Elon Musk cannot keep Tesla pay package worth more than $55 billion, judge rules
apnews.com
A judge says Elon Musk must give up a compensation package awarded by Tesla’s board of directors that is potentially worth more than $55 billion.
  • ISOmorph@feddit.de
    781·
    10 months ago

    This whole thing is a perverted joke about our corrupted society. Billionaires drag each other to court over who gets to be even more of a billionaire while people working 2 jobs in that same fucking country can’t make rent.

    Redistribute those billions among the Tesla workers who actually did the work for fucks sake.

    • Avid Amoeba@lemmy.ca
      26·
      10 months ago

      Tesla workers should sign those UAW cards. That’s how begin to redistribute those billions.

    • Zippy@lemmy.world
      161·
      10 months ago

      The CEOs of the fortune 500 companies are some of the highest paid people when their full packages are included. But their wages and compensation packages pale in respect to what Musk is taking from Tesla. With that package, Musk could pay all the compensation packages and wages for every fortune 500 CEO. Not only could be pay the entire amount, he could do it for the next 15 years.

  • nekandroOP
    222·
    10 months ago

    Capitalism, but only if it doesn’t affect shareholder value if the CEO does too well. This was part of the contract signed with Musk ages ago.

    • Aurenkin@sh.itjust.works
      181·
      10 months ago

      It’s absurd that anyone could get that wealthy honestly and Musk is an asshole but he delivered exactly what he said he would under the compensation agreement. It seems pretty wild that you can agree to pay someone a certain amount provided they meet a target, then when they meet that target you take them to court and the court says you don’t have to pay them.

      That said, I think to say he’s already been fairly compensated is a ridiculous understatement and I don’t know much about the case. Sounds like something was up with the negotiations and I’m not going to shed too many tears over some billionaire being slightly less of a billionaire than they could have been.

      • Zippy@lemmy.world
        102·
        10 months ago

        Tesla has returned near zero to shareholders yet. I don’t think people understand this. Yes share value had increased but from an investment perspective, a company must return to investors in the form of dividends or share buybacks an amount equal to that of all capital raised plus some percentage to justify the risk and time invested. That has to happen at some point.

        That doesn’t mean the company does not provide something to society but from an overall investment perspective, Tesla has yet to return a dollar yet. All that has happened so far is that many people gave a great deal of money to Tesla then a bunch more people exchanged money back and forth.

      • Trudge [Comrade]@lemmygrad.ml
        7·
        10 months ago

        The shareholder’s lawyers argued that the compensation package should be voided because it was dictated by Musk and was the product of sham negotiations with directors who were not independent of him. They also said it was approved by shareholders who were given misleading and incomplete disclosures in a proxy statement.

        The compensation agreement itself is suspect as Musk himself had over 1/4 of the total voting share and other directors were controlled by him as well. As an example, a shareholder who holds 51% of the shares can’t just choose to legally print himself more of the stock at the expense of the 49% and that is what the lawsuit is alleging.

      • nekandroOP
        74·
        10 months ago

        I mean, I’m not disappointed that he’s not getting more rich, I’m disappointed that the courts can decide to rip up a contract solely because it benefits the wrong kind of shareholders.

  • AutoTL;DR@lemmings.worldBEnglish
    3·
    10 months ago

    This is the best summary I could come up with:

    (AP) — Elon Musk is not entitled to landmark compensation package awarded by Tesla’s board of directors that is potentially worth more than $55 billion, a Delaware judge ruled Tuesday.

    They were accused of breaching their duties to the maker of electric vehicles and solar panels, resulting in a waste of corporate assets and unjust enrichment for Musk.

    Defense attorneys countered that the pay plan was fairly negotiated by a compensation committee whose members were independent, contained performance milestones so lofty that they were ridiculed by some Wall Street investors, and blessed by a shareholder vote that was not even required under Delaware law.

    Musk, who as of Tuesday topped Forbes’ list of the world’s richest people, had earlier this month challenged Tesla’s board to come up with a new compensation plan for him that would give him a 25% stake in the company.

    Greg Varallo, a lead attorney for the shareholder plaintiff, praised McCormick’s decision to reverse the “absurdly outsized” Musk pay package.

    Chesler also said Tesla made sure that the $55 billion compensation figure was included in the proxy statement because the company wanted shareholders to know that “this was a heart-stopping number that Mr. Musk could earn.”

    The original article contains 967 words, the summary contains 200 words. Saved 79%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!