The first four words of the phrase “the rich get richer and the poor get poorer” seem to sum up Elon Musk to a tee. Musk owns companies such as Tesla and SpaceX — or at least has a significant stake in them — and he seemingly earns thousands of dollars a day without lifting a finger. However, unless he can set up a functional colony on Mars, he won’t receive what could be the biggest payout in history.
Recently, Reuters got its hands on some confidential SpaceX pay package information. According to the outlet, Musk will receive “200 million in super-voting restricted shares,” but only on two conditions. First, SpaceX needs to achieve a market value of $7.5 trillion (it is currently valued at an estimated $1.48 trillion). The second condition is much more ambitious: Establish a “permanent human colony on Mars with at least 1 million people.”
While SpaceX is currently focused on setting up a base on the moon, Musk fully intends to resume Mars colonization plans after completing the lunar settlement. After all, such a colony would help any organization or entity travel to Mars. Not only would the moon occasionally cut down some of the distance (when properly aligned), but it can function as a refueling station thanks to carbothermal oxygen reduction reactors that turn lunar soil into oxygen — and because it’s easier to launch rockets from the moon due to its low gravity. That, and because depending on who you ask, Musk isn’t about to give up such a lucrative payout.
The pay package also provides a smaller, easier payout
While Elon Musk will never stop shooting for the moon — er, Mars — a permanent colony 1 million strong is a feat he might never live to see. However, that doesn’t mean he won’t see a cent from any restricted shares.
According to Reuters, the pay package document outlines another payout locked behind a more easily achievable milestone. This consolation prize consists of “60.4 million in restricted shares” if SpaceX can operate orbiting data centers that “provide at least 100 terawatts of compute capacity.” That’s the equivalent of 100,000 nuclear reactors — the average nuclear reactor provides one gigawatt of power — so maybe it isn’t exactly what most people would call feasible. Still more readily achievable than setting up a colony on Mars with a population the size of Jacksonville, Florida.
While we know the number of shares in each payout, their monetary value remains a mystery. But even if Musk doesn’t achieve any of the aforementioned goals, he still stands to earn hundreds of billions through Tesla alone. And again, that’s only one of the many companies he owns, which means he will probably pocket hundreds of billions more in the coming years. And if SpaceX starts making GPUs, that number will climb even higher.
