What could Elon Musk buy with $1 trillion? Endless possibilities as Tesla CEO secures historic pay package

Tesla CEO Elon Musk has secured his dream $1 trillion pay package from electric vehicle (EV) maker, with over 75% of shareholders supporting the move.

Historic though it might be, Musk's pay package of $1 trillion, with 12 zeros in it, is hard for the human mind to comprehend.

To make things easier, and to highlight what kind of enormous wealth we're talking about here, we'll take you through some of the things (for the lack of a better word) that Musk could theoretically purchase with his new pay package.

Entire national economies (in theory)

While nations cannot be 'bought' to the best of our knowledge, Elon Musk could, with his new package, purchase major economies with GDPs below $1 trillion.

To put that into perspective Musk could buy out Switzerland, which has a GDP of $936.56 billion, with change to spare.

Alternatively, if the Tesla CEO has aspirations of 'owning' multiple nations, he could well purchase Singapore ($547.39 billion) and Israel ($540.38 billion), for a little over budget.

Needless to say, his options here are numerous: not many nations have GDPs above $1 trillion, and if the Tesla CEO so wishes, he could theoretically buy out any of these economies.

If Musk is willing to go a couple of hundred billion beyond budget, he could also purchase either of the Netherlands ($1.23 trillion) or the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia ($1.24 trillion).

A big chunk of big tech

While Musk's pay package may not be enough to buy out chipmaker Nvidia, which recently hit a valuation of $5 trillion, or consumer electronics giant Apple and search giant Google, that doesn't mean the Tesla CEO's options are limited.

Having already made a high-profile acquisition in purchasing Twitter, Musk could leverage his new wealth to fully buy out major tech companies such as Oracle, Tencent Holdings, Samsung Electronics, the Alibaba Group, Palantir Technologies, Advanced Micro Devices (AMD), IBM, Uber, and Qualcomm to name a few.

In fact, Musk could purchase several of these companies and still have cash to spare.

Every sports team across major leagues

Ever wondered what the collective valuation of the world's major sports leagues are? Well, as it turns out, they pale in comparison to Musk's pay package.

The four major US sports leagues—the NFL, NBA, MLB, and NHL—and their 124 teams roughly have a valuation of $510 billion, a little over half of what Musk will be paid.

If we throw in the top five European football leagues—the English Premier League (EPL), La Liga, Bundesliga, Serie A, and Ligue 1—and their 96 teams, that adds another $193 billion, roughly.

So, if Elon Musk were to purchase every single team across these leagues, it would still amount to approximately $700 billion. The Tesla CEO would still be sitting on $300 billion worth of spare money, while owning every single team in these leagues.

For good measure, we could also throw in the Indian Premier League (IPL), and purchasing the 10 teams in the IPL would only add a paltry $2.5 billion to Musk's total bill.

A self-sustaining Mars colony

Would Musk, with his new pay package, be able to bankroll humanity's quest to become a multi-planetary civilization?

While it's not a straightforward answer (owing to difficulties in estimating the total amount of money required for setting up a self-sustaining colony), Musk could fund a large chunk of initial costs required.

Remember, we're talking space travel here at scale, the stuff of science-fiction movies, so let's get into it.

Musk had previously stated that a colony in Mars would require transportation of at least one million tonnes of cargo.

Assuming SpaceX manages to hit its target cost of $100,000 per tonne, that would bring initial transportation costs to about $100 billion, a tenth of Musk's new pay package.

After that initial setup, establishing a full, self-sustaining city of over one million people would be much more expensive, with estimates putting it at around $1 trillion to an upper limit of $10 trillion.

That said, it would not be a one time payment: Musk has previously argued that the cost would be spread over 40 or more years, which would require an annualized investment of $25 billion for a $1 trillion sum.

NASA estimates, however, put the cost at around $600 billion, something that Musk would easily be able to afford with room to spare.

Hollywood honchos

Hollywood films generate billions of dollars in revenue each year, but how much would it cost to own all the major studios in Tinseltown?

A LOT, as it turns out: the 'big five' Hollywood studios, namely, Walt Disney ($210.72 billion), Sony ($168.52 billion), Universal Studios owner Comcast ($123.47 billion), Warner Bros Discovery ($55.50 billion), and Paramount Global ($16,22 billion) have valuations that would put them out of the reach of many of the world's billionaires.

Not for Musk but: even if the Tesla CEO were to purchase all of these studios at their current valuations, it would cost him $574.43 billion, leaving him with over $400 billion in spare cash.

With that spare cash and little bit extra, Musk could also buy streaming giant Netflix, which is valued at around $465 billion.

The crypto market

While it is not possible to purchase the entire market or even a single currency, the fact that Elon Musk's newly-approved pay package is about one-third the size of the entire cryptocurrency market should provide some perspective on how enormous $1 trillion is.

Currently, the total cryptocurrency market capitalization stands at around $3.4 trillion, just 3.4-times Musk's pay package.

Of that, bitcoin accounts for around $2 trillion, meaning that Musk could, in theory, lap up half of all bitcoins out there.

Alternatively, Musk could buy out the major competition with cash to spare, with Ethereum, Tether, XRP, and BNB accounting for a total of $849.2 billion.

Every single house in San Diego

Yep. You read that right.

The metropolitan region of San Diego in California, also referred to as the San Diego County, recently joined the ‘$1 trillion housing market club’.

At that valuation, Musk could easily purchase every single house, condominium, apartment, or townhouse in the region with his new pay-package and still have his current wealth ($461 billion) left to enjoy the spoils.

Ruling the skies

If real estate isn't attractive enough, Musk could also buy out all the major global airlines, and still have most of his paycheck left.

If Musk were to purchase the world's 10 biggest airlines by market cap—Delta Air Lines ($39.0 billion), United Airlines Holdings ($32.0 billion), Ryanair ($30.6 billion), InterGlobe Aviation (IndiGo) ($25.2 billion), International Consolidated Airlines Group (IAG) ($23.9 billion), Air China ($17.3 billion), Southwest Airlines ($17.0 billion), Singapore Airlines ($15.2 billion), China Southern Airlines ($14.2 billion), Turkish Airlines ($12.3 billion)—he would collectively have to spend a paltry $231.7 billion, and would be left with nearly $700 billion for other indulgences.

A private, nuclear-powered navy

The US Navy's newest nuclear-powered Gerald R Ford aircraft carriers cost around $13 billion each, and Musk could build a private navy of 76 such vessels if he wanted to, with $12 billion to spare.

Of course, there exists only one such carrier at the moment and the Pentagon has planned for a maximum of 10, but that doesn't detract from the fact that the Tesla CEO could, in theory, possess a fleet of nuclear-powered aircraft carriers much larger than that of the US Navy, which has 11 in active service.

The gaming industry

Being a gamer himself, Musk buying out major video game companies isn't too hard to imagine.

Although Microsoft (which owns Xbox) remains out of the Tesla CEO's reach with his current pay package, Musk could easily buy other major video game studios, including but not restricted to Tencent ($747.35 billion), PlayStation-owners Sony ($169.93 billion), Switch-owners Nintendo ($107.67), sports gaming giant Electronic Arts ($49.98 billion), and owners of the Grand Theft Auto (GTA) franchise, Take Two Interactive ($46.56 billion).

Combined, purchasing these companies (barring Tencent) would cost Musk approximately $374.14 billion, and the Tesla CEO would have nearly $700 billion left for other pursuits.

Automotive majors

With Tesla vying for dominance in the electric vehicles (EV) space, could Musk buy out the competition?

In theory, he could, and with some room to spare.

If the Tesla CEO decided to acquire the world's biggest auto manufacturers by market cap, namely, Toyota Motor Corp ($264.5 billion), Xiaomi ($172.5 billion), BYD Co. Ltd. ($156.2 billion), Ferrari N.V. ($87.2 billion), General Motors (GM) ($64.2 billion), Mercedes-Benz Group ($61.1 billion), BMW AG ($53.7 billion), Volkswagen AG ($55.1 billion), Ford Motor Co. ($51.4 billion), Honda Motor Co. Ltd. ($40.9 billion), it would still cost him around $956.8 billion, and he would still have more left over than many of the world's billionaires.

The Coca-Cola company and a coke for everyone on planet Earth

Beverages giant Coca-Cola, with its massive market cap of $297 billion, is unaffordable for most billionaires on the planet.

Musk, however, can not only buy the Coca-Cola company, but can also throw in a free coke for every single person on the planet, and the entire transaction would cost him a bit over $305 billion dollars (assuming a standard price of $1 per bottle of coke), leaving him with nearly $700 billion to spend on other acquisitions.

₹10,000 for every single person on the planet

Elon Musk is known for many things, philanthropy is not one of them.

Still, as a thought experiment, if the Tesla CEO decided to spend his pay package on charity and distribute an equal share to every single person on Earth, it would amount to around $121 dollars (approx ₹10,000) per head.

While that sounds like a modest amount in developed economies, it would still be considerable in less advanced economies.

To take the thought experiment further, if Musk were to help only those in extreme poverty (around 700 million by latest World Bank estimates), he could provide each individual with nearly $1,500 ( ₹1.33 lakh), transforming the lives of millions around the world.