Elon's Daddy issues may have pushed Musk into Trump's arms... but there's a showdown that threatens to destroy this budding 'bromance'

Even to the richest man in the world, $130 million is a tidy sum of money.

But there's no doubt Elon Musk thought his huge financial support for Donald Trump was a price worth paying when the Republicans swept to victory on November 5.

The owner of Tesla, Space-X and X, now has a seat close to the very heart of power, not to mention a budding 'bromance' with the president-elect.

Aside from his role in cutting federal government spending as the co-leader of Trump's new Department of Government Efficiency, Musk seems ideally placed to influence decisions in his favor, whether on electric vehicles or the future of cryptocurrency, in which he is a major investor.

Yet the ease – not to mention the child-like pleasure – with which Musk has assumed his place as a member of the inner Trump clan has surprised even hardened political observers.

On Saturday, Musk sat ringside with Trump and singer Kid Rock at an Ultimate Fighting Championship event in New York City's Madison Square Garden.

Later that evening, they chowed down side-by-side on Trump's private plane as the pair tucked into a feast of McDonald's burgers and fries along with Health and Human Service nominee Robert F Kennedy and Donald Trump Jr.

On Election Night, Musk seemed to take the place of Trump's wife, Melania, in a picture shared by Trump's 17-year-old granddaughter, Kai.

Kai captioned the pic 'whole squad', prompting one commentator to describe the billionaire as Trump's 'new First Lady,' which sparked a series of jokes online. One photoshopped image superimposed Musk's face onto the body of Melania, wearing a pink pantsuit. It was captioned 'First Lady Elonia Musk'.

But of all the honors, titles and mockery that Musk might have expected to accrue by way of his friendship with Trump, 'uncle' was the least expected.

Last week, Kai, christened him a member of the family. 'Elon achieving uncle status,' she wrote. That marked an eye-opening switch from what most had assumed was a purely transactional relationship into something rather different.

Whatever else the richest man in the world might have amassed – including a fortune calculated at more than $314 billion – he's never had much in the way of a stable family life.

There's no love lost between Musk and his father, 78-year-old Errol, for example. Theirs was a tortured relationship.

In 2017, Musk told Rolling Stone magazine that Errol was a 'terrible human being' who had a 'carefully thought-out plan of evil.'

'Almost every crime you can possibly think of, he has done,' claims Musk. Errol denies many of his son's allegations.

Musk also gave a flavor of things to his biographer Walter Isaacson, recalling how, after he returned from the hospital having been beaten up by a school bully, his father expressed anger, not sympathy.

'I had to stand for an hour as he yelled at me and called me an idiot and told me I was just worthless,' Musk said.

Despite a few attempts at reconciliation, their relationship has remained extremely poor – and got still worse when, in 2017, Errol impregnated Musk's stepsister Jana, 42 years his junior, who he had raised since she was four.

Musk suggests that his desire to fix the relationship with his father has remained constant. But the pair no longer even speak.

'I've tried everything,' he told Rolling Stone, 'I tried threats, rewards, intellectual arguments, emotional arguments, everything to try to change my father for the better.'

According to the Rolling Stone reporter who penned the 2017 profile, despite Musk's cemented status as a nearly unrivaled visionary and titan of industry, he remained a 'child who is afraid of abandonment.'

Other key relationships in Musk's life are in chaos, too.

He may not, after all, be an easy man to live with.

Musk biographer Isaacson writes that Musk laid down his house rules with brutal clarity at his first wedding to Justine Wilson in 2000. During their first dance, he whispered in her ear: 'I am the alpha in this relationship'.

He is also locked in an ongoing custody battle with the mother of his youngest three children, the musician, Claire Boucher, also known as Grimes. They have filed rival suits in California and Texas, with Boucher accusing Musk of stopping her from seeing their children.

And Musk's relationship with at least one of his older children is strained – badly.

Second child, 20-year-old Vivian Jenna Wilson has railed against her father online, branding him absent and a 'grubby little control freak'. Vivian, a transgender woman, recently claimed she will leave the United States after Trump's election.

Musk has been equally colorful in response, saying in an interview with psychologist and author Jordan Peterson in July that Vivian had been killed by the 'woke mind virus' when she transitioned from male to female and that he had 'lost' his son.

Indeed, for Musk, familial strife has been a constant theme.

In contrast with his gregarious siblings, he says it was hard to make friends as a child and says that he was repeatedly beaten up for being different. The isolation seems poignant in the light of his admission to Rolling Stone that, 'When I was a child, there's one thing I said. 'I never want to be alone.' That's what I would say: 'I don't want to be alone.'

For now, at least, it seems Musk has no shortage of congenial company. He has found a surrogate family in awe of his remarkable achievements and vast ambitions. But for quite how long will this billionaire love-in last?

The history of Trump's friendships and political appointments is marred by spectacular fallings out. And there's no obvious reason why Musk – a fellow silverback – should be immune.

Reports of Musk overstaying his welcome in Palm Beach are already trickling out with Trump staffers reportedly branding him the 'guest who wouldn't leave'.

According to one person in the room when the president-elect addressed House Republicans in Washington DC last week, he joked that: 'Elon won't go home... I can't get rid of him. Until I don't like him.'

And there's another question looming over Musk's relationship with his new father figure: What happens if daddy threatens Elon's baby… Tesla.

The carmaker's largest factory, dubbed a 'gigafactory' by Musk, is in Shanghai. It produces nearly one million vehicles a year. In May, Telsa also broke ground on a $200 million battery pack factory, which is scheduled to go online by April 2025.

Yet, a central plank of Trump's foreign policy plan is a trade war against China – which threatens to throw Musk's business interests for a loop.

'Trump and Musk could fall out because Musk ends up opposing tough economic policies on China,' said Neil Thomas, a fellow at the Asia Society Policy Institute.

Despite all those 'family' photographs and chummy rides on golf carts, the richest, most famous, most innovative businessman in the world may not be ready for a new relationship, after all.