Apple CEO Tim Cook has agreed to cut his pay this year after shareholders rebelled.
The world’s largest tech company said it would reduce Cook’s target pay package to $49 million, 40% lower than his target pay for 2022 and about half Cook’s $99.4 million total compensation that he was granted last year.
The vast majority of Cook’s 2022 compensation — about 75% — was tied up in company shares, with half of that dependent on share price performance.
But shareholders voted against Cook’s pay package after Apple’s stock fell nearly 27% last year. The vote is nonbinding, but the board’s compensation committee said it took the vote into consideration.
“The compensation committee balanced shareholder feedback, Apple’s exceptional performance, and a recommendation from Mr. Cook to adjust his compensation in light of the feedback received,” the company said in its annual proxy statement released Thursday.
This year, the executive’s share award target has been cut to $40 million. About $30 million, or three-quarters, of that is linked to share price performance.
Cook’s base salary of $3 million will stay the same, the company said, as well as a $6 million bonus.
The board said it believes Cook’s new pay package is “responsive to shareholder feedback, while continuing both to align pay with performance and to recognize Mr. Cook’s outstanding leadership.”
The tech boss, who has headed up Apple since 2011, is estimated to have a personal wealth of $1.7 billion, according to Forbes.
Apple’s share price, like other tech companies, plunged last year as coronavirus lockdowns shuttered some of its factories in China. Supply chain bottlenecks and fears that a global economic slowdown would crimp demand also dragged down its stock.
In January last year, the tech giant became the first publicly traded company to notch a $3 trillion market capitalization, yet has has shed nearly $1 billion of that value since.
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