Discovery Inc. Chief Executive David Zaslav received total compensation valued at $246.6 million in 2021, including nearly $203 million in options grants, more than sextupling his compensation from the year before, the company said in a securities filing Monday.
Zaslav’s compensation package is the highest CEO pay reported by any S&P 500 company so far this year, according to a Wall Street Journal analysis of data from securities filings provided by MyLogIQ LLC.
Zaslav’s salary was flat at $3 million. The increase in compensation stems largely from a
massive grant of stock options on the eve of last year’s announcement Discovery’s
DISCA,
-0.46%
plans to merge with AT&T Inc.’s
T,
-1.29%
WarnerMedia.
Also read: HBO Max, Discovery+ to become one streaming service after merger complete
Given the strike prices of the options granted to Zaslav, Discovery’s share price would have to rise considerably for those options to be in the money.
He also received a $4.4 million discretionary cash bonus, which Discovery said in a filing earlier this month was for his leadership through the COVID-19 pandemic, growing the company’s Discovery+ streaming service and his efforts last year to negotiate the merger with WarnerMedia.
After Zaslav, the next highest-paid CEO is Apple Inc.’s
AAPL,
-2.66%
Tim Cook, who received total compensation of about $99 million in 2021, according to a securities filing from Apple.
An expanded version of this report appears on WSJ.com.
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