According to a Monday filing in a Delaware court, Tesla’s directors will return $735 million to the electric car maker to settle claims from shareholders that they “excessively overpaid themselves” in one of the largest shareholder settlements of its kind in the Court of Chancery.

The case was brought by the Police and Fire Retirement System of the City of Detroit in 2020. The settlement will be paid directly to Tesla to benefit the company, resolving the 2020 lawsuit from a retirement fund that holds Tesla stock. 

The company’s CEO, Elon Musk, is already under scrutiny in a separate suit filed by a shareholder in 2019 for his $56 billion compensation package. The suit aims to rescind Musk’s pay deal, claiming it is “the largest compensation grant in human history”. 

According to a court filing, the directors were accused of awarding themselves unfair and excessive compensation in the way of 11 million stock options from 2017 to 2020, which allegedly grossly exceeded norms for a corporate board. Directors have agreed to return the equivalent value of 3.1 million Tesla stock options.

In its defence, the company argued that the stock options were necessary to incentivise the directors and align their goals with that of investors. The carmaker further argued that its stock grew 10-fold, driven by unprecedented growth, which meant an increase in stock options awarded to its directors and Musk.