Apple's Tim Cook comes in eighth place in ranking of top-paid CEOs

AppleInsider

Apple CEO Tim Cook has fallen to eighth place in a ranking of the top-paid chief executives in the US, according to a new report.

Credit: Apple

Cook earned about $265 million in 2020, Bloomberg reported Wednesday. Around $250 million of that was in stock awards, which has long comprised the majority of Cook's compensation. Cook also earned $3 million in salary, more than $10 million in bonuses, and about $1 million in perks.

The Apple CEO fell several places year-over-year. In 2019, Cook ranked as the second highest-paid CEO behind Elon Musk with compensation of $133.7 million.

Musk, the CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, again came in first with total compensation of $6.7 billion. The lion's share of that number is made up of options awards. Musk's compensation also far eclipses the runners-up. In second place was Oak Street Health CEO Mike Pykosz with about $568 million in compensation.

The chief executives of GoodRx Holdings, Open-door Technologies, and Palantir Technologies filled out the top six. Oak Street Health's COO, Geoffrey Price, came in seventh with more than $356 million in compensation.

Bloomberg also ranked the highest-paid women CEOs and executives throughout 2020, with the top-paid female executive coming in 34th place.

Apple's people and retail chief Deidre O'Brien was the fourth highest-paid executive in 2020 with compensation of $45.4 million. Among all executives, she came in 93rd place. Just behind O'Brien was Apple SVP and General Counsel Kate Adams, who ranked as the fifth highest-paid female executive and the 96th highest paid executive.

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blastdoor

I think Cook deserves more than most other CEOs, but mostly because the others deserve far less than what they're getting.

In many (perhaps most) cases, it seems like CEOs are running a protection racket. Shareholders are just paying them not to totally wreck the business. 

lkrupp

I believe Steve Jobs worked for $1/yr when he came back. Yes/No?

carnegie

lkrupp said:

I believe Steve Jobs worked for $1/yr when he came back. Yes/No?

Mr. Jobs received a $1 annual salary during his second stint with Apple, yes.

But he was otherwise financially well compensated. He received a RSU grant in 2003 which was valued at about $75 million at the time. When the shares vested in 2006 they we worth around $650 million. Those shares, if held today, would be worth more than $40 billion. (They aren't still held, of course. For starters, nearly half of them were withheld for tax purposes.)

Mr. Jobs also received an airplane which was initially reported as representing a total cost to Apple of $90 million.

dewme

Sounds like we need to put together a GoFundMe campaign for poor Tim.

entropys

Only the owner of a company should get that kind of moolah. He is an employee. Money Tim Cook gets is money the shareholders don’t get.

Does anyone seriously think Tim Cook would not work for Apple if he was paid one tenth as much? It isn’t always about money, especially when you already have a lot of it.

badmonk

Hopefully with a bit more money we can get Elon off to Mars and out of our lives.  It is this compensation that keeps me from being a Tesla investor.

But why are healthcare executives making this much compensation?!!!

I find that despicable both as a physician and patient.  Does anyone know anything about Oak Street Health?

elijahg

entropys said:

Only the owner of a company should get that kind of moolah. He is an employee. Money Tim Cook gets is money the shareholders don’t get.

Does anyone seriously think Tim Cook would not work for Apple if he was paid one tenth as much? It isn’t always about money, especially when you already have a lot of it.

He still seems more of a caretaker than much else to me. Almost all the plans were set in motion back in the Jobs days, Cook has just presided over their execution and whilst slowly throwing out the Jobsian DNA and morphing Apple into another more traditional IBM-esque risk averse giant. We know the Jobs worked on the Watch, which was probably the last product he had input on. IMO the HP was devised under Cook, and AppleTV+ is Cook's attempt at a legacy, which is why he's pushing it so hard despite it being loss-making (vs the HP which was binned likely because it never made a meaningful profit). 

But no I'm not sure he would continue at Apple - he's a beancounter after all. 

FileMakerFeller

Why all the hate? Like Liberace, poor Tim must be crying all the way to the bank.

genovelle

entropys said:

Only the owner of a company should get that kind of moolah. He is an employee. Money Tim Cook gets is money the shareholders don’t get.

Does anyone seriously think Tim Cook would not work for Apple if he was paid one tenth as much? It isn’t always about money, especially when you already have a lot of it.

He did work for Apple when he made 1 tenth as much. 

bestkeptsecret

elijahg said:

entropys said:

Only the owner of a company should get that kind of moolah. He is an employee. Money Tim Cook gets is money the shareholders don’t get.

Does anyone seriously think Tim Cook would not work for Apple if he was paid one tenth as much? It isn’t always about money, especially when you already have a lot of it.

He still seems more of a caretaker than much else to me. Almost all the plans were set in motion back in the Jobs days, Cook has just presided over their execution and whilst slowly throwing out the Jobsian DNA and morphing Apple into another more traditional IBM-esque risk averse giant. We know the Jobs worked on the Watch, which was probably the last product he had input on. IMO the HP was devised under Cook, and AppleTV+ is Cook's attempt at a legacy, which is why he's pushing it so hard despite it being loss-making (vs the HP which was binned likely because it never made a meaningful profit). 

But no I'm not sure he would continue at Apple - he's a beancounter after all. 

I think that is a pretty harsh evaluation of Cook.

It is all speculation and conjecture, of course. "We know" Jobs worked on the Watch, "IMO" the HP was devised under Cook, Apple TV+ is "Cook's attempt at a legacy" and some more speculation. 
I find it unlikely that Apple didn't have a long term plan for Apple TV+, where they know when they will break even and when they will start seeing profits. 

carnegie

entropys said:

Only the owner of a company should get that kind of moolah. He is an employee. Money Tim Cook gets is money the shareholders don’t get.

Does anyone seriously think Tim Cook would not work for Apple if he was paid one tenth as much? It isn’t always about money, especially when you already have a lot of it.

Mr. Cook probably would work for Apple for far less compensation. His actions suggest that he isn't just in it to accumulate as much wealth as possible. For instance, he's voluntarily declined about $80 million worth of dividend equivalents that he was entitled to. He also chose to redo the RSU grant he received when he became CEO to make a large portion of it performance (and time) dependent, without increasing the total he'd receive, where originally it was all only time dependent.

It's also worth noting that a large portion of his income from Apple likely goes to various governments for income taxes. Of the $282 million worth of AAPL stock that vested for him in 2020, about $148 million worth was withheld for income tax purposes.