SpaceX has adopted corporate governance policies that will erode typical shareholder protections in unprecedented ways, giving founder Elon Musk virtually unchecked executive authority when the rocket maker goes public later this year.

Excerpts of SpaceX's IPO registration statement reviewed by Reuters show the company is combining supervoting shares, mandatory arbitration, and Texas corporate law to give Musk and other insiders broad control.

“It closes the voting door, the courthouse door and the proposal door simultaneously. It’s unprecedented in terms of creating a total lack of accountability,” said Bruce Herbert, CEO of sustainability-focused wealth management firm Newground Social Investment. Newground of Seattle challenged Musk at his electric-vehicle company Tesla with a shareholder proposal that won 49% of the vote in November.

Yet for all of Musk's controversies, many investors see him as a visionary able to achieve impossible things. It's fair to say that whatever the so-called "key executive risk" that SpaceX faces if Musk somehow were no longer in control, his backers still trust him to build wealth all around. You can read more by clicking the button below. 

I'm sending this out a bit late today after listening to an interesting roster at the Reuters Responsible Business USA event in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Brandon Sorbom, co-founder and chief science officer of Commonwealth Fusion Systems, spoke about progress in the race to get more power out of fusion reactions. He also pushed back on a recent study in Nature Energy that said that forecasts of fusion costs falling over time were too optimistic.

 Matt Patsky, CEO of Trilium Asset Management, spoke about how the current proxy season isn't so different despite changes the SEC put in place that seemed to favor management over investors.

 And Alex Hausman, Google's director of sustainability reporting, used one of my favorite business truisms when discussing the need to be skeptical when evaluating AI results: "Trust, but verify." Please use this platitude in all situations.

A proxy battle is heating up between Exxon and New York City Comptroller Mark Levine. The city's police pension fund he represents filed a proposal to modify the company's program meant to harness retail proxy votes on management's side.

Exxon says the idea reflects how Levine "has not done the work to confirm the viability of their proposal," such as conforming to a no-action letter the company obtained from securities regulators.

Levine hit back in his own filing on May 5, writing among other things that Exxon's board is trying to insulate itself from accountability and adding there is no data to support Exxon's claim it was created at "no cost."

 Vote tallies at Exxon's May 27 shareholder meeting will decide the arguments. Until then, pass the popcorn.