Tesla Shareholders Approve Elon Musk’s $1 Trillion Pay Package

The internet can’t stop speculating: what would Elon Musk do with a trillion dollars? Tesla just handed him a deal so massive that, over the next ten years, he could become the very first trillionaire. It’s the kind of headline that makes you pause and wonder—what even can’t he buy? Tesla’s shareholders have officially signed off on a pay package worth up to a trillion dollars. If Musk hits every goal tied to it, it would go down as the biggest payout ever made in corporate history.

Some big investors reportedly tried to push back, but the majority of Tesla’s shareholders made their stance clear, as they still trust Musk to lead the company into its next phase, one driven by AI and robotics. When the results were announced in Austin, more than three-quarters had voted in his favour, and the crowd erupted with chants of “Elon”. That huge payday won’t come easy. Musk has to hit some sky-high goals, like pushing Tesla’s market value up to around $8.5 trillion, more than eight times what it’s worth now. The plan also counts on building 20 million cars, plus rolling out a million robotaxis and another million AI-powered bots.

The pay deal is broken into 12 stages, each tied to milestones that would push Tesla toward that massive valuation. If Musk manages to hit them all, he’d unlock the right to claim another 12% of Tesla’s stock. But it’s not a quick win, as he has to stay on board for at least seven and a half years and help map out a long-term succession plan for the company he’s been leading for over two decades.

Tesla didn’t just sit back and wait for shareholders to decide on Elon Musk’s huge pay deal. For two months, the company’s board and top executives were out there, pushing hard for approval. They even took the unusual step of running TV ads to convince people to vote yes, a move Tesla usually doesn’t make, even for selling their cars. Still, the vote passed despite pushback from some powerful investors, including Norway’s massive sovereign wealth fund. Tesla’s board had warned that Musk might walk away if the deal didn’t go through. Still, plenty of critics, from shareholders to advisers and activists, argued the package was over the top, especially given how much of Musk’s attention has been tied up with his other ventures lately, some of which they say have damaged Tesla’s image.

The timing of the payout is also tricky for Tesla. Profits are down, and the company’s been dealing with a wave of challenges, some of them tied to the public’s growing frustration over Musk’s earlier links to the Trump administration. A Yale University study even suggested that his political moves may have cost Tesla more than a million car sales. The clock starts ticking for Musk now — can he push Tesla far enough to make that trillion-dollar dream come true, or is it a goal too big even for him?