Tesla neglect, Musk’s hurt feelings, anti-woke boohoos, and Ben & Jerry’s mission governance

Introduction

LIVE from a bottomless pit of CEO pay, it’s a Business Pants Friday Show here at March 21st Studios, featuring AnalystHole Matt Moscardi. On today’s weekly wrap up: Nelson Peltz hates woke ice cream, Self-hating Cybertrucks, and anti-ESG manbabies 

Our show today is being sponsored by Free Float Analytics, the only platform measuring board power, connections, and performance for FREE.

Story of the Week (DR):

1. ‘Incompetent:’ Jamie Dimon unloads on proxy advisor ISS

1. Jamie Dimon said Glass Lewis and Institutional Shareholder Services (ISS) should be “gone and dead and done with”, as he also launched an attack on those who pay for their services.

2. In an interview with Semafor at Blackrock’s retirement summit, Mr Dimon said: “Anyone who gives them money – shame on you.”

2. Unilever hit ‘new levels of oppressiveness,’ Ben & Jerry’s claims as its CEO was sacked over social activism

1. Ice cream maker Ben & Jerry’s has accused its parent company of firing its CEO David Stever over his support of the brand’s progressive politics.

2. On Tuesday, the Vermont-based brand filed an amended complaint in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, alleging that Unilever “has repeatedly threatened Ben & Jerry’s personnel, including CEO David Stever, should they fail to comply with Unilever’s efforts to silence the Social Mission.”

3. Ben & Jerry’s said Unilever informed its board on March 3 that it was removing and replacing Ben & Jerry’s CEO David Stever. Ben & Jerry’s said that violated its merger agreement with Unilever, which states that any decisions regarding a CEO’s removal must come after a consultation with an advisory committee from Ben & Jerry’s board.

1. “empowered to protect and defend Ben & Jerry's brand equity and integrity”

2. White man David Stever, 4 women of color (one who is the chair), and two black men. In Vermont? Are they trolling us?!?! I guess it can be done. Unilever board member Nelson Peltz is still trying to find a white actor for Black Panther

3. Unilever has not publicly disclosed a reason for Stever’s firing

4. The ice cream company has a unique corporate structure that was meant to protect its activist mission, even after its 2000 sale to Unilever:

1. Independent Board of Directors: Unlike most Unilever-owned brands, Ben & Jerry’s has an independent board specifically tasked with preserving the company’s social mission.

2. Merger Agreement Protections: The 2000 acquisition agreement required consultation with the board for key leadership decisions, including hiring or firing the CEO.

3. Social Mission Oversight: The board exists to prevent the dilution of the company’s activist identity—something that appears to be under increasing pressure.

4. Ben & Jerry’s Founders Say They Stand Behind Ousted CEO

3. Boeing Sued for Wrongful Death by Family of Whistleblower

1. Boeing pushed John Barnett, who was a quality manager at Boeing for nearly three decades, to his death by harassing and intimidating him after he raised safety concerns about the company’s plant building the 787 Dreamliner in Charleston, South Carolina, a wrongful death lawsuit filed in federal court in the state alleges. His family claim in their suit that Boeing responded by carrying out a “campaign of harassment, abuse and intimidation intended to discourage, discredit and humiliate him until he would either give up or be discredited”.

2. In the evening of March 8th last year, Barnett left the law offices of Boeing’s outside counsel in Charleston after testifying for two days in the OSHA case. Barnett was giving his account of how Boeing violated its own policies and procedures, and FAA rules, during his seven years as a quality inspector at the North Charleston plant that assembles the 787 Dreamliner. He’d delayed a trip back to his home in Louisiana to finish his deposition the next day, a Saturday. Videos cited in the police report show Barnett leaving the hotel around 8:30 PM, and getting in his Clemson orange, Dodge truck. When Barnett failed to show by the 10 AM starting time for his final round of testimony, Turkewitz called the Holiday Inn to conduct a “welfare check.”

3. Note: “America come together or die!!! Pray that the motherfk…ers who destroyed my life pay!!! I pray that Boeing pays!!! Bury me face down so that Boeing and their lying ass leaders can kiss my ass. I can’t do this any longer!!! F-k Boeing!!!

4. 'Business has been neglected': Longtime Tesla investor demands Elon Musk resign as CEO MM

1. Elon Musk Says He Has No Idea What He Did to Make Everybody So Mad at Him

1. "It's really come as quite a shock to me that there is this level of, really, hatred and violence from the left."

2. "My companies make great products that people love and I’ve never physically hurt anyone.”

3. “So why the hate and violence against me?”

4. "I always thought that the left, you know, Democrats, were supposed to be the party of empathy, the party of caring, and yet they're burning down cars, they're firebombing dealerships, they're firing bullets into dealerships, they're smashing up Teslas," Musk said. "Tesla is a peaceful company. We've never done anything harmful."

5. "I've never done anything harmful."

6. “Because I am a deadly threat to the woke mind parasite and the humans it controls."

2. Tesla just recalled basically all the Cybertrucks ever sold in America

3. Tesla workers in Germany say they don't have time to use the bathroom

1. Tesla workers at a German factory say working conditions don't allow them enough time for drinking or bathroom breaks.

2. Over 3,000 workers at a Tesla gigafactory near Berlin have signed a petition asking for more breaks and an end to intimidation from management, according to a statement from German metalworker's union IG Metall.

4. A Huge Amount of Money Is Missing From Tesla

1. Even the company's financials are now sprouting some glaring questions. As the Financial Times reports, a whopping $1.4 billion appears to have vanished in thin air. The enormous hole arises when examining the carmaker's capital expenditures and how those compare to the reported rise of the value of its assets.

2. According to Tesla's cashflow statements, the firm spent $6.3 billion on "purchases of property and equipment excluding finance leases, net of sales" in the second half of 2024. However, its balance sheet claims the gross value of property, plant, and equipment rose by only $4.9 billion — leaving an eyebrow-raising $1.4 billion discrepancy.

5. Musk Set to Receive Top-Secret Briefing on U.S. War Plans for China

6. Musk Tells Tesla Workers: Don’t Sell Your Shares

1. Tesla board members, executive sell off over $100 million of stock in recent weeks

1. Together, four top officers at the company have offloaded over $100 million in shares since early February.

2. Last week, longtime Musk ally James Murdoch  became the latest to do so, exercising a stock option and selling shares worth approximately $13 million, according to an SEC filing.

3. Elon Musk's brother, Kimbal Musk, who also sits on the board, unloaded 75,000 shares worth approximately $27 million last month, according to a filing.

4. The chairman of the board, Robyn Denholm, has offloaded more than $75 million dollars worth of shares in two transactions in the past five weeks, federal filings show.

Goodliest of the Week (MM/DR):

1. DR: Chobani CEO: Why we’re now giving all workers at least 12 weeks of parental leave

2. DR: JD Vance rips globalization, calling cheap labor a 'drug'

3. MM: Tesla Cybertruck deliveries are on hold as trims are flying off the 'bulletproof' truck DR

1. They recalled ALL of them - imagine if Mary Barra put out a car at GM that, 1 year after releasing, they had to recall ALL of them?  What would you do investors?  

Assholiest of the Week (MM):

1. Wah

1. Wah, our CEO: Tesla warns White House over tariffs in unsigned letter: ‘It’s a polite way to say that the bipolar tariff regime is screwing over Tesla’

2. Wah, China: OpenAI slams DeepSeek, warning the US government that China is catching up fast

3. Wah, customers: Tesla owners are trading in their EVs at record levels, Edmunds says, Tesla springs last-minute public all hands on staffers, confusion ensues, Tesla Cybertrucks are getting roasted on TikTok—one prank at a time

4. Wah, investors: Baillie Gifford slashes Tesla stake as investor calls on Musk to step down, $1.4bn is a lot to fall through the cracks, even for Tesla, A Huge Amount of Money Is Missing From Tesla

5. Wah, privacy: Dad demands OpenAI delete ChatGPT’s false claim that he murdered his kids

6. Wah, I’m back in middle school: Elon Musk says he's shocked at the level of Tesla hate and vandalism happening: 'I've never done anything harmful'

2. Stefan Padfield DR

1. "It is not surprising that our proposal received low support, given the concerns we have about bias and conflicts of interest infecting the votes and recommendations of the Big 5 asset managers and proxy advisors, as well as the company’s management," Padfield said.

2. "The issues raised by our proposals remain relevant to Disney’s bottom line, and we arguably saw an indication of this in the fact that neither ESG nor DEI were mentioned once, directly or indirectly, in Iger’s opening remarks -- suggesting the company is slowly distancing itself from the leftist radicalism embodied in those agendas," Padfield said.

3. Fact check: ESG and DEI were not mentioned in Iger’s remarks in 2024.  They were not mentioned in 2023.  Congrats on paying attention to whatever’s in front of your face.

4. Shareholders rejected your proposal because it was asinine and no one cares

5. Your group, NCPPR, gets an AVERAGE of 1% everywhere… but did you notice that NLPC, your sister group in anti white person crime, got a solid 11% in favor at Apple for it’s very real proposal on the dangers of AI?  And Bowyer, got a 10% in favor at Apple for a report on child sex abuse software and got 1% here at Disney?

6. Maybe the problem is you write overtly racist, stupid fucking shareholder proposals and you shout shut your fat mouth?

3. Have we reached the CEO pay tipping point?

1. Surge in incentive pay lifts HanesBrands' 2024 CEO compensation to $12.9 million

2. Big companies backtrack on climate goals in bosses’ pay

3. Starbucks Must End Its Greed'—Bernie Sanders Calls Out Starbucks CEO For Getting $96 Million For 4 Months Of Work

4. Klarna's CEO got an 862% pay rise ahead of its IPO

4. We hate TREES now?  TREES?

1. Is planting trees 'DEI'? Trump administration cuts nationwide tree-planting effort

Headliniest of the Week

1. DR: Top workplace psychologist Adam Grant says offering employees better pay packages is the smartest move for the ‘long term’

2. DR: Mom of child dead from measles: “Don’t do the shots,” my other 4 kids were fine

3. DR: Prince Harry’s friends are blaming Meghan Markle for making him ‘too woke’

4. MM: Donald Trump's favorite musical explained as he demands 'non-woke' theater

1. Like 89% of Broadway is gay, no?

5. MM: Wait, whaaaa?  British Gas: Centrica CEO’s pay slashed in half at FTSE 100 giant

Who Won the Week?

1. DR: Sonya Mishra, author of new study: How does society perceive power-seeking women differently from status-seeking women?

1. The study found that desiring status is seen as more congruent with feminine stereotypes compared to desiring power, and that women who desire status are less likely to incur backlash compared to women who desire power.

2. MM: This video: Tesla Fans Furious at Video of Tesla Crashing Into Wall Painted Like Road

1. Mark Rober tested autopilots for Lexus and Tesla… and Tesla ran over a dummy kid over and over

2. As Electrek points out, Autopilot has a well-documented tendency to disengage right before a crash. Regulators have previously found that the advanced driver assistance software shuts off a fraction of a second before making impact.

3. It's a highly questionable approach that has raised concerns over Tesla trying to evade guilt by automatically turning off any possibly incriminating driver assistance features before a crash.

Predictions

1. DR: Bowyer Research and Robbie Starbuck blame female CEOs in the S&P 500 for reducing the overall percentage of male CEOs in the S&P 500

2. MM: Bowyer Research and Robbie Starbuck blame all the women running the big 5 - Larry Fink, Ron O’Hanley, Salim Ramji, Gary Retelny, and Bob Mann - for the failure of their shareholder proposals and demand a report from each requesting an analysis of the risk of having so many woke women running the big 5