What’s a CEO worth? Millions ... and then some

updated 3:28 p.m. ET June 11, 2007

Compensation for America’s top CEOs has skyrocketed into the stratospheric heights of pro athletes and movie stars, as half now make more than $8.3 million a year, and some make much, much more.

According to a study conducted by the Associated Press, CEOs of companies in the Standard & Poor’s 500 that filed proxy information in the first half of this year received a combined $4.16 billion in 2006.

The high cost of chief executive pay has drawn criticism in recent years as salaries rose, stock options paid off like lottery jackpots, and perks like chauffeured cars and private jets spread. Still, there are few signs of any investor backlash.

Yahoo Inc.’s Terry Semel, whose Internet company has lagged behind Google Inc. in profit growth and stock performance, led the pack with total compensation last year of $71.7 million, according to the AP formula used to analyze those filings.

That’s more than 2½ times the $27 million in total compensation this year for the New York Yankees’ Alex Rodriguez, baseball’s highest-paid player, and higher than the typical pay A-list stars like Brad Pitt or Leonardo DiCaprio earn for a movie — $20 million, plus 20 percent of the gross box office take.

Semel was followed on the AP list by two energy industry CEOs, Bob Simpson of XTO Energy Inc. at $59.5 million and Occidental Petroleum Corp.’s Ray R. Irani at $52.8 million. Investment banks and energy companies were the sectors with the highest-paid leaders.

The top 10 earners were in disparate industries, but they all had one thing in common: They were paid at least $30 million each in 2006.

The Securities and Exchange Commission required companies starting this year to more completely disclose what they’re paying their top executives. But the SEC’s approach has been criticized for failing to provide useful figures for investors; the AP, in consultation with leading experts, came up with its own formula designed specifically to isolate the value of all compensation awarded to CEOs in the previous year.

Of the 386 companies in the AP list — those whose fiscal years ended after Dec. 15, and who reported by June 1 under the new SEC rules — only six reported their CEOs made less than $1 million last year.

The lowest paid was Costco Wholesale Corp. CEO James Sinegal, who made $411,688. But no need to shed tears for him: Sinegal also owns 2.4 million Costco shares, worth about $1.3 billion, and has options to buy 1.2 million more shares.

This year’s expanded disclosure requirements also offer a much more detailed look at perks given to top executives. They range from multimillion dollar tax payments on behalf of executives to much smaller amounts for household bills, including home alarm monitoring.

A handful of companies, including Washington Mutual Inc., have stopped offering perks, and pay consultants say many more are likely to do so as boards think twice about the repercussions of seeing their largess disclosed in proxies.

The AP formula, developed with advice from pay consultants Pearl Meyer & Partners and Mercer Human Resource Consulting, adds up salaries, bonuses, perks, above-market interest on pay that is set aside for later and what companies estimated the present value to be of restricted stock and options awards on the day they were granted last year.

This differs from the summary compensation formula that the SEC requires companies to use in proxy statements. Some executive pay consultants say the SEC formula is of less value to investors because it includes expenses that companies recognize during the year for current and previously awarded stock grants.

That tends to overstate in some cases, and understate in others, the specific pay decisions boards of directors took during the year, they said.

SEC Chairman Chris Cox told the AP that the SEC is looking at the statements it receives this year and could change the rules going forward.

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