentioned: Current AI companies are all working on the application layer.

What is the application layer? It's products like ChatGPT and Claude that users can see and access.

What Musk is doing is the infrastructure layer: his own chips, his own data centers, and his own computing power network, without relying on external suppliers. And this infrastructure serves physical terminals like cars and robots.

Applications will keep evolving, but the value of infrastructure will increase exponentially over time. Just like building a highway, its value isn't obvious at first, but when there are more cars, the toll booths will be like money - printing machines.

While others are optimizing existing products, he's reconstructing the entire operation mode of AI.

2. He sees that AI will become infrastructure, just like electricity

Musk's goal is clear: I want to make AI cheap enough for everyone to use.

Baron understood the