Becoming the highest paid CEO in a grand style is not an easy task. Achieving the feat in 2018 with an astronomical increase of 4.6 million percent increase is the most surprising part of it. This feat was achieved by a man that has always been a thinker and creator right from his childhood. As a child, Elon Musk coded his own video game, and he has always found resourceful ways to make money. After he graduated from college, he opted for entrepreneurship rather than wait for any firm to notice his skills.
Elon Musk was consumed with multiple passion as a young lad, and this has impacted his entrepreneurship spirit. Elon Musk manages companies and projects that specialize in electric and self-driving cars, private space exploration and Mars colonization, solar energy and artificial intelligence. The firms he sits atop include Tesla, SpaceX, SolarCity, and OpenAI. With this prowess, achieving this great feat as an entrepreneur looks so easy for such a man.
Achieving the feat of the highest paid CEO in 2018 by a great surge of 4.6 million percent increase was revealed in a recent report of new york times. The report was done with the executive compensation consultancy Equilar, on the compensation for CEOs at 200 large publicly-traded companies in the year 2018.
According to the report, Elon Musk was awarded about $2.3 billion last year, which is a whopping 4.6 million percent increase. This was mostly in the form of stock options. The next in rating to him among the list of CEOs is Discovery’s David M. Zaslav, who made $129 million 2018. New York Times noted that his earnings in 2018 are more than what the top 65 CEOs after him earned combined in the year. The large disparity is uncommon to see among top executives.
The compensation was approved by Tesla’s board in March 2018, with the options of the firm achieving some specific market capitalization milestones over a decade. During the period there were different comments on the unusual nature of the compensation package, with insider’s Troy Wolverton noting that Musk already controls a large amount of Tesla’s stock, and already has a strong incentive to boost the firm’s market cap.
Dispute Of Huge Tesla’s Compensation
Meanwhile, the report of Musk’s massive compensation coincides with the report of a tumultuous year for him and Tesla. In an article by the new york times, it was noted that Tesla had issues with scaling up production of their cars. Also, Musk revealed in a tweet last August that he had funding secured to take the company private led to an SEC investigation and an ongoing legal battle. Further, the stock price of Tesla dwindled last year, and there has been a dramatic decline in 2019 as the woes of the firm continue.
According to the insider report on the huge compensation of Elon Musk, it noted that a spokesperson of Tesla refuted the report of the huge compensation. The spokesperson informed Business Insider that;
“Elon earned $0 in total compensation from Tesla in 2018, and any reporting otherwise is incorrect and misleading. Unlike other CEOs, Elon receives no salary, no cash bonuses, and no equity that simply vests by the passage of time. His only compensation is a completely at-risk performance award that was specifically designed with ambitious milestones, such as doubling Tesla’s current market capitalization from approximately $40 billion to $100 billion. As a result, Elon’s entire compensation is directly tied to the long-term success of Tesla and its shareholders, and none of the equity from his 2018 performance package has vested.”
While a spokesperson already refutes the report according to the insider’s report, Musk making such a huge earning is possible considering his prowess. Clarity still needs to be made on the report of the executive compensation consultancy Equilar.
