A new report shows that the compensation packages of the CEOs of America’s largest companies will break records by 2023, with stock compensation largely responsible for the increase.
Analysis by the Wall Street Journal showed that the average salary of the CEOs of the largest companies in the US was $15.7 million. That’s up from $14.5 million in 2022.
The top eight CEOs all earned $50 million or more last year, reflecting a global trend of rising executive salaries. These salaries generally depend on performance.
The list of highest earners does not include high-profile CEOs like Mark Zuckerberg, Elon Musk or Tim Cook, nor are there any women in the top 25.
The top earner on the Journal’s list was Broadcom’s Hock Tan, who raked in about $162 million. As part of his deal, Tan must remain in his role for five years while ensuring the company meets price targets.
The top earner on the Journal’s list was Broadcom’s Hock Tan, pictured here, who raked in about $162 million
Nikesh Arora, a former Google executive, came in second thanks to his role at Palo Talo Networks
Tan’s 2023 salary, which was driven by stock awards of $160.5 million, was 510 times the average salary of employees at the chip company.
Broadcom previously said Tan’s pay deal is partly intended to ensure loyalty and ensure shareholder objectives can be achieved. During the remainder of his time as CEO, Tan will not receive any cash bonuses or other shares.
In November 2023, Broadcom announced that it had cleared all regulatory hurdles and plans to complete its $69 billion acquisition of cloud technology company VMware.
Broadcom posted revenue of $35.82 billion in 2023, and its shares are up about 17 percent so far in 2024, after nearly doubling last year.
Tan has been pursuing such deals for years, building the company with major acquisitions such as Symantec for nearly $11 billion in 2019, and CA Technologies for about $19 billion the year before.
Tan follows Nikesh Arora of Palo Alto Networks, who earned $151 million, including $149.5 million in stock awards. Arora, a former top executive at Google, has held the position at Palo Alto since June 2018.
The company provides software security to 85 of the Fortune 100 companies.
In third place is Stephen Schwarzman, who raised $119.7 million, including nearly $350,000 in equity from Blackstone, the world’s largest private equity firm.
Schwarzman, a former strong supporter of Donald Trump’s presidency but who revealed he will not support him in 2024, took home a total of $896.7 million including dividends, a 30 percent drop from his 1, $2 billion by 2022.
Schwarzman owns approximately 231.9 million shares of Blackstone and the company paid an annual dividend of $3.35 per share.
Stephen Schwarzman, co-founder, chairman and CEO of Blackstone, is third on the list. He recently made headlines after declaring that he would not support Donald Trump in 2024
Charter CEO Chris Winfrey came in fourth on the list of CEOs, having been with the company since 2010
In fourth place, Christopher Winfrey of Charter Communications earned $89 million, including $84 million in equity. Winfrey has been with Charter since 2010, first as CFO before becoming COO in 2021. In that time, Charter has grown significantly.
In December 2022, he ascended to his current role as CEO and president. It was the first revealed in March of this year that his pay had increased to just under $90 million.
The highest-paid woman on the list is Accenture’s Julie Sweet, who ranks 28th on the list with an income of just over $30 million, $120 million less than those at the top.
The next highest-ranking woman on the list, Lisa Su of Advanced Micro Devices, with earnings of $30 million, earned $28 million in shares.
In the year ending 2023, 31 women headed companies in the S&P 500, up from 24 in 2020.
Apple CEO Tim Cook managed to crack the top ten earners, alongside Netflix’s Ted Sarandos and Discovery’s David Zaslav.
A third of the worst performers in the WSJ analysis were healthcare companies, with Pfizer admitting it failed to pay bonuses to executives after missing financial targets.
The pharmaceutical giant’s CEO Albert Bourla received $17.5 million in equity as a thank you for loyalty and to help focus on long-term goals, the company said.
