World’s largest wealth fund will reject Musk’s $56B Tesla pay package

The world’s largest wealth fund said Saturday it will vote “no” to Elon Musk’s $56 billion pay award at Tesla.

Norway’s $1.7 trillion sovereign wealth fund — the eighth-largest shareholder in Tesla with a .98% stake worth $7.7 billion — took issue with the size of Musk’s compensation, which marks the largest pay package in corporate America.

“While we appreciate the significant value generated under Mr. Musk’s leadership since the grant date in 2018, we remain concerned about the total size of the award, the structure given performance triggers, dilution, and lack of mitigation of key person risk,” Norges Bank Investment Management, the operator of the fund, said on its website.

Tesla’s shareholders will vote on the CEO’s award at the the electric vehicle maker’s annual meeting on Thursday, which would require them to ratify the pay package a judge previously voided and to reincorporate Tesla in Texas, its home state, according to Reuters.

Ruling on a lawsuit brought by a shareholder to strike down the package in January, a Delaware judge called Musk’s salary, which had been approved in 2018, an “unfathomable sum” and said it could be voided.

Last July, Tesla’s directors agreed to return $735 million to the company to settle shareholder allegations of overpayment brought in a separate lawsuit filed in 2020.