Ahead of EV giant Tesla’s annual shareholder meeting, the company board’s chair Robyn Denholm asked shareholders to vote in favour of CEO Elon Musk’s nearly $1 trillion pay package.
Per a report by CNBC on Monday, Denholm wrote this in a letter supporting Musk’s vision for the future of the EV maker as it shifts focus to full self-driving and Optimus, Tesla’s humanoid robot designed to perform general tasks.
Further, she acknowledged that Tesla would lose significant value without Musk.
Tesla will hold the meeting on November 6 to discuss key proposals, along with the shareholder vote for Musk’s pay package, which is closing at 11:59 pm (US) eastern time on November 5, the report added.
Tesla’s proposed $1 trillion pay for Musk came under fresh scrutiny on Friday, with proxy advisor Institutional Shareholder Services (ISS) urging stakeholders to reject what might be the largest-ever compensation awarded to a company chief.
Musk concluded Tesla’s earnings call on Thursday by urging investors to approve his pay package and criticising shareholder advisory firms that opposed the proposal.
“There needs to be enough voting control (of the shareholders) to give a strong influence, but not so much that I can’t be fired if I go insane,” Musk said, interrupting his chief financial officer as the more than hour-long call wrapped up.
The staggering compensation stands to make the richest man in the world even richer. The package will be effective if Tesla expands its market capitalisation from around $1.1 trillion to $8.5 trillion.
The targets also include delivering 20 million vehicles annually, having one million robotaxis in operation, and producing a million humanoid AI robots within 10 years. Musk must remain CEO for at least 7.5 years for the compensation to start vesting and 10 years for the full payout.
What can put the enormity of this pay package in context is that 91 per cent of all the nations in the world have a gross domestic product (GDP) less than $1 trillion.
