What's Next for Elon Musk After Judge Voids Tesla Pay Package

Elon Musk suffered a major loss in a Delaware court this week when a judge voided his $55 billion compensation package from Tesla. Uh, Judge Kathaleen McCormick, uh, called the compensation, quote, "An unfathomable sum," and it was unfair to shareholders and the process leading to its 2018 approval was deeply flawed. When you read through the documents, it really, (laughs) it was such a back-scratchy situation among the board members, who are all friends of his. Um, apparently one of them cried how, how much he loved Elon o- on it, which was kind of disturbing. Uh, Elon responded to the ruling on X, posting, "Never incorporate your company in the state of Delaware." Too late, Elon. And also, you should have had, uh, stock that ha- puts you in contro- control of the, uh, dual-class shareholders, which you didn't do either. Um, so too bad. You know, that w- if you had a time machine. Um, were you surprised by the ruling, first of all? The judge, let me, gives you more facts. The judge ordered Tesla to cancel the stock options award to Elon valued at about 51 billion, which is where most of his compensation is. Tesla's directors now have to figure out a new compensation plan that passes legal muster and keeps Elon happy and does it at an arm's length, which is, good luck with that, 'cause this board has shown itself to be a giant rubber stamp for Elon Musk. Um, we haven't heard if he's gonna appeal, but after a poll on X, he's now saying Tesla will hold a shareholder vote to incorporate in Texas. Um, h- uh, anyway, what does the ruling mean for Elon's quest to get that 25%?

I've never, I've never heard of this happening or seen it happen. The fact that I've been on compensation committees of boards, I've never had a shareholder lawsuit against the compensation, the schematic you put in place. But to have a shareholder lawsuit, I've heard of them. Like Martin Sorrell had, uh, shareholder lawsuits constantly around his-

Yeah.

... compensation.

Mm-hmm.

But to have it rejected... I mean, effectively, the shareholders decide who the board is.

Mm-hmm.

And so if the shareholders, uh, decide who the board is, who decides the compensation, then technically the owners of the company have decided, you know, what, what he or she gets. I'm not a... I don't believe you should limit compensation. I think we live in a capitalist society, and I don't like the idea. I, I do believe that we should have a more progressive tax structure. But anyways, that's another talk show. But this effectively says that this board is so incompetent and so conflicted that any decisions they make might not hold up in court because of the conflicts here. Even if you read the ruling, it, it, they talk about the size of it, but what they talk about is the conflicts and just how, uh, poor the rationalization was for giving him this. 'Cause as much as the compensation was, I mean, just to, just to be fair and try, try and call balls and strikes, him getting incr- an incremental 50 billion if he increases the sh- value of the company 500 billion, that's, that's not... I've seen compensation, uh, plans that on, you know, I mean, it's exceptional, but on a proportionate size or percentage of value increase, it wasn't outrageous. What this says is, you know what's gonna end up happening here? Uh, h- he's not gonna be able, uh, to reincorporate all this, all these threats, all these jazz hands, all this fake-