The Tesla boss and richest man in the world Elon Musk is now entitled to a compensation package worth almost $150 billion. This was decided by an appeals court in the US state of Delaware, overturning the verdict of a lower court that had upheld a shareholder lawsuit in the first instance.
In 2018, Tesla shareholders gave Musk the right to purchase the share package as compensation in twelve steps if the electric car manufacturer meets ambitious goals over a period of up to ten years. Tesla hit the targets much faster. The package was worth more than $50 billion at the time.
However, at the beginning of 2024, a court ruled that the allocation of the package was not legal. The judge responsible described the compensation as “incomprehensible”. Musk also had too much influence in the background in negotiations with the board of directors of the electric car manufacturer – and this was kept secret from the shareholders, the verdict said. Musk then appealed.
Another package is still pending
In November, the Tesla boss was independently awarded another compensation package by the shareholders that dwarfed the previous one. It has a value of up to a trillion dollars and could consist of up to 423.74 million Tesla shares. However, Musk has to achieve a few goals to achieve this: Tesla must be worth at least $8.5 trillion on the stock market in ten years. In addition, Musk must remain in the executive suite throughout the decade, and Tesla must have a million robotaxis in operation and deliver a million AI robots.
According to estimates by the financial service Bloomberg, Musk already has a fortune of more than 640 billion dollarswhich mainly consists of shares in Tesla and the space company SpaceX he leads.
