Delaware, USA

Elon Musk will face an unexpected adversary in a US court next week. Richard Tornetta, a small Tesla shareholder and drummer for 'Dawn of Correction', a Philadelphia-based thrash metal band who played in concerts in the mid-2000s, has sued Elon Musk's Tesla, calling its pay packet "unfair". 

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Tornetta in a 2018 lawsuit had alleged that Tesla's pay packet, which is based on company performance targets, is unfair due to the targets being set particularly low, enabling Musk to earn tens of billions. 

WATCH | Elon Musk faces trial over $56 billion pay package

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The lawsuit survived a motion to dismiss and is scheduled to go to court on Monday, November 14. It sets up the clash between the world's richest person against one of Tesla’s smallest investors, Richard Tornetta, who held just nine shares of the electric carmaker firm when he filed the suit in 2018.

Tornetta has argued in his 96-page legal brief that the Tesla board failed to perform its fiduciary duty to minority investors by green-lighting “the largest compensation grant in human history”. The compensation, however, was put to a shareholder vote and approved.

The trial will be heard before the same Delaware judge who directed Musk to honor his contract with Twitter’s board to purchase the social media company. 

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"The disputed pay package allows Musk to buy 1% of Tesla's stock at a deep discount each time escalating performance and financial targets are met; otherwise Musk gets nothing," a Reuters report says. 

"Tesla has hit 11 of the 12 targets as its value ballooned briefly to more than $1 trillion from $50 billion, according to court papers.

"Musk and the directors argue in court filings that the package kept Musk focused on Tesla during a difficult period and led to a 10-fold rise in the stock price."

If the lawsuit succeeds, it will strip Musk of his $56 billion pay via his stock grants, money which will benefit Tesla, rather than go to Tornetta directly.

Tornetta's Dawn Of Correction band was formed in 2005, releasing one album, Dead Hand Control, in 2008, before splitting a year later. 

(With inputs from agencies)

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