7 ms·

Elon's award is tied to growing Tesla's market cap - it's pretty transparent that he's just trying to ball-of-mud together everything he can to hit that target

by munk-a 4mo ago

Elon's award is tied to growing Tesla's market cap - it's pretty transparent that he's just trying to ball-of-mud together everything he can to hit that target and grab the bag.

andruby 4mo ago
What would it mean if SpaceX buys Tesla though? Does the combined market cap count? That would be wrong. Tesla buying SpaceX just for hist bonus and then rebranding to X would be classic Musk. It's a game for him, but so ridiculous. While Tesla was pushing electrification and SpaceX pushing rapid rocket re-use I kind of tolerated Elon's antics, but since he got involved in politics and DOGE I can't bear it anymore.
- lesuorac 4mo ago
  > Does the combined market cap count? That would be wrong. It counts and it's not wrong. Sure, the Tesla award takes into account any M&A but growing a 2T company to 3T is a 50% increase. While growing a 1T company to 2T is a 100% increase so it's expected to be easier for him to hit his award targets with the companies merged as opposed to not merged.
  - andruby 4mo ago
    I understand Tesla acquiring other companies counting to the cap, but Tesla _being acquired_ by another company, why would that count?
    - lesuorac 4mo ago
      Because that's the grand plan from the start. You don't put a sentence like "In other words, upon a change in control where Tesla is acquired, vesting of milestones under the CEO Performance Award does not require the achievement of a matching Operational Milestone." if you didn't think Tesla could be acquired. The goal is to give Elon his 2012 award package but making it his 2018 one.
  - xmprt 4mo ago
    If we combine the market cap of the entire S&P500 we get close to 70T. That doesn't mean any of those individual companies are any more valuable or any of the investors are any richer. It makes no sense that Tesla shareholders would be ok with paying out a performance bonus just for M&A that doesn't grow the value of Tesla and would just dilute their shares.
    - s1artibartfast 4mo ago
      Most are tied to operational milestones as well if I understand correctly
      - lesuorac 4mo ago
        As pointed out by somebody else [1]; Operational Milestones are waived if SpaceX buys Telsa. [1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=antasvara https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=antasvara
        s1artibartfast 4mo ago
        Thats not what it says. My understanding is SpaceX milestones stay intact. For Tesla ops milestones they would be waived, this is fine because accusition is a chance for Tesla shareholders to cash out at that price.
        lesuorac 4mo ago
        We're talking about his Tesla grant so SpaceX's grant is irrelevant. The text written in the link you did not read, states "Notwithstanding Sections I, II and III above, in the event of a Change in Control, the Operational Milestones shall be disregarded".
        s1artibartfast 4mo ago
        The link supports wxactly what I wrote. Not sure where your confusion is.
  - paulddraper 4mo ago
    It the shareholders' value that counts. And that doesn't get any more by 50% increase with the same dilution.
    - adgjlsfhk1 4mo ago
      the problem is Tesla's board is controlled by musk
- antasvara 4mo ago
  >What would it mean if SpaceX buys Tesla though? Does the combined market cap count? That would be wrong. I took a look at the proxy statement as they have it outlined in this [0] document (Proposal 4). As currently formulated, Musk has 12 operational goals (like ship 1 million robots or hit 50 billion EBITDA) and 12 market cap goals. These need to be paired together for the shares to vest; so, if he reaches the first market cap number, he also needs to fulfill an operating goal for the first set of shares to be earned. These earned shares vest in ~5 years. This comes with a huge caveat. If Tesla changes control, those operational goals go out the window and his stock award is based solely on market cap (along with the shares immediately vesting). The share price for this is the greater of: 1. The last traded Tesla price prior to the acquisition, or 2. The per share price outlined in the acquisition. The "easiest" way to take advantage is to IPO SpaceX (which he did), pump up the market cap, acquire Tesla for a sizable premium, and vest as much of the stock award as you can. It means you get to avoid the operational goals entirely and vest a bunch of Tesla (but soon to be SpaceX) stock. [0]: https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1318605/000110465925087598/tm252289-4_pre14a.htm#tKTPC https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1318605/000110465925...
  - NuclearPM 4mo ago
    Conflict of interest laws don’t apply to fascists.
    - brigandish 4mo ago
      Fascists don't support free speech. Please, learn what that word means[0] and then use it responsibly. We're already seeing the effects of misusing and overusing several other important words for political/societal discourse, and this is one of them. It's entirely unhelpful and lowers the quality of conversation here. [0] The Doctrine of Fascism is available, for free, in several places. Start there.
      - bakies 4mo ago
        Elon fits the definition in Britannica pretty neatly
- mcintyre1994 4mo ago
  I feel like it has to eventually become X. Just because he’d find it funny for the stupidest people in the world to post about how he’s turned Twitter into a $2t or whatever company.
itslennysfault 4mo ago
I agree with this, but it seems so crazy to me. How can money be a motivator when you're that rich. I'm not even "rich" but I'm already at a point where money is far from my #1 motivator. I LOVE puppies, but if I had a trillion of them the last thing I'd want is another puppy.
- carlosjobim 4mo ago
  You cannot get that rich without money being the motivator.
  - digitaltrees 4mo ago
    Yes you can. Money is a medium of exchange. Stock is a medium of exchange. But they buy the ability to effectuate your will in the world. If you have a vision of the world money, human capital, political power are not the measure of success or the goal. They are the instruments of executing a vision. Some people aren't motivated by money, they are motivated by reputation, or pathology.
    - deleted 4mo ago
      [deleted]
- davidguetta 4mo ago
  Assuming best intentions, making a colony on mars is gonna require money
  - Jtarii 4mo ago
    Not even Elon is delusional enough to truly believe a mars colony is a remote possibility.
    - amoss 4mo ago
      I don't think you can describe his beliefs using booleans like that: you have to use a numeric scale. It would be be correct to say: Elon would need a hell of a lot of ketamine to believe a colony on mars is a possibility.
testing22321 4mo ago
His award is also tied to numbers of vehicles and robots sold. So just increasing market cap won’t do it alone. Even if he merged them, they still have to produce WAY more than they are now.
digitaltrees 4mo ago
No. He is making it an AI company. The prospectus makes that clear. Everything is in service of training and deploying AI. Twitter is data, distribution and marketing, space x is distribution with data centers and internet in space. Cursor is training data and hostile distillation.
- munk-a 4mo ago
  NewBird AI is an AI company which had an extremely irrational stock price bump because it's all about AI. It AI'd its AI with some more AI to AI harder with AI... and that equaled money. If you're writing a prospectus right now and want a lot of large institutional investment you put AI between every letter. We are in a bubble, I don't think there's any disagreement about that, when the bubble will pop nobody knows - but while we're in this bubble everything is AI. I think it's unwise to read that prospectus in good faith given all the other factors (the court case against OpenAI, the race to IPO first, Google's additional stock grant, Elon's history of corporate bailouts) that are pretty plain to see.
- AmericanOP 4mo ago
  Unfortunately computers generate heat, so while Elon can build a business running on hot air on earth, he will not be able to do so in space.
  - Catloafdev 4mo ago
    This is very far from an obstacle, space-functional radiators and thermal management systems do exist.
    - denkmoon 4mo ago
      KW scale radiators for GW scale compute demand. It is not based in reality.
      - keeganpoppen 4mo ago
        it actually is not that impossible, and in fact can be done in a form factor not that different from Starlink satellites: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FlQYU3m1e80 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FlQYU3m1e80
rlt 4mo ago
That’s not how it works. There’s provisions to adjust the targets if there’s M&A.
burnte 4mo ago
> it's pretty transparent that he's just trying to ball-of-mud together everything he can to hit that target and grab the bag. I agree, and most people do too, yet he'll get away with it. We're in the kleptocracy phase of the fall.

by munk-a 4mo ago

Elon's award is tied to growing Tesla's market cap - it's pretty transparent that he's just trying to ball-of-mud together everything he can to hit that target and grab the bag.

andruby 4mo ago

What would it mean if SpaceX buys Tesla though? Does the combined market cap count? That would be wrong. Tesla buying SpaceX just for hist bonus and then rebranding to X would be classic Musk. It's a game for him, but so ridiculous. While Tesla was pushing electrification and SpaceX pushing rapid rocket re-use I kind of tolerated Elon's antics, but since he got involved in politics and DOGE I can't bear it anymore.

lesuorac 4mo ago
> Does the combined market cap count? That would be wrong. It counts and it's not wrong. Sure, the Tesla award takes into account any M&A but growing a 2T company to 3T is a 50% increase. While growing a 1T company to 2T is a 100% increase so it's expected to be easier for him to hit his award targets with the companies merged as opposed to not merged.
- andruby 4mo ago
  I understand Tesla acquiring other companies counting to the cap, but Tesla _being acquired_ by another company, why would that count?
  - lesuorac 4mo ago
    Because that's the grand plan from the start. You don't put a sentence like "In other words, upon a change in control where Tesla is acquired, vesting of milestones under the CEO Performance Award does not require the achievement of a matching Operational Milestone." if you didn't think Tesla could be acquired. The goal is to give Elon his 2012 award package but making it his 2018 one.
- xmprt 4mo ago
  If we combine the market cap of the entire S&P500 we get close to 70T. That doesn't mean any of those individual companies are any more valuable or any of the investors are any richer. It makes no sense that Tesla shareholders would be ok with paying out a performance bonus just for M&A that doesn't grow the value of Tesla and would just dilute their shares.
  - s1artibartfast 4mo ago
    Most are tied to operational milestones as well if I understand correctly
    - lesuorac 4mo ago
      As pointed out by somebody else [1]; Operational Milestones are waived if SpaceX buys Telsa. [1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=antasvara https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=antasvara
      - s1artibartfast 4mo ago
        Thats not what it says. My understanding is SpaceX milestones stay intact. For Tesla ops milestones they would be waived, this is fine because accusition is a chance for Tesla shareholders to cash out at that price.
        lesuorac 4mo ago
        We're talking about his Tesla grant so SpaceX's grant is irrelevant. The text written in the link you did not read, states "Notwithstanding Sections I, II and III above, in the event of a Change in Control, the Operational Milestones shall be disregarded".
        s1artibartfast 4mo ago
        The link supports wxactly what I wrote. Not sure where your confusion is.
- paulddraper 4mo ago
  It the shareholders' value that counts. And that doesn't get any more by 50% increase with the same dilution.
  - adgjlsfhk1 4mo ago
    the problem is Tesla's board is controlled by musk
antasvara 4mo ago
>What would it mean if SpaceX buys Tesla though? Does the combined market cap count? That would be wrong. I took a look at the proxy statement as they have it outlined in this [0] document (Proposal 4). As currently formulated, Musk has 12 operational goals (like ship 1 million robots or hit 50 billion EBITDA) and 12 market cap goals. These need to be paired together for the shares to vest; so, if he reaches the first market cap number, he also needs to fulfill an operating goal for the first set of shares to be earned. These earned shares vest in ~5 years. This comes with a huge caveat. If Tesla changes control, those operational goals go out the window and his stock award is based solely on market cap (along with the shares immediately vesting). The share price for this is the greater of: 1. The last traded Tesla price prior to the acquisition, or 2. The per share price outlined in the acquisition. The "easiest" way to take advantage is to IPO SpaceX (which he did), pump up the market cap, acquire Tesla for a sizable premium, and vest as much of the stock award as you can. It means you get to avoid the operational goals entirely and vest a bunch of Tesla (but soon to be SpaceX) stock. [0]: https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1318605/000110465925087598/tm252289-4_pre14a.htm#tKTPC https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1318605/000110465925...
- NuclearPM 4mo ago
  Conflict of interest laws don’t apply to fascists.
  - brigandish 4mo ago
    Fascists don't support free speech. Please, learn what that word means[0] and then use it responsibly. We're already seeing the effects of misusing and overusing several other important words for political/societal discourse, and this is one of them. It's entirely unhelpful and lowers the quality of conversation here. [0] The Doctrine of Fascism is available, for free, in several places. Start there.
    - bakies 4mo ago
      Elon fits the definition in Britannica pretty neatly
mcintyre1994 4mo ago
I feel like it has to eventually become X. Just because he’d find it funny for the stupidest people in the world to post about how he’s turned Twitter into a $2t or whatever company.

itslennysfault 4mo ago

I agree with this, but it seems so crazy to me. How can money be a motivator when you're that rich. I'm not even "rich" but I'm already at a point where money is far from my #1 motivator. I LOVE puppies, but if I had a trillion of them the last thing I'd want is another puppy.

carlosjobim 4mo ago
You cannot get that rich without money being the motivator.
- digitaltrees 4mo ago
  Yes you can. Money is a medium of exchange. Stock is a medium of exchange. But they buy the ability to effectuate your will in the world. If you have a vision of the world money, human capital, political power are not the measure of success or the goal. They are the instruments of executing a vision. Some people aren't motivated by money, they are motivated by reputation, or pathology.
  - deleted 4mo ago
    [deleted]
davidguetta 4mo ago
Assuming best intentions, making a colony on mars is gonna require money
- Jtarii 4mo ago
  Not even Elon is delusional enough to truly believe a mars colony is a remote possibility.
  - amoss 4mo ago
    I don't think you can describe his beliefs using booleans like that: you have to use a numeric scale. It would be be correct to say: Elon would need a hell of a lot of ketamine to believe a colony on mars is a possibility.

testing22321 4mo ago

His award is also tied to numbers of vehicles and robots sold. So just increasing market cap won’t do it alone. Even if he merged them, they still have to produce WAY more than they are now.

digitaltrees 4mo ago

No. He is making it an AI company. The prospectus makes that clear. Everything is in service of training and deploying AI. Twitter is data, distribution and marketing, space x is distribution with data centers and internet in space. Cursor is training data and hostile distillation.

munk-a 4mo ago
NewBird AI is an AI company which had an extremely irrational stock price bump because it's all about AI. It AI'd its AI with some more AI to AI harder with AI... and that equaled money. If you're writing a prospectus right now and want a lot of large institutional investment you put AI between every letter. We are in a bubble, I don't think there's any disagreement about that, when the bubble will pop nobody knows - but while we're in this bubble everything is AI. I think it's unwise to read that prospectus in good faith given all the other factors (the court case against OpenAI, the race to IPO first, Google's additional stock grant, Elon's history of corporate bailouts) that are pretty plain to see.
AmericanOP 4mo ago
Unfortunately computers generate heat, so while Elon can build a business running on hot air on earth, he will not be able to do so in space.
- Catloafdev 4mo ago
  This is very far from an obstacle, space-functional radiators and thermal management systems do exist.
  - denkmoon 4mo ago
    KW scale radiators for GW scale compute demand. It is not based in reality.
    - keeganpoppen 4mo ago
      it actually is not that impossible, and in fact can be done in a form factor not that different from Starlink satellites: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FlQYU3m1e80 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FlQYU3m1e80

rlt 4mo ago

That’s not how it works. There’s provisions to adjust the targets if there’s M&A.

burnte 4mo ago

> it's pretty transparent that he's just trying to ball-of-mud together everything he can to hit that target and grab the bag. I agree, and most people do too, yet he'll get away with it. We're in the kleptocracy phase of the fall.