Where Tesla Shareholders Stand on Elon Musk’s $1 Trillion Pay Package

The State Board of Administration of Florida, a fund that manages assets worth over $280 billion and counts former presidential hopeful Ron DeSantis as its chairman, said on Monday it would back the proposed pay package.

The board, which holds over $1 billion in Tesla shares, described the 2025 CEO performance award as a “bold, performance-driven incentive structure.”

ARK Invest CEO and longtime Tesla bull Cathie Wood said earlier this month she was confident Musk’s pay package would pass, and that it could lead Tesla to “super-exponential growth,” adding that she disagreed with Glass Lewis and ISS.

Tesla is the biggest holding in ARK’s portfolio, with the firm holding around $1 billion worth of shares.

Dan Ives, a Wedbush Securities analyst and one of Tesla’s biggest Wall Street cheerleaders, also expressed support for Musk’s $1 trillion payday.

In a note released shortly after Tesla unveiled the package, Ives said it would help keep Musk focused on the company and accelerate Tesla’s “autonomous and robotics future.”

Gavin Baker, the managing partner of investment firm Atreides Management, posted on X on Thursday that Atreides would vote in favor of the pay package, adding that he would prefer every company he invests in to have a comparable CEO compensation plan.

“Elon’s involvement is integral to maintaining Tesla’s current course and trajectory,” Baker wrote. As of June 2025, Atreides held around 321,000 shares in Tesla, with the firm’s position valued at $141 million at the time.

New York State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli wrote a letter to Tesla shareholders on Monday, urging them to vote against the compensation plan and criticizing the board for an “alarming lack of independence.”

The state’s retirement fund holds over three and a half million Tesla shares, valued at about $1.7 billion, according to a recent SEC filing.

The nation’s second-largest teachers’ labor union joined a group of unions, state treasurers, and investment firms earlier this month in urging Tesla shareholders to vote against the mammoth pay deal, arguing it did not secure enough commitments from Musk to keep him focused on Tesla.

The California Public Employees’ Retirement System (CalPERS), the largest public pension fund in the US, voted against Elon Musk’s previous $46 billion pay plan last year — and this time is no different.

The agency’s global equities investment director told Bloomberg in an email on Thursday that CalPERS would vote against Musk’s $1 trillion pay package, saying it was far larger than that of other CEOs and concentrated too much power in a single shareholder.

CalPERS is one of the largest Tesla shareholders to come out against the pay package, with Bloomberg estimating the pension fund holds around 5 million shares in the EV giant.