WILMINGTON, Del – Legal professionals for Elon Musk and a Tesla Inc. investor will make closing arguments on Tuesday in a trial over his $55 billion pay package deal and whether or not it fueled the EV maker’s progress or improperly sponsored Musk’s dream of sooner or later touring to Mars.

The arguments comply with a five-day trial in November that featured testimony from the Tesla chief govt in regards to the origins of the 2018 pay package deal and whether or not its efficiency objectives had been tough to attain and precisely described to traders.

Richard Tornetta, a small Tesla investor, sued Musk and the board in 2018 and hopes to show Musk coerced compliant administrators into offering a package deal of his design, which is many occasions bigger than the mixed pay of the following 200 highest-paid CEOs. It contributes to Musk’s fortune, the world’s second largest.

The package deal permits Musk to purchase 1 p.c of Tesla’s inventory at a deep low cost every time escalating efficiency and monetary targets are met, in any other case Musk will get nothing.

Tesla has hit 11 of the 12 targets as its worth ballooned to briefly high $1 trillion in 2021 from $50 billion when the package deal was negotiated.

Tornetta’s legal professionals argued the Tesla board had an obligation to supply a smaller pay package deal or search for one other CEO and they need to have required Musk to work full-time at Tesla as an alternative of permitting him to deal with different initiatives, like working Twitter.

Tornetta needs some or all the package deal to be rescinded.

Musk, who based rocket firm SpaceX, admitted throughout his testimony that his pay package deal offered funds he would use to finance interplanetary journey.

“It is a approach to get humanity to Mars,” he testified. “So Tesla can help in doubtlessly attaining that.”

His legal professionals additionally argued the pay plan benefited shareholders by rising the worth of their inventory 10 occasions.

Chancellor Kathaleen McCormick of Delaware’s Courtroom of Chancery should decide if the Musk, who owned 22 p.c of Tesla inventory in 2018, managed the corporate by way of board ties and his character, which can form the result of the case.