[This was supposed to be a quick note, and it is short, but Figures 2 to 4 took an exorbitant amount of research to produce. They show just how dangerous Tesla’s robotaxi fleet in Texas is compared to both its new rivals in Texas and even human drivers. If you’re not in the mood to read much of this on a Friday, do at least take a look at the tables in this report.]The Texas Department of Motor Vehicles has officially rubber-stamped Elon Musk’s "FSD self-certification" model, granting permits for just 42 Tesla robotaxis under the state’s new, stricter automated vehicle regulations. While the Cult of Musk was rejoicing, the meager fleet size—only 7.2% of Waymo’s Texas presence—suggests this is more about maintaining its veil of self-driving prowess than actually launching a real driverless ride-hailing service.If Musk were truly confident of Tesla’s FSD being over 7x safer than human drivers, why did he only apply for 42 permits? Waymo obtained 577 permits, Zoox got 35, and May Mobility got 18 AV permits to operate in Texas. In my May 13th magnum opus on why Musk is under pressure to tone down his robotaxi ambitions (“Why Musk is Walking Back Tesla’s Robotaxi Roll Out”, here), I wrote that Musk would need to self-certify FSD as capable of Level 4 autonomous driving or stop all “unsupervised” robotaxi rides in Texas altogether. In light of the Texas DMV granting Tesla permits to operate 42 Tesla robotaxis in the state yesterday, it appears that Musk produced documents for the Texas DMV that say Tesla’s FSD is indeed a “Level 4 automated driving system”. There are reams of data in my May 13th report (here) showing just how dangerous Tesla’s FSD is, and Figures 2 and 3 below provide further evidence, compared to Waymo, Zoox, and May Mobility’s track records, on how far Tesla is from achieving Level 4 autonomy. While the Tesla fanboys on Twitter were ecstatic over this news (and subjected me to significant vitriol for having been skeptical), it didn’t impact Tesla’s share price: The Texas permit news came out around an hour before Tesla closed yesterday’s session up by only 0.40%, and it declined by around 0.30% in after-hours trading. It seems that the big Reuters scoop about Tesla’s AI trainers not trusting FSD weighed more on the stock (see Video 1 for a short summary of Reuters’ excellent scoop, with the full article here). Video 1: Reuters’ Scoop on Tesla’s AI Trainers Not Trusting FSDSource: Reuters. Great Part of Reuters’ Scoop on Tesla AI Trainers Not Trusting FSD: Inside Tesla, as these events approached, staffers worked long hours mapping routes and training the software on specific hazards to make the company’s self-driving technology appear more capable than it really is, four of the former Tesla employees told Reuters. The staffers said these labor-intensive safeguards are impossible to deploy on a broad scale.The significant points about Tesla obtaining permits to operate 42 of its “robotaxis” in Texas are as follows: Tesla barely runs its “unsupervised robotaxis”: Figure 1 below shows just how laughable Tesla’s confidence level is about the safety of its “robotaxis”. Musk promised robotaxis for “half the US population by the end of the year” in July 2025, yet Tesla is doing roughly 2 driverless rides per day in just 3 cities in Texas. On average, Waymo does 735x more rides per day, while Uber does 33,333x more daily rides than Tesla’s “robotaxis” in the 3 main cities of Texas. Figure 1: Proof of Why Tesla Isn’t Serious About “Robotaxis” Yet Source: Tesla estimates of “unsupervised” robotaxi rides are based on data from the Robotaxi Tracker website; Waymo estimates are based on February 2026 expansion disclosures and NHTSA incident reporting frequency; Uber figures estimated via municipal TNC trip data and market share extrapolations.