Elon Musk’s $1 trillion Tesla pay deal has sparked a meme coin frenzy, with numerous Musk-themed tokens flooding the market within hours of its board approval.
New tokens such as “TRILLIONS,” “Elon’s $1,” and “MUSK” launched across Solana, Ethereum, and BNB Chain, according to DEXTools. Several versions of TRILLIONS surged hundreds of percent after launch, with combined trading volumes topping $20 billion.
Many of the new coins plummeted soon after launch as creators pulled liquidity in apparent exit scams.
Musk Receives Historic Compensation Package
More than 75% of Tesla shareholders agreed to give Musk, already the world’s wealthiest person, shares worth almost $1 trillion if the company achieves ambitious financial and operational goals over the next decade. If paid out, it would likely make him the world’s first trillionaire.
The compensation package will be broken up into 12 tranches of Tesla shares, with one of the milestones being that Tesla’s market cap reaches $8.5 trillion in the coming years.
Tesla’s board and Musk emphasized that the compensation package is key to retaining Musk’s leadership as the company transitions from electric vehicle manufacturer to an AI/robotics firm.
That $8.5 trillion capitalization goal is over six times more than the company’s current market cap of around $1.4 trillion, according to Google Finance.
Tesla’s stock fell more than 3% yesterday, but is up more than 1% in pre-market trading.
Elon Musk Frequently Impacts Meme Coin Trading
Elon Musk’s influence on meme coins is not new. The billionaire has for years helped shape market sentiment with his comments, tweets, and corporate moves.
Nicknamed the “DOGE-Father,” Musk helped propel Dogecoin to mainstream fame with his frequent mentions.
More recently, he’s shifted his focus toward Bitcoin, with both Tesla and SpaceX holding the crypto as part of their treasury strategies.
Tesla ranks as the 12th-largest corporate holder with 11,509 BTC worth about $1.16 billion at current prices, giving the company more than a 200% unrealized gain, according to Bitcoin Treasuries.
Musk continues to champion Bitcoin’s principles. On The Joe Rogan Experience, he revealed that X Chat, a new encrypted messaging system for his social media platform X, uses a peer-to-peer framework that’s “kind of similar to Bitcoin.”
Last month, he posted that Bitcoin’s foundation in energy makes it “uniquely trustworthy” compared to fiat money, later replying with the “100” emoji to a user who said Dogecoin shares that same quality.
True.
That is why Bitcoin is based on energy: you can issue fake fiat currency, and every government in history has done so, but it is impossible to fake energy.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) October 14, 2025