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Lawyers who voided Elon Musk's pay as excessive want $6B fee

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Re: Lawyers who voided Elon Musk's pay as excessive want $6B fee

#81

Post by rhelz »

Fire-Dragon-DoL wrote: post #74
isodev wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Elon leaves Tesla: - Tesla finally settles with unions and starts treating their employees fairly. - Tesla addresses the water pollution of their Gigafactories in Europe. - Tesla signs that collective bargaining agreement in Sweden so they can finally sell cars there (and have their charging stations unblocked). - Tesla adapts their marketing to stop claiming auto-pilot bs. - Tesla adapts their quality control so Tes…

It looks great on paper, but isn't their core customer going to drop them without elon?

chuckke nobody buys a car because they feel like giving a billionaire money.

I mean, if you can afford to spend $100k just to simp for Elon Musk, god bless you, but the rest of us want $100k of value when we pay $100k for a car.

Re: Lawyers who voided Elon Musk's pay as excessive want $6B fee

#82

Post by AlchemistCamp »

f38zf5vdt wrote: post #41
theragra wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not if Elon decides to leave Tesla. In this case, this was a catastrophic failure.

Elon leaving Tesla would be the one thing _to_ make me invest. The company has fantastic growth potential being squandered by Musk on useless products like the Cybertruck.

And how have your investment returns over the past 15 years stacked up against someone with all their savings invested in Tesla?

Re: Lawyers who voided Elon Musk's pay as excessive want $6B fee

#83

Post by AlchemistCamp »

Eddy_Viscosity2 wrote: post #71
pie_flavor wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They thought he deserved it, and voted to send him the money. Then this guy started stopping them.

It turned out this guy's claim was justified, given the court agreed. Again, if it was really important to these investors that Elon have more billions, they do not need any courts permission to just send him money.

Try to think about this from the shareholders’ point of view.

They want Elon compensated with the bonus he hit very difficult growth targets to earn because they want to make money from him further growing the company.

If they just donate the shares they personally bought, then they don’t make money. They lose it.

Re: Lawyers who voided Elon Musk's pay as excessive want $6B fee

#84

Post by drdaeman »

rhelz wrote: post #40
drdaeman wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’d love to see a legal system that is comprehensible enough for a layman so pro se is the go-to option and the lawyers are for the real tricky cases, or people who can’t or don’t want to even think about it. Not happening, of course. Modern legal systems have incentives to build barriers. (For what it’s worth, I’ve never needed a lawyer and I’ve dealt with immigration in two countries and some basic legal stuff. Was…

// a legal system that [laymen can understand] // Alas, you wouldn't like a legal system which a layman could understand, any more than you'd like a computer which a layman could understand. We are doing things, as a society and as a species, which take far longer than one individual lifetime to learn, so we divide up the work and specialize.

I could be wrong or naive, of course, but...

> so we divide up the work and specialize

There's an important key difference - no one is forcing anyone to understand how computers work in detail, and the situation where one needs this specialized knowledge is quite uncommon. Thus, this can be left to the specialists.

I do believe, though, that everyone should probably know how the computers work at the extremely high level, though. Because virtually everyone deals with computers those days, so this knowledge is nearly essential. And if someone wants to learn more for whatever reason - they should be more than welcome to do so, without any artificial barriers. No one should ever say "computers are really hard, only licensed engineers should be allowed to... (idk what)"

In the same way of logic, consider that everyone is a part of a legal and political systems, whenever they want it or not. Which is why I'd like to make those as accessible as reasonably possible, with the basics well comprehensible so you don't normally need a lawyer.

I think a better comparison could be with electricians, plumbers or builders. And with those, no one should need a specialist to do basic stuff (like replacing a light bulb or installing a bidet), and no one should be actively discouraged from learning more advanced things.

I'm saying this as someone who re-wired a fire hazard of an old house (with copper-aluminium twists from '40s, no grounding, and so on) up to a proper code (checked with a real electrician, of course), installed a water heater after old one had failed, replaced a car radio, etc. - just because I had time and desire to learn and do it myself (also saved some money). At the same time, I've happily went to a mechanic when there was something with the starter and I'm about to call a contractor for a simple leaky faucet, just because I don't have time for this.

Computers or anything else - I'm all for all the modern man-designed systems to be understandable and/or serviceable. So anyone with a working brain can do things themselves if they want it and have time for it, and no one is forced to hire anyone unless they prefer it that way (which is totally fine - like you've said, we divide work and specialize, optimizing our resources). Save the obvious exceptions where the risk of harming others is too high - e.g. the building codes are there for a good reason.

And I'd say some legal systems look way too unnecessarily complicated (or poorly designed) to me. And popular culture is complicit in re-enforcing this isn't helping - it's reinforcing the current status quo. Which seems to contradict the whole idea of resource optimization.

Re: Lawyers who voided Elon Musk's pay as excessive want $6B fee

#85

Post by rhelz »

drdaeman wrote: post #84
rhelz wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

// a legal system that [laymen can understand] // Alas, you wouldn't like a legal system which a layman could understand, any more than you'd like a computer which a layman could understand. We are doing things, as a society and as a species, which take far longer than one individual lifetime to learn, so we divide up the work and specialize.

I could be wrong or naive, of course, but... > so we divide up the work and specialize There's an important key difference - no one is forcing anyone to understand how computers work in detail , and the situation where one needs this specialized knowledge is quite uncommon. Thus, this can be left to the specialists. I do believe, though, that everyone should probably know how the computers work at the extremely high…

// no one is forcing anyone to understand how computers work //

There is something very right about this, or the implication of this: Everybody, no matter how dumb or smart, rich or poor, educated or illiterate, is expected to comply with EVERY law, all day, everyday, 24/7, every minute of their lives. Whether they know about those laws or not.

So yeah, having a broadly understandable and accessible legal system is a necessity.

Nevertheless, at the rate we are inventing new algorithms (like LLMs), new financial techniques (like derivatives) and are going into new realms (like space), there are exponentially more opportunities for people to collaborate with each other--or, unfortunately--harm each other. So we need ever more laws. A few, simple laws just cannot give us all the protections we want, or create enough of a space for cooperation. There is an element of irreducible complexity.

Re: Lawyers who voided Elon Musk's pay as excessive want $6B fee

#86

Post by Eddy_Viscosity2 »

AlchemistCamp wrote: post #83
Eddy_Viscosity2 wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It turned out this guy's claim was justified, given the court agreed. Again, if it was really important to these investors that Elon have more billions, they do not need any courts permission to just send him money.

Try to think about this from the shareholders’ point of view. They want Elon compensated with the bonus he hit very difficult growth targets to earn because they want to make money from him further growing the company . If they just donate the shares they personally bought, then they don’t make money. They lose it.

I get that, but my proposal is the same thing. The shareholders could indicate that the only reason they are sending the money is because he met the targets. Therefore he knows that he got the money for meeting target -- precisely the same outcome whether from the company coffers or from individual investors.

Those billions could have gone directly to shareholders as dividends, or reinvested in the company for future growth. Either of these would be better at making money for investors. I question the logic that giving it to Elon will motivate him any differently than a lesser, but still very generous compensation would have.

It is presumed here that money is what is driving Elon (or other already billionaires). This is only ever partially true. People like him also love the power of being in charge and notoriety. Those are likely worth more than the money for Elon in particular. The board and investors should, as is their fiduciary duty, pay the minimum needed to keep him doing what he's doing.

Re: Lawyers who voided Elon Musk's pay as excessive want $6B fee

#87

Post by rhelz »

seydor wrote: post #65
rhelz wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

An example with smaller numbers: Suppose a company is worth $10 and has 10 shares. The board issues 10 more shares to one person. Sure, the company would still be worth $10. But there are now 20 shares outstanding. Everybody except the guy who got 10 shares would see their shares fall in value from $1 to 50 cents. Basically, issuing stock to one person has the effect, mutatis mutants, of transferring wealth from all…

Still the total value the shareholders hold is the same so they have have not been damaged as a group, which is alleged here. The damage is psychological, i.e. most of them are jealous of one of them

chuckle so if you had $100,000 of stock, you would in no way feel like you had been ripped off if you logged in tomorrow and it was only worth $50,000? Because...that $50,000 was transferred to the CEO's stock account? After all, the $50,000 didn't just disappear, it transferred to the CEO's stock account, so it all evened out...

...man if you really feel that way, can I interest you in some stock? I'm thinking about making a start-up...

Re: Lawyers who voided Elon Musk's pay as excessive want $6B fee

#88

Post by AlchemistCamp »

Eddy_Viscosity2 wrote: post #86
AlchemistCamp wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Try to think about this from the shareholders’ point of view. They want Elon compensated with the bonus he hit very difficult growth targets to earn because they want to make money from him further growing the company . If they just donate the shares they personally bought, then they don’t make money. They lose it.

I get that, but my proposal is the same thing. The shareholders could indicate that the only reason they are sending the money is because he met the targets. Therefore he knows that he got the money for meeting target -- precisely the same outcome whether from the company coffers or from individual investors. Those billions could have gone directly to shareholders as dividends, or reinvested in the company for future…

I don't think you do get it. The company has lost $75B in market cap since this activist ruling and will likely lose much more going forward, especially if the ruling is not overturned on appeal.

Not only that, but I think it's a real loss for the US in general and Deleware in particular as a good environment for business that respects property rights. Some guy with nine shares of stock overrode the wishes of over 3/4 of the shareholders and his lawyers may extract billions from the company which the market clearly sees as having been harmed by their actions.

Re: Lawyers who voided Elon Musk's pay as excessive want $6B fee

#89

Post by AlchemistCamp »

1vuio0pswjnm7 wrote: post #60
pylua wrote: post #6

I am confused. These are the lawyers that sued Tesla and won, not Elon/Telsa's lawyers, and they want that sort of payout due to the cost savings to Tesla? If so, I wonder who funded the original lawsuit -- was that not enough -- or was this the idea all along?

"If so I wonder who funded the original lawsuit -- was that not enough -- or was this the idea all along?" The plaintiffs law firms "funded it" by working for free, on a contingency basis: if plaintiffs win, the law firms get paid for their work. They won. Now they seek payment for their work.

But instead of from their client, they seek payment from their victim—the company's shareholders, including market indexers such as retirement funds.

Re: Lawyers who voided Elon Musk's pay as excessive want $6B fee

#90

Post by Eddy_Viscosity2 »

AlchemistCamp wrote: post #88
Eddy_Viscosity2 wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I get that, but my proposal is the same thing. The shareholders could indicate that the only reason they are sending the money is because he met the targets. Therefore he knows that he got the money for meeting target -- precisely the same outcome whether from the company coffers or from individual investors. Those billions could have gone directly to shareholders as dividends, or reinvested in the company for future…

I don't think you do get it. The company has lost $75B in market cap since this activist ruling and will likely lose much more going forward, especially if the ruling is not overturned on appeal. Not only that, but I think it's a real loss for the US in general and Deleware in particular as a good environment for business that respects property rights. Some guy with nine shares of stock overrode the wishes of over 3/…

I doubt the $75B drop was BECAUSE of this ruling and if that's your assertion, it would need some evidence to back it up. Delaware has one of deepest bodies of case law for corporations and if Elon and the board acted inappropriately as they were found to have done, then it shouldn't matter if the case was started by a shareholder of 1 or a million shares.
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