After Tesla shareholders approved Musk's sky-high salary package, his first salary data was released, amounting to a staggering US$158 billion. Tesla disclosed total compensation for 2025 in a regulatory filing on Thursday. Nearly six months ago, more than 75% of voting shares voted in favor of the CEO's massive equity award. While this number is staggering, the company also disclosed several important caveats.
Tesla stated in the filing that there may be a "huge discrepancy" between Musk's total compensation announced by the company each year and his actual value.
There are several reasons why Musk’s salary data disclosed by Tesla is out of touch with actual earnings. First, the unprecedented compensation package approved last year, with a potential value of up to US$1 trillion, is entirely composed of equity awards. The plan sets conditions for exercise: Musk can only realize the benefits if Tesla's stock price rises significantly and the company reaches various operating milestones.
Since Tesla failed to achieve any market value and operating assessment targets last year, Musk's actual salary was zero.
Of the total compensation disclosed this time, approximately US$132 billion is the highest valuation of Musk's equity awards last year calculated based on the fair value on the grant date and assuming that all performance conditions are met.
The remaining compensation of more than $26 billion is the grant-date fair value of an interim award approved by Tesla's board of directors for Musk in August last year. Due to the resumption of the old salary plan in 2018, Musk gave up receiving this payment in April this year.