Tesla shareholders share mixed reactions to latest sales pitch

Tesla  (TSLA)  shareholders are riding high into the company's earnings release next month. 

Tesla shares have jumped more than 30% since the end of August, heavily outpacing the wider S&P 500's 3% gain.

Barclays analysts cite several reasons for the stock's performance over the past four weeks. 

“We believe the rally can also be put in context of Tesla as the ‘OG meme stonk,’ with performance also reflecting a combination of technical factors (i.e., option activity/call purchasing), retail excitement, and Mag7 catch-up,” Barclays analysts wrote, according to Investing.com. 

Tesla shares received an early bump from the company the morning of Sept. 29, but they dipped shortly after its well-timed social media post. 

Tesla makes a pitch for Elon Musk's pay package

To keep Tesla CEO Elon Musk happy, the company needs to pay him a lot more money and give him much more power. 

Tesla debuted a new video promoting the pay package, which it plans to have shareholders vote on at the Tesla Annual Meeting on November 6. 

Related: Elon Musk's road to $1 trillion fortune is full of potholes

The opening message of the video: We pay for outstanding performance — not for promises. 

The video goes into detail about the 12 tranches of share distribution and the 12 benchmarks Musk must hit to receive the entire pay package. 

Tesla performance benchmarks for Elon Musk

• 20 million Tesla vehicles delivered
• 10 million active FSD subscriptions
• 1 million bots delivered
• 1 million Robotaxis in commercial operation
• $400 billion of Adjusted EBITDA over four separate quarters

Tesla says it can reach a valuation of $8.5 trillion under Musk. 

Tesla shareholders react to Elon Musk's payment pitch on X

Social media can be an excellent gauge of consumer sentiment. Tesla fans, detractors, and shareholders converged under the company's post on X (the former Twitter) to discuss the pros and cons of voting for Musk's pay package. 

A quick scan of X user @BMohammedl's profile reveals him to be a staunch fan of Tesla and other Elon Musk properties, like SpaceX.

He urged shareholders to "Vote FOR" the pay proposal, while noting that Tesla's market cap jumped from under $60 billion in 2018 to over $800 billion in 2025. 

Related: Elon Musk unveils Tesla's Master Plan Part 4

"People saying 'overpaid' forget every $1 we gave Elon came back $50 in stock value. No one in history took a car company on the edge of bankruptcy to the biggest by market cap except him. It's not about salary, it's about betting on the mind that built the future twice," @BMohammedl said.

Another shareholder, @DBurkland, posted a screenshot of his "for" vote on X. 

X user Anthony Smith, who goes by @anthonyisonline, put Musk's pay in perspective.

"So... 2018 plan was worth $55b, but Net profits since 2010 are only $27b. New deal - Tesla must hit an adjusted EBITDA of $400 billion over 12 consecutive months & Elon gets another $1 trillion. Sounds generous," Smith wrote. 

Social media users point out Elon Musk's broken promises over the years

Again, Tesla says it pays for "outstanding performance — not for promises."

But one X user took that premise to task, posting a video showing numerous clips of Elon Musk promising something that still hasn't come to fruition. 

Musk's promises in the video include:

• In 2015, he promised autonomous highway driving was "only a month away."
• In 2016, Musk said Tesla could drive better than a person "right now." 
• He promised that by 2020, "We will have a million Tesla cars on the road with FSD hardware...at a reliability level that no one needs to pay attention" to the road.  
• In 2017, he promised that users would be able to watch movies and go to sleep while using Tesla Autopilot. 

It's noteworthy that in 2023, a Tesla driver in China admitted he was sleeping when his car rear-ended two other vehicles on the Beijing-Hong Kong-Macau Expressway.

Related: Tesla gets another wakeup call from Europe