The Tesla followers posted. And over the previous few months, Elon Musk engaged.
Each time he did, Tesla’s authorized group needed to get to work, writing and submitting regulatory filings to the Securities and Trade Fee (SEC). It’s all a part of an effort to say that, this time, when the shareholders vote to approve his monster $56 billion compensation bundle, they had been totally knowledgeable.
The Delaware decide who rescinded the 2018 pay bundle in January did so partly as a result of shareholders weren’t totally knowledgeable on the stockholder vote resulting from inaccurate proxy statements. So within the run-up to this vote — which will likely be finalized at Thursday’s annual shareholder assembly — Tesla has clearly needed to cowl as many bases as doable by over-sharing something Musk posted about or engaged with.
Right here they’re transcribing a five-minute video from TeslaBoomerMama video that Musk shared on X, the place she pleaded with shareholders to vote “yes.”
Right here they’re submitting a video Musk shared of Andrew Ross Sorkin in Davos from 2018 supporting the unique compensation plan, which was posted by an account the Anti-Defamation League says promotes QAnon.
Right here they’re posting a screenshot of a put up of help from Musk’s former divorce lawyer, and Tesla’s former normal counsel, Todd Maron.
Right here they’re, within the closing week earlier than the vote, piling dozens of screenshots of posts Musk interacted with into one very lengthy submitting.
None of those filings are signed, so it’s not clear who has been doing all this work. Musk has a bone-deep behavior of behaving in a approach that creates billable hours, so a few of that is to be anticipated. However this push to “re-ratify” his compensation bundle has had Tesla’s regulatory group busier than possibly ever.
By way of simply uncooked filings, Tesla has submitted extra to the SEC within the final three months than it has at any level within the final 5 years:
Strip out all of the filings associated to executives and institutional buyers shopping for and promoting shares, in addition to all letters to and from the SEC, and Tesla has been submitting extra filings than in any time since earlier than the “funding secured” mess in 2018:
That is all set towards the backdrop of an unrelenting get-out-the-vote effort from Tesla’s largest followers over the previous few months. They’ve posted numerous calls-to-action, have coordinated by way of direct messages on Musk’s X platform to assist shareholders work out how you can vote and extra.
Tesla and its workers have joined in, too. The corporate posted pictures of its Optimus robotic prototype filling out a vote card. It printed a rosy timeline of the corporate’s accomplishments for the reason that plan was initially voted on in 2018. It even spun up a whole web site devoted to selling the shareholder assembly, together with a video from Tesla chair Robyn Denholm — who, till this current push, not often made public appearances on behalf of the corporate.
Lots of its prime executives voiced help, together with some who’ve not often used X. Tesla VP of Provide Chain Karn Budhiraj, who has solely ever posted a few dozen occasions on X, wrote, “Elon is the driving force at Tesla and is critical for the future of the company.”
Tom Zhu, who was lately moved again to China amid Tesla’s bigger restructuring, wrote that the corporate has a “vast vision beneath the surface that requires Elon’s wisdom, courage, and decisiveness to achieve.” Grace Tao, a high-ranking worker who leads communications in China and reportedly manages Tesla’s relationship with the federal government there, additionally posted (on Weibo) about Musk’s “wisdom, courage, and determination.”
Vanishingly few of the corporate’s workers or its supporters truly touched on the substance of the decide’s opinion that bought us right here: that Musk’s simple sway over Tesla and its board meant the method main as much as the pay bundle was inherently unfair.
However the effort has nonetheless helped Tesla’s shareholders reinforce the narrative across the firm (and its inventory) that Tesla is nothing with out Musk, and that he deserves the compensation bundle he testified he basically negotiated with himself. Because the struggle over Musk’s pay bundle and the re-incorporation to Texas is probably going headed for months of authorized challenges, that is likely to be victory sufficient for now.
In actual fact, they’re already celebrating because the votes are being tallied.
