• Home
  • Latest
  • Fortune 500
  • Finance
  • Tech
  • Leadership
  • Lifestyle
  • Rankings
  • Multimedia
Tech

Elon Musk gives Twitter employees details on ‘very significant’ stock awards after relentless layoffs, cost-cutting: Report

Steve Mollman
By
Steve Mollman
Steve Mollman
Contributors Editor
Down Arrow Button Icon
March 25, 2023, 6:34 PM ET
Twitter CEO Elon Musk
Twitter CEO Elon Musk is offering employees new equity grants.Marlena Sloss—Bloomberg/Getty Images

Twitter employees might have left the office Friday feeling particularly demoralized. Last month, after yet another round of layoffs, CEO Elon Musk indicated he’d share information about “very significant stock and other compensation awards, based on performance” on March 24. 

Employees received no such information by the end of the workday. “People are not happy, to say the least,” tweeted Platformer journalist Zoë Schiffer, who tracks the company closely. 

But late last night, Musk apparently sent an email to employees with some of the much-anticipated details. Schiffer and the Wall Street Journal reported they obtained the message. 

Fortune reached out to Twitter for comments but received no immediate reply, at least not from any humans. (The company no longer has a media communications team.)

In the email, Musk acknowledged the radical changes at Twitter since his $44 billion takeover in October, but said they were needed because the company had been close to running out of money, according to Schiffer. Now, financial incentives for workers should align with the company, which will do periodic liquidity events, he reportedly wrote.

Twitter is offering employees new equity grants that will start to vest after six months, according to the Journal, and in about a year it will offer a liquidity event in which they can cash out some of that equity.

The new grants will vest over four years, according to the Journal, and will be separate from legacy equity converted to cash when Musk took over.

The grants reflect a roughly $20 billion valuation, about 55% below the price Musk paid for the company, according to The Information.

Musk took Twitter private after buying it. In its last full year as a public firm, it had more than 7,500 employees and spent nearly $630 million on stock-based compensation, according to the Journal. As of December, the company had about 2,000 workers, following one round of layoffs after another and drastic cost-cutting measures. 

Earlier this week, Musk sent employees an email at 2:30 a.m. saying the “office is not optional,” complaining about the San Francisco office being half empty. Musk has been a fierce critic of remote work, suggesting remote employees only “pretend to work.”

Subscribe to Well Adjusted, our newsletter full of simple strategies to work smarter and live better, from the Fortune Well team. Sign up today.
About the Author
Steve Mollman
By Steve MollmanContributors Editor
LinkedIn iconTwitter icon

Steve Mollman is a contributors editor at Fortune.

See full bioRight Arrow Button Icon

Latest in Tech

Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025

Most Popular

Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Rankings
  • 100 Best Companies
  • Fortune 500
  • Global 500
  • Fortune 500 Europe
  • Most Powerful Women
  • Future 50
  • World’s Most Admired Companies
  • See All Rankings
Sections
  • Finance
  • Leadership
  • Success
  • Tech
  • Asia
  • Europe
  • Environment
  • Fortune Crypto
  • Health
  • Retail
  • Lifestyle
  • Politics
  • Newsletters
  • Magazine
  • Features
  • Commentary
  • Mpw
  • CEO Initiative
  • Conferences
  • Personal Finance
  • Education
Customer Support
  • Frequently Asked Questions
  • Customer Service Portal
  • Privacy Policy
  • Terms Of Use
  • Single Issues For Purchase
  • International Print
Commercial Services
  • Advertising
  • Fortune Brand Studio
  • Fortune Analytics
  • Fortune Conferences
  • Business Development
About Us
  • About Us
  • Editorial Calendar
  • Press Center
  • Work At Fortune
  • Diversity And Inclusion
  • Terms And Conditions
  • Site Map

© 2025 Fortune Media IP Limited. All Rights Reserved. Use of this site constitutes acceptance of our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy | CA Notice at Collection and Privacy Notice | Do Not Sell/Share My Personal Information
FORTUNE is a trademark of Fortune Media IP Limited, registered in the U.S. and other countries. FORTUNE may receive compensation for some links to products and services on this website. Offers may be subject to change without notice.


Most Popular

placeholder alt text
Retail
Trump just declared December 26th a national holiday. What's open and closed?
By Dave SmithDecember 26, 2025
2 days ago
placeholder alt text
Success
As millions of Gen Zers face unemployment, CEOs of Amazon, Walmart, and McDonald's say opportunity is still there—if you have the right mindset
By Preston ForeDecember 26, 2025
2 days ago
placeholder alt text
Future of Work
Malcolm Gladwell tells young people if they want a STEM degree, 'don’t go to Harvard.' You may end up at the bottom of your class and drop out
By Sasha RogelbergDecember 27, 2025
1 day ago
placeholder alt text
Europe
Christmas 500 years ago was a drunken 6-week feast that may have been considerably better than the modern holiday, medieval historian says
By Bobbi Sutherland and The ConversationDecember 25, 2025
3 days ago
placeholder alt text
Success
Billionaire philanthropy's growing divide: Mark Zuckerberg stops funding immigration reform as MacKenzie Scott doubles down on DEI
By Ashley LutzDecember 22, 2025
6 days ago
placeholder alt text
Commentary
Why over 80% of America's top CEOs think Trump would be wrong not to pick Chris Waller for Fed chair
By Jeffrey Sonnenfeld and Steven TianDecember 27, 2025
23 hours ago

Latest in Tech

InvestingMutual Funds
Brutal year for stock picking spurs trillion-dollar fund exodus
By Isabelle Lee, Alexandra Semenova and BloombergDecember 27, 2025
14 hours ago
Innovationspace
Blue Origin names Tory Bruno to new national security group
By Loren Grush and BloombergDecember 27, 2025
14 hours ago
Alex Bores stands near a window in the Capitol building
AIdeepfakes
Ex-Palantir turned politician Alex Bores says AI deepfakes are a ‘solvable problem’ if we bring back a free, decades-old technique
By Dave SmithDecember 27, 2025
24 hours ago
AIData centers
At the edges of the AI data center boom, rural America is up against Silicon Valley billions
By Sharon GoldmanDecember 27, 2025
1 day ago
research
Cybersecuritydeepfakes
2026 will be the year you get fooled by a deepfake, researcher says. Voice cloning has crossed the ‘indistinguishable threshold’
By Siwei Lyu and The ConversationDecember 27, 2025
1 day ago
Employee is applauded at office
SuccessCareers
The ‘occupations most exposed to AI automation’ actually outperform the rest of the job market, new research reveals
By Emma BurleighDecember 27, 2025
1 day ago