Tag: CEOs

Listed: Biggest NEO-CEO Pay Flips

The typical S&P 500 company pays its chief executive officer more — typically 2.7 times more — than its next four named executive officers, or NEOs. But not always.

Agenda commissioned research firm MyLogIQ, which crunches data from SEC filings, to analyze the largest S&P 500 companies at which an NEO received more compensation than the CEO last year. That provided several management insights.

To be sure, key NEO personnel such as technology experts and product designers are among those who can make more than CEOs. A separate analysis of the highest-paid NEOs found that eight of the 10 highest-paid made as much or almost as much as their CEOs.

Media CEOs Reigned in 2018 Pay

Media titans came under heavy scrutiny in 2018 for their business practices and deal making, but they were well-compensated for their trouble.

The S&P 500’s communication-services sector, a group that includes Facebook Inc., Walt Disney Co. and AT&T Inc., posted a median CEO pay of $22.6 million in 2018, according to a Wall Street Journal analysis, higher than any other sector and more than $10 million above the median pay of S&P chief executives as a group.

The sector included two of the five highest-paid CEOs in the Journal’s analysis of the index. David Zaslav of Discovery Inc., one of the sector’s smallest companies, had a $129.4 million pay package, more than any other CEO, as the owner of television networks such as Discovery Channel, HGTV and Food Network posted a total shareholder return of 10.6% for the year. A spokesman for Discovery said Mr. Zaslav’s compensation is mostly made up of performance-based equity over the next five years and is 97% at risk

Strong Returns Lift Pay for Software CEOs

PayPal Holdings Inc.’s PYPL -1.79% Daniel Schulman collected a pay package totaling $37.8 million in 2018, making him one of the highest-paid bosses in the S&P 500. But for Mr. Schulman and many of his fellow CEOs in the software industry, big paydays were backed by healthy returns.

Most companies selling software and related services thrived last year, with half delivering a total shareholder return of at least 10.3%, a Wall Street Journal analysis shows. That success translated to their CEOs, who received a median raise of 11.7%.

By contrast, median shareholder return for S&P 500 companies as a group was minus 5.8%, the first negative showing of any postrecession year. Despite those losses, most CEOs got a raise and the median pay reached $12.4 million last year.

CEO Pay Up Despite TSR Plummet

CEOs have done pretty well for themselves in 2019. Data from multiple compensation consultancies share one consistent finding: Pay is up.

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MyLogIQ’s data, for instance, shows that median CEO total direct comp was roughly $12.5 million for the S&P 500 and around $5.1 million for the Russell 3000.

Pay Ratios

Meanwhile, in the second year of companies’ disclosing the ratio between their median worker’s pay and the CEO’s pay, the average pay ratio is 282 to 1 for the S&P 500, MyLogIQ data shows.

At Mattel, as one example, CEO Ynon Kreiz would have to work only 36 minutes to make the entire annual wages of the company’s median worker, who made a little less than $5,500 last year.

MyLogIQ broke down what the hourly pay for CEOs would be if that were how they were compensated. Kreiz’s pay would sit at just below $9,000 per hour.

Jet Perks: Which Travel Bills Were the Priciest?

The list of the top-10 biggest spenders on aircraft perks added a new member to its ranks: Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg.

In 2018, Sandberg’s pay package included nearly $909,000 in aircraft perks, according to SEC filings analyzer MyLogIQ.

She ranks fourth on Agenda’s list of top-10 air travel spenders in the S&P 500.

First on the list is, once again, Mark Zuckerberg, Sandberg’s boss.

Zuckerberg’s corporate aircraft travel costs reached nearly $2.6 million, more than twice the amount of the next executive on the list, Tyson Foods chairman John Tyson. Tyson’s corporate jet travel amounted to almost $1.2 million, according to company disclosures.

CEOs Under 50 Are a Rare Find in the S&P 500

When he became chief executive of power-generation company NRG Energy Inc. more than three years ago, Mauricio Gutierrez said his selection raised eyebrows.

One reason: He is younger than most executives running S&P 500 companies. “I’m an outlier,” the 48-year-old said. “People take notice.”

At America’s largest companies, chief executives under 50 are still a relative rarity. A Wall Street Journal analysis of S&P 500 companies that filed corporate proxy statements by May 1 shows 28 of 493 CEOs, or 6%, are under 50.

Among members of Generation X in the top job: Nasdaq Inc.’s Adena Friedman, age 49, along with the chief executives of burrito chain burrito chain Chipotle Mexican Grill Inc. and casino giant casino giant Wynn Resorts Ltd.

Big Companies Pay CEOs for Good Performance—and Bad

The mechanics of chief-executive pay have grown ever more complex, but the rules remain simple: Strong performers get a raise. So do most of the rest.

For the fourth year straight, the biggest U.S. companies set CEO pay records in 2018, a Wall Street Journal analysis found, even as a majority delivered negative stock-market returns to their shareholders—a sign of the often-weak relationship between pay and performance.

Median compensation rose to $12.4 million for the bosses of S&P 500 companies last year, up 6.6% from 2017 and the highest since the 2008 recession, the Journal analysis found. Yet the median shareholder return for the companies was minus 5.8%, the worst showing since the financial crisis.

Think CEOs Are Overpaid? See How They Compare With Hollywood Celebs and Sports Stars

Halfway through this season of “American Idol,” Katy Perry hit a milestone. That’s when her earnings as a judge on the ABC show surpassed what most chief executives in the S&P 500 made all of last year.

The Wall Street Journal this week released its annual analysis of CEO pay, which hit another post-recession record in 2018. But almost all of them are still looking up at radio host Howard Stern and basketball star Steph Curry.

To put executive pay in context, the Journal matched it up against earnings for highly paid professionals across a variety of fields, from sports and entertainment to finance and law.