Elon Musk Pay Package at Tesla - no surprise there!

The normous pay package for Elon Musk is no surprise for anyone who is watching the (fruitless)  debate about the correct level of executive pay.
So far there has not been an agreement what approriate pay for senior executives, especially CEO's should be.
And I always argued that ANY level of pay could be justified under the current regime. If, say, a company earns 100 million and next year it earns 150 million, why no award the reigning CEO half of that increase? of even half of the total? (as some Hedge Funds do).
14-June-2024

Mega Grants: Why Would a Board Approve Nine-Figure CEO Pay?

https://corpgov.law.harvard.edu/2023/08/07/mega-grants-why-would-a-board-approve-nine-figure-ceo-pay/
15-Aug-2023

Du Plessis: Pot calling the Kettle black

Interesting to read this lament from someone who has to much to be grateful for this "narrow british way of life". Thanks to the "narrow" circle of people who seem to be in control of so much of the City he sailed comfortably from one post to the next.

When he extols the positive (in his "narrow" view) aspects of the business enviroment in the United States he conveniently forgets to mention that a separation of CEO and Chairman is highly unusual over there. And rightly so, as the facts clearly demonstrate that a separation has virtually no benefit and if anything is detrimental. If business performs markedly better in the USA it clearly speaks against this (expensive) separation.

Du Plessis clearly thinks that the sky is the limit for executive pay - again assuming that only high pay for the C-Suite will lead to strong economies when that is not supported by the facts. The USA may look well positioned as the nation with the highest per-capita income (apart from minnows like Luxembourg, Monaco etc) but can one assume that extravagant levels of executive pay are the principal - or necessary - cause of this?

One of the people rankings so popular with the press placed du Plessis as the 10th most powerful person in UK business (TheTimes 2006 Top 100) But does he enjoy any legitimacy? Who gives him this "power"? the same narrow circles that control government, regulators and major firms!

In the latter case it is the financial intermediaries - Pension Funds, Mutual Funds, Insurance companies and Private Banks - that vote "their" shares in favour of high pay. Like du Plessis they have no explicit mandate on how to cast their votes from the ultimate shareholders - the great unwashed public. Proxy Advisors may look like they take an objective view they are also beholden to these Intermediaries who pay substantial (secret) fees to them.

(10 May 2023)

Narrow British way of life’ is holding back the City (PayWall)

JPMorgan shareholders vote against Jamie Dimon’s pay

Just shows that the efforts to contain Executive Pay, esp at the very top, have been fruitless so far. If only 31% support Dimon's pay, how can it actually stay at the same level? Is there no moral sense of obligation - at least with the toothless board of directors? Nobless oblige one used to say.....so there is no nobless anymore.
What is really wrong with the Personnel Management of many - if not most - firms is the fact that too much reliance is put on the top man/woman and there is no succession plan or proper preparation. Before boards should end pointless debates and rush to the lunch/dinner/golf course they should really review top executive staffing to at least two levels below the CEO. There should also be a plan for the immediate succession - a firm like JP Morgan should be able to have groomed at least two or three worthy successors to Dimon, and reward them well - and cut his ridiculous compensation and assorted freebies.
(19-May-2022)

Private Equity basically a Conglomerate in Drag

That the Head of this 'Private' Equity firm openly states how he controls the CEOs of the companies he controls gives away the fact that PE firms basically are Conglomerates in drag and should never have been allowed to slip under the regulatory mantel designed to protect retail investors from fraudulent investment firms. As a consequence PE promoters enjoy unfair advantages with respect to tax, corporate governance (esp corporate compensation), transparency, treatment of staff and clients. No wonder the universe of listed companies is shrinking fast - and will accelerate if regulations are not changed - FAST!
(6-Dec-2019)
Marketwatch

I do like to be working for an Association

Nearly as good as to be beside the seaside: to work for one of the Associations that(claim) to work for the good of investors. AFME (also known as the Association for Financial Markets in Europe) pays its top executive £1.7 Mio in 2018 and he is 'understood' to be in line for  £2 Mio in 2019. This is a huge number that is totally out of proportion given that staffing and pay in the sectors the AFME is representing is under pressure. The chief of the Investment Association - a lobby group that is looking after the interests of savers in a more direct fashion than the lobby for market professionals - pockets a relatively paltry£666,000 in 2018. How any of the member firms of these two lobbies can claim to protect the interests of investors/savers is difficult to imagine as they seem to be incapable (unwilling?) to keep their own houses in order.
(19-August-2019)

Anyone still thinks that investment fiduciaries should run Corporate Governance?

Who are the 90% that waved through Lloyds Bank CEO Horta-Osorio's pension? The missing link in the whole debate about corporate governance, and inequality in particular, is the lack of any control that real end investors - the man/woman on the street whose savings are at stake - have over the actions that fiduciaries (and fund managers do NOT own any shares!). And make one guess how fund managers associated with Lloyds Bank voted.
(18-May-2019)
Lloyds wins backing for CEO’s pension — but 10% of shareholders dissent

Amundi investors urged to vote against chief’s pay deal

Major problem for the whole governance debate: The 'Shareholders' as the Investment Management Firms and/or Banks are often mistakenly called are in reality nothing but fiduciaries for the real end investors. But they have disproportionate power over corporate policies - and therefore our whole economic (market? capitalist?) system. This is a relatively recent development - just remember that Fidelity was a comparative midget in terms of AuM just 45 years ago, and Blackrock was only founded in 1986. No one seems to have thought of introducing a mechanism that allows end investors - the real shareholders - to influence - let alone control - the governance policies that are exercised on their behalf by these fiduciaries. To add insult to injury directly or indirectly they pay their fiduciaries twice, once with any management fees and again for farming out governance to third parties, known as Proxy 'Advisers'. Not many savers are informed about the fees that are charged by these advisers and how their performance is measured. At best they provide a fig leaf for the fiduciaries and at worst the fees they receive are an outright waste of money as fund managers should be able to assess companies they invest in in a 360 degree fashion, not just if the price will go up or down in the next five minutes. So to conclude: would the great unwashed public agree to pay CEO's the sums they get paid these days? I think the answer should be obvious.
(11-May-2019)
Amundi investors urged to vote against chief’s pay deal

NO! The GE 'Shareholders' DID NOT approve Executive Pay!

How often do I have to repeat this: it is the financial intermediaries, aka investor fiduciaries, who approved the Pay for the senior GE executives - and most other C-suite staffers. The REAL investors have no say in this matter and the whole corporate governance movement is at best a fig-leaf, at worst a circus to entertain the ordinary citizen watching helplessly.
(9-May-2019)
GE Investors Approve Executive Pay, Reject Independent Chairman

Overpaid CEO's are lacking Modesty and Decency

Given the astronomical pay that CEO's and their carefully selected board members (and they all belong to the same Club) award themselves one can only presume that the old fashioned habits of Modesty and Decency have given way to unbridled greed. These pay rises are not simply the result of misconceived economic and business theories but also the reflection of a general decline in moral standards.
(24-April-2019)

CEO Pay - how much is too much?

$65 million for Disney's Bob Iger is insane says Disney heiress. And many - if not most people - would tend to agree. But in the heated discussion about CEO pay one question has not been answered: what is the correct level of CEO pay, and how should it be set?
(23-April-2019)
Disney heiress calls Bob Iger's $65 mio pay insane 

The Real Problem with the Carried Interest Tax

Another broadside from a supporter of the status quo. But one aspect is forgotten (on purpose?) in this ongoing saga. For arguments sake let us agree that it is beneficial and fair to give entrepreneurs and investors a lower tax rate on capital gains. But the promoters behind Private Equity are not always putting sufficient funds of their own into the businesses they finance. Taxable income could easily be converted into capital gains if they award themselves a sort of founder's shares at artificially low prices - and voila, when the company/asset is sold they can book a capital gain that is taxed at a much reduced rate. Given the opaque nature of Private Equity one has to assume that this practice is quite prevalent in the industry. In addition, basing buy-out vehicles in offshore tax havens allows even more manipulation of tax levels. So while most of the money managed by 'Private' Equity ultimately comes (via financial intermediaries) from the Public the tax affairs of the promoters are the one aspect that is really private. Maybe a small part of all the noise and energy spent on reforming pay in the listed company sector would be much better addressed to shed more light on the pay practices in the Private Equity business.
(19-April-2019)
Hiking the tax on carried interest capital gains is a lose, lose, lose

What purpose do Proxy Advisers serve?

One of the large Proxy Advisers seems to be more than happy to sign off on the compensation of Credit Suisse CEO Thiam. And many institutional investors are similarly content with his pay. But where does that leave the ordinary investor - the great majority is not holding CS shares directly but invests their savings via intermediaries who are really fiduciaries. But how do they insure that their investor's best interests are represented? This is the great deficiency in all the discussions about corporate governance - the real participants have no voice!
(10-April-2019)

The 100 Most Overpaid CEOs 2019

This 2019 study is the fifth report by As You Sow. During these five years, what has changed? Quite a bit, and not enough. Significantly, more large shareholders are voting against more CEO pay packages. Those who are not are more isolated and defensive (25-Feb).
As You Sow

UK bank CEOs paid 120 times as much as average employee

The banks made the disclosures alongside full-year results over the past fortnight, ahead of new reporting requirements coming into force next year that oblige firms to set out the ratio of CEO pay to a median UK employee and those in the lowest and upper pay quartiles. (25-Feb)
Reuters

Proxy Advisers - cosy and intransparent cartel

Who gives the handful of proxy advisers to right to set their own 'policies'?
Do they ever ask the real end investor, - and not only the intermediaries that pay hefty fees with other peoples' money?
Why does it seem impossible for real end investors - and the public at large - to find out the fees that are paid to proxy firms so that they can do the work that the financial intermediaries should be doing, i.e. supervising the companies they invest in on behalf of the great unwashed public?
(10-Feb-2019)
ISS Policies on Compensation 

Does UBS Chairman really deserve $ 6 Mio?

Or is he just an extremely well-paid PR operator? If American firms can get by without a separate Chairman is keeping such expensive staffers a necessary expense? Any decent IR professional could front such an announcement. Does anyone in the Corporate Governance crowd really care?
(22-Jan-2019)
UBS sees outflows of $13 Million

ESG Investing - more than just a fashion?

The targets of ESG investors are all worthwhile but do not take much courage. Why not also go after excessive executive compensation or nasty political regimes?
(17-Dec-2018)
ESG groupthink has captured the fund industry

Ghosn's deferred Pay - an isolated case?

The latest instalment from the Executive Pay Series highlights another aspect of over-complicated pay structures. One has to wonder if this was an isolated case. A simple compensation system as favoured by Pro-Governance would help to prevent similar problems.
(27-Nov-2018)
Possible Ghosn Defense: He Didn’t Think He Needed to Report Deferred Pay
(Wall St Journal, PayWall)
 

Pay Revolts - But key question is unresolved

All very well to threaten further investor 'revolts' on executive pay. But apart from the fact that the 'investors' are really only fiduciaries the main question remains unresolved: When is pay 'excessive'? (24- Nov-2018)
Investors tell companies: curb excessive pay or expect more revolts