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Jobs highest paid CEO over last 3yrs: $219M

updated 02:05 pm EDT, Wed August 13, 2003

A review of total pay from 2000 through 2002 for 243 CEOs running companies with 2002 revenue of $5 billion or more also shows that total pay ranged from a low of $336,000 a year received by Berkshire Hathaway Inc.'s Warren Buffett to of Apple Computer Inc, according to Bloomberg: " Besides having the group's highest three-year average annual pay, Jobs also wins my Most-Ludicrous-Pay-Package trophy, which isn't awarded every year... In March 2003, after the end of my study period, Jobs gave up the ghost entirely on stock options. He turned in his 27.5 million option shares for a grant of five million free shares worth $74.6 million."

by MacNN Staff

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08/13, 02:13pm | report spam | close Reply |
What about Pixar?

Does being the CEO of Pixar have any impact on the numbers? Or is that job paying even less than Apple ($0 a year)?

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08/13, 02:14pm | report spam | close Reply |
he deserves it

he started the company and then saved it from certain bankruptcy

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08/13, 02:16pm | report spam | close Reply |
As long as...

Apple is making a profit, I don't see a problem.

This isn't take the money, run, and who cares about the employees at least they still have social security, Enron.

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08/13, 02:22pm | report spam | close Reply |
$1 salary

He used to be making $1 a year. When did that end? There has been news that he's been taking home this ridiculous salary for a few years now (as we have seen). That's quite a ridiculous pay package if you ask me. I think he should be paid 25% of that. He deserves a multi-million dollar salary, yes, eight digits, yes. But not $200 million over 3 years. That's just ridiculous.

I wish someone would show us how much Jobs has made every year since he came back to Apple, Pixar salary as well.

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08/13, 02:27pm | report spam | close Reply |
$1 a year

these numbers are based on options, benefits, etc..he still does make just $1 a year.

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08/13, 02:28pm | report spam | close Reply |
It is $1

His salary is $1/year at Apple. The $219 million is from bonuses and options.

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08/13, 02:32pm | report spam | close Reply |
Unfair, or...?

Are you guys really upset about fairness, or are you just jealous?

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08/13, 02:32pm | report spam | close Reply |
agreed!

I believe he is well overpaid, I would rather see the hard working employees who without them the company would be nothing, get more pay for the great job they have done! And why do they say he making a dollar salary a year, when you are recieving other benefits that are into the millions. Why can't the company and Steve jobs be upfront about this?? Are they ashamed of something? Are they just telling the stockholders that they are so stupid that they will actually believe that someone would do this for a dollar a year? If he is getting paid by the performance that he is doing, then why don't they say so, and list actually what the company would pay him if he meet X amount of sales, or whatever they want to base it on. Why do they needlessly play games like this? What are they hiding? Why can't they innovate and actually pay someone X amount of dollars to do something when they are a CEO?

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08/13, 02:35pm | report spam | close Reply |
Fine by me

At least he brought Apple back to life, and is responsible for great products.
Good fo him.

They should be frowning on Gates and Balmer for making money on inferior software.

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08/13, 02:39pm | report spam | close Reply |
yes but..

Is he happy with all that money?

damn *%@^! % right he is.

I'd settle for half that 219mill a year.

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08/13, 02:41pm | report spam | close Reply |
how the number computed?

The article is singularly devoid of any sort of meaning without a breakdown of that "pay" into its source: salary, cash bonus, stock and/or options grants (and whether the money comes from Apple or the market), paid benefits, etc.

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08/13, 02:42pm | report spam | close Reply |
Funky math

I find it amusing that the "$219M a year" figure mostly comes from options that were cashed in for a total of $75M. Add the plane, and you get a total actual compensation of ~150M for a three year period, or about 50M a year. Much less than 219. Still, perhaps, too high, but much less silly than the original number.

Scott

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08/13, 02:48pm | report spam | close Reply |
Yes VERY bad math

This man is an idiot. He correctly notes steve got a jet worth 84 mil. and the 5 million shares worth 74 mill. Thats it. The other options he returned. That adds to 158 mill over 3 years for an average of 52.

Its really embarrasing that the lead headline of the article is TOTALLY bogas. I would sue if I were Steve.

http://homepage.mac.com/salmonstk

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08/13, 02:51pm | report spam | close Reply |
Re: agreed

And why do they say he making a dollar salary a year, when you are recieving other benefits that are into the millions. Why can't the company and Steve jobs be upfront about this??

They are upfront, as they have to be, on salary, bonuses, options, etc. Salary is $1 a year. Rest in bonuses, which I'm sure helps someone tax-wise.

Its like football players who sign contracts paying them $3 million a year, but also get a signing bonus of $20 million. Its all based on how the money is distributed and accounted for.

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08/13, 02:55pm | report spam | close Reply |
Re: the board

This guy apparently has a problem with Apple's BOD, but apparently very few others do, as no one seems to be mounting a campaign to kick them out. I mean, shareholders get to vote on the board, they're not just Steve's lackeys or something.

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08/13, 03:21pm | report spam | close Reply |
Graef's email

GRAEFC@bloomberg.net

Email him and tell him he is crazy. I did, this is what he had to say.

"Sorry to say, but you appear not to have read the article very carefully. Yes, t
he $84 million for the jet was part of his three-year pay. But so was the estima
ted present value at grant of 27.5 million option shares. Although I did not not
e the value in my article, it was $569.1 million. As to the $74.6 million of fre
stock, that, as I said, was granted after the end of the study period and didn'
t even figure in the calculations. I note that you must be connected in some way
with the University. I find it curious that an educated person in an
academic environment would be so intolerant in their language over an error --
in this case, an error made by you, not me. Sincerely, Graef Crysta

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08/13, 03:34pm | report spam | close Reply |
Re: Complete and utter...

Horse hockey. It's a sad state of affairs when a Bloomberg columnist doesn't understand finance and can't do simple math. The stock options were worth _nothing since Apple's share price never rose above the option price. Even if you figured the options at some value, they became meaningless since Apple converted them all to stock shares earlier this year. Therefore Steve's total compensation during the three years Crystal said he tracked is the stock and the Gulfstream. Assuming the figures are correct for the Gulfstream at $84 mil, that makes Steve's total compenstation (and that assumes that the jet was never used for anything that Apple might have otherwise paid for and that Steve never paid for any of the jet's use and upkeep) at $28 mil per year (plus $3.00). Still high, but nowhere near the ridiculous figure the article claims (which if accurate would have put Jobs total compensation during his tenure at Apple at close to three-quarters of a billion dollars.

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08/13, 03:36pm | report spam | close Reply |
re: Graef's email

Aha. So that is where all the money came in. It was a paper value of the options that were turned in for $74.6 million in stock. So if you redo the numbers you get around $50m a year.

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08/13, 03:40pm | report spam | close Reply |
Steve's Cool

But I think he'd be even cooler if he used his bonuses to give everyone in their hardware and software divisions bonuses. They deserve it just as much as he does.

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08/13, 03:40pm | report spam | close Reply |
Steve's Cool

But I think he'd be even cooler if he used his bonuses to give everyone in their hardware and software divisions bonuses. They deserve it just as much as he does.

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08/13, 03:41pm | report spam | close Reply |
my email to graef

"You seem to have made an error. You calculated his 27+ million in options as money in the bank when in reality it was paper money. And he LOST all that $569m or so when he turned them in for the stock grant, so in reality the yearly over three years, when recalculated would be about $50m or so a year since the paper money went poof and the stock itself was only $74m or so plus the plane plus his $1/year in salary.

I realize that the stock option swap was not part of your "study period" but you did mention it in the article and could have adjusted your values to match the new realization.

The fact is, Job's $219m/year pay was not money taken out of the company and from shareholders. It was a paper grant of options that he gave back, plus some real stock and a plane.

Still pretty good, but not as egregious as you make it out to be.
"

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08/13, 03:44pm | report spam | close Reply |
$1/yr + $218,999,999 tip.

He's worth every penny.

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08/13, 03:49pm | report spam | close Reply |
Still...

The pay is out of proportion with the performance. Sure, as an Apple fan I'm thrilled to see great products. But the market share never took off, the stock is not doing anything worth mentioning, and the company is barely making profits. Meanwhile, revenue has been on a steady decline for years. Apple is NOT a stellar performer. Its executive team deserves kudos for bringing it back from near-death, sure. But they don't deserve this kind of compensation. That should be the reward for turning Apple into a stellar performer. And the job hasn't been done yet.

But hey, if he can pull it off without a shareholders riot, more power to him. As someone else pointed out, it's not like he's lining his pockets while running the company into the ground like happened with Enron.

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08/13, 03:51pm | report spam | close Reply |
the new equation

(steve jobs) = (1 song from iTunes) + (1 cent)

oh yeah and a plane

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08/13, 03:58pm | report spam | close Reply |
Re: Still

"The pay is out of proportion with the performance. "

$84 million since 1997?

"Meanwhile, revenue has been on a steady decline for years"

The last quarter had the highest revenue in 11 quarters.

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08/13, 04:11pm | report spam | close Reply |
jeez, Steve...

piggy piggy...

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08/13, 04:28pm | report spam | close Reply |
egomaniac

No CEO deserves that much. I guess Steve traded his Hippie free love philosophy for some really nice loafers.

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08/13, 04:37pm | report spam | close Reply |
Re: egomaniac

He didn't get that much. Read the damn article and you'll notice the many flaws.

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08/13, 05:04pm | report spam | close Reply |
yeah

...yeah, I would really love to be CEO of a successful firm and make as much as they do without having to listen people whine about it, but considering how few get to that position and how many people are required to keep a company afloat, I really think there needs to be a much fairer distribution of income in American firms. Sure, Jobs, Welsch, etc have great vision etc, and sure they give firms a great sense of direction, but the work they put into the firm and goodwill that create by being heads of firms is quite disproportional to how much they make. It just seems a lot fairer to think a successful company should be generous to everyone that makes it work, with the story being not that the CEO has more money then the GDP of some nations, but that all the employees, right down to the janitor, make more money then their counterparts at other firms. Of course, it's a lot easier to not give a s*** when you're as detached from the rest of humanity as most CEOs are...
big ups to warren buffet and the bill and melinda gates foundation

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08/13, 05:05pm | report spam | close Reply |
Re: 1 dollar

Indeed, the $1/yr is for tax purposes. There was a Cheers episode where this was explained.

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08/13, 05:06pm | report spam | close Reply |
whatever

whine whine whine ... you jealous b*******. were it not for this man, we wouldn't have any of this. CEO's have more on the line than anyone else in the company. you f*** up, your career is tarnished. the company fails, who gets the blame? a software engineer that can now go and get ANOTHER high paying job or the ousted CEO who's been shot down in flames and accused for wrecking thousands of jobs?

anyone heard from gil amelio lately?

and anyone who denies that steve has an obscene ego knows nothing about apple. of course he does. so what? wouldn't you?

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08/13, 05:11pm | report spam | close Reply |
it does not add up

How in the world are they coming up with $219 million per year?

Since his return in 1997, Steve Jobs has received the following :

$74.6 million in stock
a jet worth $84 million
$1 per year salary (Aug 1997-present = $6)

All of that together does not add up $219 million total for the whole 6 years!!!

What else are they adding into their calculations?

Are they counting the original estimated value of the stock options that were never exercised? The stock options did not cost Apple anything and Steve Jobs did not profit from the stock options. Steve Jobs gave up all of his stock earlier this year when he was given the $74.6 million in stock.

His average pay for the past 3 years has actually been less than $70 million per year. If you average it out over the 6 years that he has been back, he has been paid less than $35 million per year. So obviously he is indeed one of the most highly paid CEOs, but he nowhere near the number one spot with the alledged $219 million per year.

I can not believe Bloomberg allows such bogus reporting. �At the top of the article it says "Graef Crystal is a columnist for Bloomberg News. The opinions expressed are his own." but it fails to mention that the absurd math is his own invention too.

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08/13, 05:19pm | report spam | close Reply |
6 years, not 3

Steve has been given a jet, stock, and salary totalling $150 million since 1997. That averages to $25 million per year.

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08/13, 05:39pm | report spam | close Reply |
Right...

"The fact is, Job's $219m/year pay was not money taken out of the company and from shareholders. It was a paper grant of options that he gave back, plus some real stock and a plane."

I like this theory where no one's (stockholder, company( hurt and Job can take money out of nowehere. Where do I sign up for this School of Finance?

Also, for people say that as along as Apple is profitable Jobs can rape Apple for whatever he wants. I don't think so. Apple can make $1 and technically be profitable while he takes away 99% of revenue (of course he did not in this case) away from building the business into his own coffer. Apple has been fighting for its life for a long time (no, I am not predicting Apple's death) and I think it needs all the help it can get! G5 is good (G4 sucked), Ives is good, OS X is good, excellent peripherals (iPod, iSight) and software (iApps, ITMS) are all good. Jobs taking millions out - not good.

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08/13, 05:42pm | report spam | close Reply |
I'm not whining

because I am jealous. I am clearly stating that Mr. Jobs does a terrible job and is not worth even a dollar a year. There is not and has not been any innovation from Apple since the iMac.

Apple steals ideas (like a portable music player) from others, applies their design which is good and then sells products.

Nothing from Apple is innovative.

You people better wake up. Apple is a failure.

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08/13, 05:50pm | report spam | close Reply |
strictly from a

shaeholder's view, AAPL has been flat for the last 5 years like most tech stocks. I don't mind him getting paid in the 7-8 figure range but 9-figure? Get the f*** outta here.

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08/13, 05:57pm | report spam | close Reply |
Hey dude

Yeah you, the "it does not add up" guy.

Take a finance class. Learn that you cannot create wealth out of nothing. Learn that stock option has a cost associated with it. Learn why companies are stopping giving away stock options as compensation because their cost to shareholders. Dumbass.

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08/13, 06:00pm | report spam | close Reply |
Re: Right

" I like this theory where no one's (stockholder, company( hurt and Job can take money out of nowehere. Where do I sign up for this School of Finance?"

The point is that Jobs didn't take a dime out of Apple.

The $219 million a year is nothing but fuzzy math.

The columnist took Jobs' 27.5 million stock options x a stock price of $105.

Jobs never cashed those stock options, and he returned them in favor of 5 million shares (which he haven't cashed either).

The only thing Jobs got in the last six years is the plane.

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08/13, 06:05pm | report spam | close Reply |
Re: Hey dude

"Learn that you cannot create wealth out of nothing"

But that's exactly what the columnist did. Where did he get the idea that the stock options was worth $500+ million considering that AAPL has been much lower since that time?

$500+ million would be correct if the stock price was $65 today.

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08/13, 06:54pm | report spam | close Reply |
ha

"The point is that Jobs didn't take a dime out of Apple."

What do you call the GV jet and Apple paying Job's tax on that gift?

Also, he now has 5 million shares of Apple stock which is worth about $100 million US. Is that not money?

So... here you guys are, people who think Apple is infalliable and Jobs is the best thing since sliced bread and can do no wrong. Here is another guy who is called by many as a leading expert on executive pay. Who is biased here?

I want Apple to succeed. It can better do so with the $ not in Steve's pocket but in its R&D, engineering, and marketing divisions.

Of course, you guys the fanboys will gladly PAY money to kiss Steve's a** and argue how it is worth every penny (it's like BMW! the butt is so elegant!).

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08/14, 03:34am | report spam | close Reply |
Re: ha

"What do you call the GV jet and Apple paying Job's tax on that gift?"

I was talking about the stock option that the columnist valued at $500+ million.

The two other things I mention later in the post - perhaps you should learn to read!

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08/14, 11:06am | report spam | close Reply |
get a clue

" Take a finance class. Learn that you cannot create wealth out of nothing. Learn that stock option has a cost associated with it. Learn why companies are stopping giving away stock options as compensation because their cost to shareholders."

You need to go back to your finance class.

A stock option that is never excercised does not cost the company anything and it does not cost stockholders anything.

Steve Jobs never exercised his options.

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08/14, 11:25am | report spam | close Reply |
get a clue

"I like this theory where no one's (stockholder, company) hurt and Job can take money out of nowehere."

What the heck are you talking about? Steve Jobs did not take money out of nowhere. The only compensation that Jobs received was the jet and the stock this year; he gave up the stock options because they had no value. Neither the stockholders nor the company sufferred any expense from the stock options.

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08/18, 09:13pm | report spam | close Reply |
what about the children?

Just think of all schools he could have bought computers for.....

And printers, and scanners, and ISP accounts.

Oh well, I'm sure the hum of the Gulfstream jet makes him forget all that.

;)

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pixar

nice!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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pixar

nice!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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pixar

nice!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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Jobs highest paid CEO over last 3yrs: $219M

updated 02:05 pm EDT, Wed August 13, 2003

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