Typical CEO made $9.6M last year, AP study finds

Profits at big U.S. companies broke records last year, and so did pay for CEOs. The head of a typical public company made $9.6 million in 2011, according to an analysis by The Associated Press using data from Equilar, an executive pay research firm. That was up more than 6% from the previous year and is the second year of increases in a row. The figure is also the highest since the AP began tracking executive compensation in 2006. Companies trimmed cash bonuses but handed out more in stock awards. For shareholder activists who have long decried CEO pay as exorbitant, that was a victory of sorts. That’s because the stock awards are being tied more often to company performance. In those instances, CEOs can’t cash in the shares right away: They have to meet goals first, like boosting profit to a certain level. The idea is to motivate CEOs to make sure a company does well and to tie their fortunes to the company’s for the long term. For too long, activists say, CEOs have been richly rewarded no matter how a company has fared—”pay for pulse,” as some critics call it. The typical CEO got stock awards worth $3.6 million in 2011, up 11% from the year before. Cash bonuses fell about 7%, to $2 million. The value of stock options, as determined by the company, climbed 6% to a median $1.7 million. The Associated Press has complete survey results in the full story here.