News
Tesla gets pressure from NY Retirement Fund over DFEH’s systemic racism allegations
The New York State Common Retirement Fund is currently urging Texas-based electric vehicle maker Tesla to disclose how much the company spends on settling complaints related to sexual harassment and racial discrimination. The Fund’s requests were filed in a shareholder proposal last week after the California Department of Fair Employment and Housing (DFEH) filed its high-profile racism case against Tesla.
As per the resolution outlined in the Fund’s shareholder proposal, it would be best for Tesla to publish an annual report indicating how much it paid in settlements related to harassment and discrimination complaints. The Fund also urged Tesla to provide specifics on the progress it has made in decreasing the time it takes to settle grievances. The EV maker was urged to disclose the number of pending cases it is looking to rectify internally and through litigation as well.
The NY Pension Fund described its proposal in the following section:
“Shareholders request the Board of Directors of Tesla, Inc. to oversee the preparation of an annual public report describing and quantifying the effectiveness and outcomes of Company efforts to prevent harassment and discrimination against protected classes of employees, including, but not limited to, sexual harassment and racial discrimination.
“The report should disclose the Company’s progress on relevant metrics and targets, such as: (a) the total number and aggregate dollar amount of disputes settled by the company related to abuse, harassment or discrimination based on race, religion, sex, national origin, age, disability, genetic information, service member status, gender identity, or sexual orientation; (b) the company’s progress toward reducing the average length of time it takes to resolve sexual harassment or discrimination complaints, either through internal processes or through litigation; and (c) the total number of pending harassment or discrimination complaints the company is seeking to resolve through internal processes or through litigation.
“This report should not include the names of accusers or details of their settlements without their consent and should be prepared at a reasonable cost and omit any information that is proprietary, privileged, or violative of contractual obligations.”
These pieces of information, according to the Fund, are material to shareholders. This is especially true since civil rights violations could easily result in notable costs for the EV maker. A good example of this was a $137 million jury verdict against Tesla, which was announced following a lawsuit by a former employee who accused the company of racial discrimination. Tesla is currently challenging the $137 jury verdict, which U.S. District Judge William Orrick has described as “extremely high.”
The NY Pension Fund explained this in the following section:
“Information concerning complaints, legal disputes, and settlements (individually and in the aggregate) are of great interest, and often material to investors. The SEC has shown increased attention to human capital management issues, as demonstrated by its 2020 rulemaking, and Chairman Gensler’s public comments about upcoming additional disclosure proposals and characterization of workforce as a ‘key asset.’ There have been several high-profile derivative suits settled recently, including at Twentieth Century Fox, Wynn Resorts, and Alphabet, alleging boards breached their duties for failing to protect employees from discrimination and harassment, injuring the companies and their shareholders.”
“A report such as the one requested would assist shareholders in assessing whether the Company is improving its workforce management. Civil rights violations within the workplace can result in substantial costs to companies, including fines and penalties, legal costs, costs related to absenteeism, and reduced productivity. A company’s failure to properly manage its workforce can damage corporate goodwill, making it more difficult to retain and recruit employees, and jeopardize relationships with customers and partners.”
The New York State Common Retirement Fund is among the company’s shareholders that have decided to put some pressure on Tesla following the California DFEH’s lawsuit. Other notable shareholders in the EV maker, such as Baron Capital, Vanguard Group Inc., BlackRock Inc., Capital group, the California Public Employees’ Retirement System, and Fidelity Investments, have so far been silent about the issue. Tesla has not issued a response to the NY Pension Fund’s proposal either, though the company has outlined its stance against the DFEH’s racism case in a blog post published on its website.
In its blog post, Tesla noted that the DFEH has so far declined to provide the company with specific allegations or factual basis for its lawsuit. The EV maker also noted that over the past five years, the DFEH had been asked on almost 50 occasions to investigate the company, but each one of these was closed with the agency finding no fault in Tesla.
“Over the past five years, the DFEH has been asked on almost 50 occasions by individuals who believe they were discriminated against or harassed to investigate Tesla. On every single occasion, when the DFEH closed an investigation, it did not find misconduct against Tesla. It therefore strains credibility for the agency to now allege, after a three-year investigation, that systematic racial discrimination and harassment somehow existed at Tesla. A narrative spun by the DFEH and a handful of plaintiff firms to generate publicity is not factual proof,” Tesla noted.
Don’t hesitate to contact us with news tips. Just send a message to simon@teslarati.com to give us a heads up.
Elon Musk
Tesla gains massive vote of confidence on compensation plan for Elon Musk
“”The SBA supported Tesla’s 2018 performance award proposal and reaffirmed that support in the 2024 Tesla shareowner vote. The total return on Tesla’s stock after enactment of its 2018 performance award and the prior history of incentive structured plans leads us to strongly support the proposed 2025 CEO performance award.”
Tesla gained a massive vote of confidence on its proposed $1 trillion compensation plan for CEO Elon Musk from the State Board of Administration of Florida (SBA) on Monday.
On Monday, the SBA submitted a filing to the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) stating that it would vote to support Musk’s compensation plan, just as it did with the 2018 performance award and its second vote last year:
“The SBA supported Tesla’s 2018 performance award proposal and reaffirmed that support in the 2024 Tesla shareowner vote. The total return on Tesla’s stock after enactment of its 2018 performance award and the prior history of incentive structured plans leads us to strongly support the proposed 2025 CEO performance award. We believe the proposed award continues to promote an aggressive strategy to align incentives between management and shareowners and focuses solely on pecuniary factors and long-term shareowner value creation.”
This is the first large-scale shareholder that has come out and supported Musk’s potential compensation plan, which was outlined by Tesla and its Board of Directors earlier this month.
Most of the news surrounding Musk’s pay plan has been the opposite of what the SBA said today, as Institutional Shareholder Services (ISS) and Glass Lewis, two proxy firms, said they would be voting against the compensation package.
Tesla Board Chair defends Elon Musk’s pay plan, slams proxy advisors
Musk replied to their vote last week during the Q3 Earnings Call, calling them “corporate terrorists.”
He said:
“I just don’t feel comfortable building a robot army here and then being ousted because of some asinine recommendations from ISS and Glass Lewis, who have no freaking clue. I mean, those guys are corporate terrorists. The problem, yeah. Let me explain, like, the core problem here is that so many of the index funds, passive funds, vote along the lines of whatever Glass Lewis and ISS recommend. They’ve made many terrible recommendations in the past. If those recommendations had been followed, they would have been extremely destructive to the future of the company.”
SBA’s perspective on the plan relies on what Musk has done in the past decade with Tesla, as he has driven company growth, increased shareholder value, and kept the company on track with its lofty and ambitious goals.
It also outlined nine reasons to support Musk’s compensation:
- Pure Pay for Performance Design – Entirely Performance-Based, aligns with Shareowners
- Size of the Award and Share Count – Performance-based allocation, dilution tied to value creation, structured milestone design
- Market Capitalization Milestones – Clear, tiered targets, sustained performance requirement, shareholder value focus
- Operational/Product Milestones – Clear, quantifiable goals, strategic product focus, financial discipline, multi-quarter evaluation windows
- Vesting/Holding Periods – Long-term vesting structure, mandatory holding period, continuous service requirement
- CEO Succession – Succession planning requirement, performance integrity safeguard
- Time Horizon and Duration – Extended performance window of 10 years, no intermediate vesting
- Dilution & Voting Power Implications – Potential for significant ownership increase, permanent dilution
- Ambition and Stretch Goals – Extraordinary Scale of Growth, Shareowner value focus
Shareholders will vote on Musk’s compensation package on November 6 at the annual Shareholder Meeting.
News
Tesla Optimus gets its latest job, and it’s not in the company’s factories
Tesla Optimus was spotted in its latest job placement, not at any of the company’s manufacturing or production facilities.
Optimus was instead spotted in New York City at Times Square, handing out Halloween candy to people:
Just saw Optimus in Times Square handing out candy to people! Pretty cool $tsla pic.twitter.com/Eg5Q8KH17H
— Will Coggins (@Patient_Profits) October 27, 2025
It is not Tesla Optimus’s first gig in the service industry, as it has already secured several employment opportunities through the company’s projects. Last year, it served drinks at the company’s We, Robot day, where the Cybercab and Robovan were unveiled.
Additionally, Optimus has been helping out at the Tesla Diner in Los Angeles, serving popcorn and greeting guests.
Elon Musk reveals big plans for Tesla Optimus at the Supercharger Diner
Optimus has many capabilities, and its applications can benefit both residential and commercial users. It is designed to be an at-home assistant, helping with tedious, monotonous tasks around the house.
In a commercial setting, Optimus will be programmed to handle everything from manufacturing to other factory-type tasks, as Tesla has already been using the robot in its own factories for smaller jobs.
Optimus has been in development for several years, but Tesla is ready to turn up the heat in terms of its capabilities and engineering as it prepares to launch it to a wider audience in the coming years.
During the recent Q3 Earnings Call, Tesla CEO Elon Musk gave updates on the Optimus project, highlighting its progress and the company’s current development status.
Musk said that Tesla is “on the cusp of something really tremendous with Optimus, which I think is likely to be, has the potential to be, the biggest product of all time.” He also mentioned that Tesla is in an interesting position because not only has it established itself as one of the biggest car companies in the country, but it’s the only company that manufactures vehicles and has a monumental grasp of the importance of AI and robotics.
“I’m unaware of any robot program by Ford or GM or, you know, by U.S. car companies,” he said.
Musk added that Optimus has some pretty big responsibilities around Tesla’s factories:
“I mean, bringing Optimus to market is an incredibly difficult task, to be clear. It’s not like some walk in the park. At some point, I mean, actually, technically, Optimus can walk in the park right now. We do have Optimus robots that walk around our offices at our engineering headquarters in Palo Alto, California, basically twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week.”
Right now, it appears Tesla is having its biggest challenge with the Optimus project around the development of its hands and forearms, which Musk called “an incredible thing” on the human body:
“The human hand is an incredible thing. The more you study the human hand, the more incredible you realize it is, and why you need four fingers and a thumb, why the fingers have certain degrees of freedom, why the various muscles are of different strengths, and fingers are of different lengths. It turns out that those are all there for a reason…Making the hand and forearm, because most of the actuators, just like the human hand, the muscles that control your hand are actually primarily in your forearm. The Optimus hand and forearm are an incredibly difficult engineering challenge. I’d say it’s more difficult than the rest of the robot from an electromechanical standpoint.”
Tesla is stumped on how to engineer this Optimus part, but they’re close
Optimus is starting to get more visibility in the public, and Tesla’s move to put it smack dab in the middle of New York City is one that will certainly bring some additional eyes to its development.
Investor's Corner
Tesla analysts are expecting big things from the stock
Tesla analysts are expecting big things from the stock (NASDAQ: TSLA) after many firms made price target adjustments following the Q3 Earnings Call.
Last Wednesday, Tesla reported earnings with record revenue but missed EPS estimates.
It blew delivery expectations out of the water with its strongest quarter in company history, but Tesla’s future relies on the development of autonomous vehicles, robotics, and AI, which many bullish firms highlight as major strengths.
The earnings call reiterated those points, along with the belief that Tesla CEO Elon Musk should be rewarded with a newly proposed pay package that would enable him to gain $1 trillion in wealth if he comes through on a lengthy list of performance tranches.
Nine Wall Street firms made adjustments to their outlook on Tesla shares in the form of price target increases since last Wednesday’s call, all of which are indications of big expectations for the stock moving forward.
Here are the nine firms that made moves:
- Truist – $280 to $406, reiterated Hold rating
- Roth MKM – $395 to $404, reiterated Buy rating
- Cantor Fitzgerald – $355 to $510, reiterated Overweight rating
- Deutsche Bank – $435 to $440, reiterated Buy rating
- Mizhuo – $450 to $485, reiterated Outperform rating
- New Street Research – $465 to $520, reiterated Buy rating
- Evercore ISI – $235 to $300, reiterated In Line rating
- Freedom Capital Markets – $338 to $406, upgraded to Hold rating
- China Renaissance – $349 to $380, reiterated Hold rating
The boosts in price target are largely due to Tesla’s future projects, as Roth MKM, Cantor Fitzgerald, Mizuho, New Street Research, and Evercore ISI all explicitly mention Tesla’s autonomy, robotics, and AI potential as the main factors for its price target boosts.
Cantor Fitzgerald raises Tesla PT To $510, citing Cybercab, Semi, and AI momentum
It is no surprise that many firms are adjusting their outlook on Tesla shares considerably in an effort to prepare for the company’s transition to even more of a tech company than a car company.
The issue with many analysts is that they treat the company’s vehicle deliveries as the main indicator of value.
However, Tesla has a robust energy division, which was a major contributor to the company’s strong margins and gross profit in Q3, as well as its prowess in robotics and AI.
Additionally, the company is seen as a key player in the autonomy field, especially after launching driverless rides on a Robotaxi platform in Austin and expanding a similar program in the Bay Area.
Tesla shares were up over 5 percent at 12:18 p.m. on the East Coast.
-
Elon Musk1 week agoSpaceX posts Starship booster feat that’s so nutty, it doesn’t even look real
-
Elon Musk1 week agoTesla Full Self-Driving gets an offer to be insured for ‘almost free’
-
News1 week agoElon Musk confirms Tesla FSD V14.2 will see widespread rollout
-
News1 week agoTesla is adding an interesting feature to its centerscreen in a coming update
-
News2 weeks agoTesla launches new interior option for Model Y
-
News2 weeks agoTesla widens rollout of new Full Self-Driving suite to more owners
-
Elon Musk1 week agoTesla CEO Elon Musk’s $1 trillion pay package hits first adversity from proxy firm
-
News1 week agoTesla might be doing away with a long-included feature with its vehicles

