Owning a large stake in Tesla made the company’s president Elon Musk (Elon Musk) the richest person in the world, and some media even mistakenly call him the founder of this electric car manufacturer. This week, a US court nullified Musk’s right to receive $56 billion in compensation for his work as Tesla’s CEO, and the company’s shares fell 3% after the close.

The corresponding compensation package in the form of company shares was transferred to him in 2018, setting a record in terms of its size among all public companies. The decision regarding the cancellation of this agreement between Tesla’s board of directors and Elon Musk was announced this week by the Delaware state court, which evaluated the lawsuit filed by Richard Tornetta, one of Tesla’s shareholders, who had previously expressed his disagreement about the compensation amount of Elon Musk. work in this position. The parties to the dispute have not yet determined the conditions under which Musk will have to return the shares and funds he previously received as payment for his work as Tesla’s CEO. The defendant reserves the right to appeal this decision to a higher court.

According to the court’s findings, what enabled Elon Musk to become the richest man in the world was the $ 56 billion compensation package. According to the current plan, starting from 2018, Musk would be able to buy Tesla shares in 12-pack portions if the company’s financial indicators reached certain target values. Selling shares above market at current prices allowed Musk to make large amounts of money. According to the court, Tesla’s president managed to set the real indicators to the required value, and therefore the resulting enrichment is unfair. According to the plaintiff, the board followed suit by giving Musk a generous compensation package. The board of directors included people with strong ties to Musk, and therefore the compensation decision was made with a bias in favor of the billionaire. According to representatives of American justice authorities, neither Tesla’s board of directors nor its compensation committee acted in favor of the company and its shareholders at that stage. There is no clear evidence that negotiations even took place on this issue.

When preparing the material for publication, Elon Musk limited himself only to an appeal from the pages of the social network X “never register a company in a Delaware jurisdiction “. He also launched a poll calling for Tesla to re-register in Texas, where it is headquartered, after moving from California. Incidentally, this move was made by Elon Musk not only due to a dispute with California authorities over the quarantine of the company’s local factory in the first weeks of the 2020 pandemic , was also launched to save taxes.

Elon Musk owned 21.9% of Tesla shares in 2018, currently his share has decreased to 13%, but recently he started to spread the idea that this rate should be increased to 25% to ensure more efficient management. work. In such positions, he could remain quite influential, but at the same time, as the head of the company himself explained, shareholders would have the opportunity, if necessary, to block his most controversial decisions.