Elon Musk says the latest rejection of his mega Tesla payday is ‘totally crazy’

Elon Musk is CEO of Tesla. 

Elon Musk hit out at a Delaware judge’s latest rejection of his mega pay package.

In posts on X, his social media platform, the world’s richest person said the ruling by Court of Chancery Judge Kathleen St. J. McCormick was “totally crazy” and “absolute corruption.” Musk also described her as an “activist posing as a judge.”

The compensation plan was introduced in 2018 and was worth $56 billion when McCormick struck it down in January.

A surge in Tesla stock in recent weeks means the package would now be worth about $100 billion. Shares dipped in premarket trading but have jumped 47% in the past month, valuing the EV maker at about $1.1 trillion.

The judge initially ruled that Tesla gave little reason for how it decided on the package and that Musk had undue influence over the board. In June Tesla put the compensation plan to a shareholder vote in June and investors voted to approve it.

However, McCormick upheld her earlier finding on Monday. “The large and talented group of defense firms got creative with the ratification argument, but their unprecedented theories go against multiple strains of settled law,” she wrote.

In a post on X, Tesla said it would appeal the ruling.

Musk and Tesla supporters took to social media after the ruling was issued.

Cathie Wood, founder of CEO of ARK Invest and a long-term Tesla investor, said on X: “Judge McCormick is an activist judge at its worst. No judge has the right to determine CEO compensation. Shareholders voted twice, overwhelmingly each time, to ratify @elonmusk’s 2018 performance-based pay package. She will lose this fight in Supreme Court.”

Paul Graham, cofounder of Y Combinator, wrote on X: “It used to be automatic for startups to incorporate in Delaware. That will stop being the case if activist judges start overruling shareholders.”

In another post he wrote: “This evening the CEO of a public company told me that all startups should reincorporate in Nevada. That’s apparently the best alternative, and for startups that are still private it’s trivially easy.”

Shaun Maguire, a partner at Sequoia Capital, posted: “I recommend all future companies to incorporate outside of Delaware.”