Meta told the SEC this week that CEO Mark Zuckerberg considered moving his primary residence out of California ahead of a November ballot measure that would hit billionaires with a one-time 5 percent wealth tax. Rather than risk losing him, the company’s special committee moved to make staying worth his while.
According to the filing, Zuckerberg told the committee he was “evaluating relocating his primary residence outside California” and warned that any public step in that direction, including listing his California real estate, would be noticed by employees and “raise questions for management of the Company going forward.”
Meta decided keeping him in place mattered more than letting him walk. The filing states the company’s goal was to keep Zuckerberg “continuing to lead the Company from California and in close proximity to Meta Superintelligence Labs,” as Meta pours resources into AI and fights for ground against competitors.
The fix: Meta will phase out restrictions over the next eight years on Zuckerberg’s ability to sell certain shares, but only if he keeps leading the company and stays based near its Silicon Valley headquarters. The plan creates a new share class letting him cash out up to half his economic stake without giving up the voting control tied to his special shares.
Meta didn’t pretend this comes cheap. The filing flags a “significant, multi-billion dollar tax payment” tied to the ballot measure if it passes.
A Tax Already Dividing Tech’s Biggest Names
California voters decide the measure in November. It would impose a one-time 5 percent tax on billionaires’ total assets. Opposition has already drawn serious money from Google co-founder Sergey Brin, investor Ron Conway, DoorDash CEO Tony Xu and crypto billionaire Chris Larsen. Xu also sits on Meta’s special committee that negotiated Zuckerberg’s new arrangement.
Not every tech executive is against it. Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang has said he wouldn’t mind paying the tax.
Startup founders have raised a separate concern: how the tax would treat paper gains on private company stock, a standard form of compensation at firms that aren’t yet profitable. Figma cofounder and CEO Dylan Field has warned that founders and early employees could owe the tax on stakes they can’t use to pay it, potentially triggering capital gains taxes on top of that in what he called a “double tax event.”
Field also warned that founders whose startups have a bad year could still owe the wealth tax, forcing them into a “down round” that lowers their company’s valuation, scares off talent and investors, or pushes them to take on debt they can’t easily repay — or leave California entirely.
“Silicon Valley startups (ironically) follow the herd. Once enough respected companies/founders establish a pattern, other startups will follow, even if the wealth tax does not apply to them yet,” Field wrote on X.
