Elon Musk Says It's An 'Open Secret' That Apple Is Building An Electric Car

Is Apple Inc. AAPL planning on manufacturing and developing an electric car? Does the company's ambition in the new market include an acquisition of Tesla Motors Inc TSLA? These are some of the most pressing questions on investors minds. It is unclear if a clear answer will be provided in 2016. In the interim, investors will continue turning towards Wall Street analysts for their analysis. Gene Munster of Piper Jaffray recently told Benzinga that Apple could dish out $35 to $50 billion to acquire Tesla. The analyst added that this is "not a lot of money" to acquire Tesla and doing so "makes a lot of sense." Meanwhile, Tesla's CEO Elon Musk told the BBC that it is an "open secret" that Apple is working on an electric car. He also added that it was "obvious" Apple is gearing up to offer a compelling competing product of its own. "It's pretty hard to hide something if you hire over a thousand engineers to do it," Musk said.