Key Tesla Investor Says It Will Be Voting In opposition to Making Elon Musk a Trillionaire

Elon Musk is hoping to make himself the world’s first trillionaire with an obscene Tesla pay package that might—over the course of a number of years—make him exponentially richer, even supposing he’s already the richest individual on the planet.

Nevertheless, for Musk to get the cash, Tesla’s buyers should approve it on the firm’s annual shareholder assembly on November sixth in Giga, Texas. A minimum of one distinguished investor has made it identified that they plan to vote in opposition to Musk’s ridiculous pay package deal. That investor is CalPERS, California’s pension system, which made it identified this week that it thought giving a trillion {dollars} to Musk—a man who says he needs to go to Mars and who, not too lengthy, obtained on a stage and waved a chainsaw around—was in all probability a nasty thought.

On Thursday, a CalPERS spokesperson told Bloomberg that the group didn’t assist the absurdly massive payout for Musk. “The CEO pay package deal proposed by Tesla is bigger than pay packages for CEOs in comparable firms by many orders of magnitude. It could additionally additional focus energy in a single shareholder,” the spokesperson instructed the outlet in an announcement.

It’s price noting that this isn’t the primary time CalPERS has voted in opposition to a Musk pay package deal. Final yr, the pension voted in opposition to Musk’s $46 billion pay package deal—what was thought-about by many, on the time, to be fully and completely obscene. “This exorbitant compensation package deal is at odds with CalPERS’ longstanding views on govt pay,” stated CalPERS CEO Marcie Frost, at the time. “The compensation is extreme when in comparison with executives at peer firms, extremely dilutive to shareholders, and isn’t tied to the long-term profitability of Tesla.” That pay package deal, which was initially permitted in 2018 however has been held up by authorized challenges since then, was finally re-approved by shareholders final yr, however a Delaware decide has also rejected that decision. Musk is presently appealing the decision.

At this level, Musk’s general possibilities of getting the brand new gigantic pay package deal are unclear. Reuters notes that Tesla’s board has been pushing for buyers to vote for it, with Chair Robyn Denholm warning them that “Musk might go away if the deal is rejected.” (At this level, on condition that it’s widely believed that Musk is without doubt one of the single largest causes that Tesla’s world gross sales are cratering, perhaps that wouldn’t be the worst factor on the planet for the corporate?) Different pension leaders and unions have criticized the pay package and, on Tuesday, Bloomberg reported that Tesla was inside candidates to exchange Musk, ought to the pay package deal not undergo and he resolve to bail on them. Gizmodo reached out to CalPERS and Tesla for remark.

The pay package deal battles are humorous for the way fully and completely pointless they’re. Elon is already the richest individual on the planet—in actual fact, he’s one of many richest folks within the historical past of the world. So why does he want so rather more? Tim Prepare dinner, the CEO of Apple (arguably a way more essential firm than Tesla), solely took house a measly $76 million final yr. Why can’t Elon simply settle for the same pay package deal—you understand, one thing within the neighborhood of $100 million? Within the present setting of oligarchic ascendance, no one would bat an eyelash at that form of factor. As an alternative, he insists on comically gargantuan quantities of cash. The sort of gargantuan sum that might buy elections for generations to come.

That stated, monetary perspective has by no means been Elon’s robust go well with. It is a man who spent almost $300 million in the course of the 2024 presidential marketing campaign, solely to flame out with the administration after six months and accuse Donald Trump of being within the Jeffrey Epstein information. I suppose when you could have an excessive amount of cash it’s simple to lose sight of what a greenback is absolutely price—or how a lot you really want.