That's the $46 billion question at the upcoming Tesla shareholder meeting.

Tesla is now going to be going to shareholders asking them to vote again on Elon Musk's multi-billion dollar pay package.

The ratification of the pay package is really about fairness.

We would not be voting in favor of that proposal.

After a judge shot down the initial pay deal,

Tesla's board is hoping a second vote will help secure Musk's compensation and keep the CEO, who also owns X and runs SpaceX and XAI, focused on Tesla.

Sometimes the work pain level is quite excruciating.

Here are the four ways the shareholder vote could go and how the outcome could affect Tesla.

Two hurdles currently stand between Musk and the compensation package.

Shareholders and a Delaware judge.

In January, the judge, Chancellor Kathleen McCormick, struck down the initial pay deal, calling the approval process deeply flawed.

She said Musk held some of the most influential corporate positions, enjoyed thick ties with the directors tasked with negotiating on behalf of Tesla, and dominated the process that led to board approval of his compensation plan.

Instead of waiting for McCormick to issue her final judgment and then appealing,

Tesla's board decided to hold a second vote on the pay package.

It's just unprecedented.

I have never heard of a situation where after a court concluded that there had been a breach of fiduciary duty and ordered some kind of remedy, there was an attempt to undo that with a new shareholder vote, but no substantive changes to the original conduct.

It's just, it hasn't been done.

Legally, there are four ways the vote could play out.

If shareholders decide against the package, as though the vote never happened.

If they vote for the pay deal, Chancellor McCormick can accept that result.

She says, OK, you got me, that's it, I guess I'll give it all back and we're done.

Musk is probably very happy, he doesn't want to appeal, but the plaintiff appeals to the Delaware Supreme Court.

The other extreme is that she looks at it and she says, this is ridiculous, you can't undo a trial finding this way.

And then that all gets appealed to the Delaware Supreme Court.

The third possibility is she says,

I don't have enough information to be able to determine if this fixed at all.

In which case, maybe there has to be document production, discovery.

Maybe there has to be depositions.

Maybe there has to be a whole new hearing.

Whatever the shareholders say and whatever Chancellor McCormick decides, the second vote could still play a role in any appeal.

Either way, it's color.

And you have to wonder, especially when this gets to the Delaware Supreme Court, which it absolutely will, whether the Delaware Supreme Court, when it evaluates what happened in 2018, whether in the back of their minds is, well, there was this new vote, even if it's not technically relevant.

Back in 2018, Tesla was valued at around $53 billion, less than one-tenth of where it stands today.

And Musk was struggling with production issues.

At times, he was sleeping on the factory floor.

When this deal was proposed, the future of Tesla was really a big question mark.

We're not perfect, but we pour our heart and soul into the product we really care.

Tesla was struggling.

It had posted its seventh consecutive quarterly loss in the second quarter of 2018.

And by August of that year, the company barely had enough cash on hand to function.

The size of the pay package was unheard of.

And Musk was going to have to earn it.

His compensation was tied to Tesla's performance.

In a recent video addressing shareholders, the board chair laid out the strategy.

If he failed, Elon was entitled to receive no salary, no cash bonuses, and no equity.

The award worked.

Elon Musk wants to get paid.

He argues that he had a deal.

He had a deal in 2018 to meet incredibly ambitious targets for the company to get the market valuation to huge levels that didn't seem possible to a lot of outsiders.

And he achieved those things.

The Tesla board is hoping shareholders will support Musk's pay package in Thursday's vote.

But it's not a sure thing.

For some investors, this is a referendum on Elon Musk.

There has been criticism that he has been distracted.

Been distracted buying Twitter, now known as X.

Been distracted with X.A.I., this startup that he created for artificial intelligence that to some looks like a competitor to Tesla.

A referendum on is he engaged enough.

Some feel that he's distracted and they're not getting the best of him.

On top of that, Musk has said he wants a greater stake in the company.

Currently, he directly holds about 13%.

In January, he posted on X.

I'm uncomfortable growing Tesla to be a leader in A.I. and robotics without having around 25% voting control.

Enough to be influential, but not so much that I can't be overturned.

Unless that is the case, I would prefer to build products outside of Tesla.

That's a problem for some Tesla investors who have thought of the company as an A.I. company.

Its future is not just making cars, but cars that can drive themselves and also humanoid robots.

This big vision for the future has been taking that stock to record heights in past years.

So the big existential question is what is Tesla going forward?

And the idea that Elon Musk might not be there really rattles a lot of investors.

Musk has been retweeting supporters and sharing voting instructions on X.

But with the legal battle still looming, the shareholder vote will likely be just one element and not the deciding factor in Musk's future at Tesla.

The hope among Tesla's board is that if investors approve this pay package, it will remove this cloud hanging over the company.

But the fact of the matter is there will still be some uncertainty.

There is still a court case going on.

There are still legal questions that are plaguing the company regarding this pay package.

And it is not decided yet.