A federal judge on Friday approved the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission’s (SEC) plans to distribute $40 million USD from the regulator’s 2018 settlements with Tesla and company CEO Elon Musk to the electric vehicle (EV) pioneer’s investors — reports Reuters.
The news comes after the SEC said earlier this month that it was going to begin paying out the funds to involved investors following Musk’s criticism of the agency for ignoring its “court-ordered duty” by not having done so yet.
The distribution plan was first proposed by the SEC on March 9, and approved by U.S. District Judge Alison Nathan in Manhattan last week.
As part of the original settlements, both Tesla and Musk paid civil fines of $20 million each after the SEC brought a lawsuit alleging Musk defrauded the company’s investors when he tweeted in August 2018 that he had “funding secured” to take Tesla private. The funds have since grown to about $41.2 million including interest, per the SEC.
Musk also agreed to step down as Tesla chairman and have a company lawyer pre-approve all of his tweets before posting.
The Tesla CEO last month accused the SEC of conducting “unfounded investigations” against him and his company, to which the agency responded days later.
Musk is currently looking to relieve his Twitter account of SEC oversight. Earlier this month, Musk petitioned a judge to stop the SEC’s oversight of his Twitter after previously alleging that the watchdog leaked trade information from its probe into Tesla.
The SEC is also investigating Musk’s Twitter poll last fall asking his then-62.5 million followers if he should sell 10% of his stake in Tesla to cover his multibillion-dollar tax bill. Musk has since sold about $16.4 billion worth of Tesla stock.
