"It is an indication that the market is concerned about large downside risk," said DeSimone. One-month skew shot up as high as 18.5 percent in late August and has largely remained elevated since then. The only other time the measure was higher was in March, following a credit downgrade of the electric car maker by Moody's Investors Service. The recent departure of two high-level executives, media reports of a U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission probe into Musk's tweets and the CEO being filmed smoking marijuana and wielding a sword on a webcast have weighed on Tesla's share price. Tesla stock is down about 25 percent from the multi-month high of $387.46 reached on Aug 7. On Wednesday, the shares were up 3.2 percent. Investors' skepticism about the fate of the shares is evident in the accumulation of large number of put contracts at the $50 strike price, expiring in September and mid-January.