Kimbal’s comments come at a time when Elon Musk’s $56 billion compensation hangs in the limbo.
Elon Musk’s younger brother, Kimbal Musk, said in a television appearance on Friday that the Tesla CEO deserves to be paid.
“I think my brother deserves to be paid,” Kimbal Musk said on CNBC’s “Squawk Box” on Friday. “He has zero pay for the past six to eight years. I don’t think that’s right. I’ll let Tesla shareholders make that decision, but I believe that it does need to be. He needs to be paid.”
The comments come as Elon Musk’s $56 billion compensation hangs in the limbo. Kimbal also sits on Tesla’s board of directors.
On Stocktwits, retail sentiment around TSLA stock stayed within ‘bearish’ territory over the past 24 hours, while message volume stayed at ‘low’ levels.
A Stocktwits user said they trust in Elon Musk.
The Delaware Chancery Court struck down Musk’s record $56 billion Tesla compensation package, initially approved in 2018, based on a lawsuit from a shareholder named Richard Tornetta in January 2024. The court deemed the package excessive and noted that the process of approval was “deeply flawed.”
Tesla held a second shareholder vote on the compensation in June, but the court dismissed it in December. Musk subsequently moved Tesla’s state of incorporation to Texas from Delaware and appealed the court’s decision earlier this year. The Delaware Supreme Court has now scheduled oral arguments for October 15 in Dover, Delaware, in Musk’s appeal.
Earlier this month, Tesla said that it approved an award of 96 million shares of restricted stock to Musk to incentivize the CEO to remain with the company. These were valued at about $29 billion based on Tesla’s closing price on August 1.
The new package will be forfeited and returned to the company if, before vesting, there is a final judgment in the ongoing court case about Musk’s 2018 pay package that results in him becoming able to fully exercise the performance-based stock option award he was granted in January 2018, the company said.
Tesla directors Robyn Denholm and Kathleen Wilson-Thompson also said in a letter to shareholders that the special committee established by the board to consider matters concerning Musk’s pay package continues to work to address a longer-term CEO compensation strategy. It plans to put it to a shareholder vote at the November 6 annual meeting.
TSLA stock is down by 16% this year but up by about 60% over the past 12 months.
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