Image: Cath Virginia / The Verge, Getty Images Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner is suing Elon Musk and his Donald Trump-supporting America PAC. Filed Monday in Philadelphia Common Pleas Court, it's the first legal action against Musk's $1 million daily award offered to registered voters.As reported previously by CNN and the Philadelphia Inquirer, the lawsuit argues that all lotteries in Pennsylvania must be run by the state and calls the arrangement deceptive, saying that Though Musk says that a winner's selection is random,' that appears false because multiple winners that have been selected are individuals who have shown up at Trump rallies in Pennsylvania."According to the suit, Since launching on October 19, 2024, America PAC claims it awarded $1,000,000 checks... Continue reading...

Image: Cath Virginia / The Verge, Getty Images Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy have laid out their plans for the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), a currently nonexistent entity they say will cut the federal government down to size." Though DOGE isn't a real department - and may in fact just be President-elect Donald Trump's way of placating Musk by giving him the appearance of a real job - it represents a long-running right-wing attempt to gut the civil service, a plan the incoming administration fully supports.DOGE could be a mechanism for a Musk shadow presidency, a nonsense job designed to keep Musk busy without giving him real power, or a curious mix of the two. In any case, Musk and Ramaswamy have proposed cutting thousands" of federal regulations and determining the... Continue reading...

Image: Cath Virginia / The Verge, Getty Images Tesla CEO Elon Musk's $56 billion pay package was struck down once again. In a ruling on Monday, Delaware Chancery Court Judge Kathaleen St. J. McCormick upheld her decision to block the compensation plan over concerns about conflicts of interest following its approval in 2018.After warning shareholders in June that Musk could leave the company if his pay package isn't approved, Tesla held a vote in hopes of reversing the judge's decision. Shareholders voted to approve the hefty compensation, but this still wasn't enough to convince the judge to reinstate it.The decision states that Musk has no procedural ground for flipping the outcome of an adverse posttrial decision based on evidence they created after trial." It also calls claims... Continue reading...

Image: Cath Virginia / The Verge, Getty Images Ever since Elon Musk closed his deal to buy Twitter he's claimed the company, now called X, is in a very dire situation from a revenue standpoint."Now, the Wall Street Journal reports that banks are preparing a coordinated move to sell off some of the $13 billion in debt they loaned Musk to finance the deal. It mentions an email sent to employees this month, also confirmed by The Verge, where the Chief Twit said, ...we've witnessed the power of X in shaping national conversations and outcomes," but also claimed, Our user growth is stagnant, revenue is unimpressive, and we're barely breaking even."Part of the reason Bank of America, Barclays, and Morgan Stanley are holding so much of the debt is from trying to avoid selling at a loss after economic conditions changed, and Musk had an extended court battle attempting to get out of the deal. While equity investors have reportedly slashed the value of their stakes by as much as 78 percent, the Journal reports, banks hope to sell senior debt at 90-95 cents on the dollar, while retaining more-junior holdings."As Musk referenced in his email, the report says the banks hope to use the narrative of Musk's link to Donald Trump, as some unnamed investors may be interested in buying based on a belief that its financials are on the way up.However, Musk also said that the company could become cash-flow positive within months" nearly two years ago, and it still faces over $1 billion in annual interest payments on the loans. The platform is increasingly turning into a testing ground for his AI ambitions, as we reported earlier this month, and while X has added some features, like job listings and a new video tab, there's little sign of the service he'd said would be able to someone's entire financial life" by the end of 2024.