$1,000,000,000,000: Tesla's unprecedented offer to Elon Musk to keep him as lead for years to come

Tesla Inc. proposed a new compensation agreement for Chief Executive Officer Elon Musk potentially worth around $1 trillion, a massive package without precedent in corporate America.

File photo of Elon Musk at a news conference with President Donald Trump in the Oval Office of the White House(AP)

The long-awaited proposal, designed to incentivize Musk to lead Tesla for years to come, sets a series of ambitious benchmarks he must meet to earn the full payout, including expanding Tesla’s robotaxi business and growing the company’s market value to at least $8.5 trillion from around $1 trillion today. The plan spans 10 years.

The additional shares Musk could receive would push his stake in the electric-vehicle maker to at least 25%, according to the terms detailed in Tesla’s proxy filing Friday. Musk has publicly stated he wants a stake of that size.

The plan dangles a financial windfall and expanded control of the company to Musk, already the world’s richest person, after his 2018 package valued in excess of $50 billion was struck down by a Delaware court. While Tesla appeals that decision, the board is seeking other ways to compensate its CEO, including with an interim stock award in early August valued at about $30 billion.

The incentives in the new plan aim to keep Musk’s focus on Tesla while it pursues growth in newer markets including robotics and artificial intelligence. Friday’s filing also included a non-binding shareholder proposal for Tesla to take a stake in Musk’s xAI startup, an idea Musk has previously discussed.

The new agreement underscores Musk’s iron grip on the automaker, despite the myriad demands on his time. Musk, who has served as Tesla’s top executive since 2008, oversees four other companies: SpaceX, xAI, Neuralink and the Boring Co. He told Bloomberg in an interview in May that he’s committed to still being at the helm of Tesla in five years.

Tesla shares rose 2% as of 6:30 a.m. Friday in New York. The stock has fallen 16% this year.

A market capitalization of $8.5 trillion would be more than double that of Nvidia Corp., currently the world’s most valuable company. Tesla’s value peaked in late 2024 at about $1.5 trillion.

The value of the latest CEO award, at $87.8 billion in the filing, would swell to about $1 trillion if Musk hits all the performance targets and gets to collect all the restricted shares. The proxy also outlines that Musk must participate in the board’s development of a framework for long-term CEO succession in order to earn either of the last two tranches of the performance award.

“Simply put, retaining and incentivizing Elon is fundamental to Tesla achieving these goals and becoming the most valuable company in history,” Tesla said in a shareholder letter signed by Chair Robyn Denholm and director Kathleen Wilson-Thompson.

Competing Priorities

Musk, 54, has previously urged the board to arrange a new compensation package for him, suggesting he would pursue artificial intelligence and robotics products elsewhere if he didn’t have roughly 25% voting control at Tesla. While Musk remains Tesla’s largest shareholder, he sold a significant portion of his stock to fund his acquisition of Twitter. The social-media platform, which he renamed X, was acquired by Musk’s xAI earlier this year.

Tesla’s board is sticking with Musk despite his competing priorities. Besides overseeing other companies, his attention has increasingly turned to politics. He was President Donald Trump’s biggest financial backer in last year’s election and briefly led efforts to remake the federal government. This sparked a backlash against Tesla that included sporadic cases of arson and vandalism at stores and charging stations.

The blowback contributed to a volatile first half, with Tesla reporting two of its worst quarters in years and a 13% decline in worldwide vehicle deliveries.

Late May marked Musk’s last official day as a special government employee, and he committed to spending more time at Tesla. Only days later, he and Trump had a bitter falling-out.

Tesla regained some momentum the last few months, rolling out its long-promised driverless-taxi service that Musk sees as an important part of its future business. The company launched June 22 with a handful of robotaxis in Austin.

--With assistance from Kara Carlson, Catherine Larkin and Anders Melin.

(Updates with share trading, chair comment, additional details beginning in seventh paragraph.)

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