{"id":19745,"date":"2025-06-17T00:17:53","date_gmt":"2025-06-17T00:17:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thisbiginfluence.com\/?p=19745"},"modified":"2025-06-17T00:17:53","modified_gmt":"2025-06-17T00:17:53","slug":"warner-bros-to-cut-david-zaslavs-pay-package-following-shareholder-rebuke","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thisbiginfluence.com\/?p=19745","title":{"rendered":"Warner Bros to cut David Zaslav\u2019s pay package following shareholder rebuke"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div>\n<p>Unlock the Editor\u2019s Digest totally free<\/p>\n<p class=\"article__content-sign-up-topic-description o3-type-body-base\"><span>Roula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favorite tales on this weekly e-newsletter.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><iframe class=\"article__content-sign-up-iframe close\" scrolling=\"no\" id=\"signUpIframe\" data-prev-url=\"\/register\/in-article-sign-up?ft-content-uuid=15f332db-2677-4fe5-9455-4e2470640e95\"><\/iframe><\/div>\n<div id=\"article-body\">\n<p>The long run annual pay bundle of David Zaslav, chief government of Warner Bros Discovery, might drop by about 50 per cent after the corporate splits in 2026, following years of shareholder criticism of his remuneration.<\/p>\n<p>Zaslav\u2019s $52mn pay bundle for 2024, which exceeded that of his counterparts at Walt Disney and Comcast, was rejected by shareholders in a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ft.com\/content\/9e98e421-715a-4282-ade1-7bcfdc6fe88b\" data-trackable=\"link\">symbolic vote last month<\/a>. Warner board members mentioned his new remuneration bundle can be reconfigured following \u201cshareholders\u2019 suggestions\u201d in an announcement launched on Monday.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.ft.com\/stream\/8241c076-3edc-48bd-90b0-6b051978b996\" data-trackable=\"link\">Warner Bros Discovery<\/a>\u00a0introduced this month that it could break up itself into two corporations in a deal that&#8217;s anticipated to shut in mid-2026. The brand new pay method will take impact after the break up, which is able to go away Zaslav to run the corporate\u2019s film studio and streaming companies, whereas chief monetary officer Gunnar Wiedenfels will lead a enterprise holding most of its cable TV belongings.\u00a0The decrease pay additionally displays the actual fact the businesses can be smaller following the break up. <\/p>\n<p>If <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ft.com\/stream\/e3b35641-3917-3bc6-8515-809af758a4ed\" data-trackable=\"link\">Zaslav<\/a> hits 100 per cent\u00a0of his operational and monetary targets within the first yr after the break up, his goal pay can be $16.5mn, in contrast with $37mn within the present contract. If he hits 200 per cent of the targets, it will likely be as excessive as $30mn, the corporate mentioned on Monday.<\/p>\n<p>Nevertheless, the majority of Zaslav\u2019s future pay can be primarily based on inventory choices after shareholders rebuked a mannequin primarily based on free money stream era.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>The securities submitting made late on Monday mentioned the beleaguered media boss would obtain about 24mn in WBD shares that could possibly be bought for the present $10.16 worth. <\/p>\n<p>If the share worth have been to double, the bundle might ultimately be price practically $250mn. To be eligible for the complete award, Zaslav should stay with the corporate for 5 years.<\/p>\n<p>Shares of WBD have fallen greater than 60 per cent for the reason that merger of Time Warner and Discovery three years in the past. Zaslav had engineered the mix because the Discovery chief after which took over the helm of the mixed firm. The shift in the direction of streaming and a heavy debt load weighed on its inventory worth although Zaslav had lengthy been richly paid.\u00a0<\/p>\n<aside aria-labelledby=\"aside-label\" class=\"n-content-recommended--single-story n-content-recommended--inset\" data-component=\"recommended\">\n<p class=\"n-content-recommended__title o3-type-body-highlight\">Advisable<\/p>\n<div class=\"o-teaser o-teaser--article o-teaser--small o-teaser--stacked o-teaser--has-image o-teaser--opinion js-teaser\" data-id=\"67a6ad4b-1e4d-4b1f-aac6-936d13a1a1a9\">\n<div class=\"o-teaser__image-container js-teaser-image-container\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.ft.com\/content\/67a6ad4b-1e4d-4b1f-aac6-936d13a1a1a9\" data-trackable=\"image-link\" data-trackable-context-story-link=\"image-link\" tabindex=\"-1\" aria-hidden=\"true\"><\/p>\n<div class=\"o-teaser__image-placeholder\" style=\"aspect-ratio:2290\/1288\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"o-teaser__image\" src=\"https:\/\/www.ft.com\/__origami\/service\/image\/v2\/images\/raw\/https%3A%2F%2Fwww.ft.com%2F__origami%2Fservice%2Fimage%2Fv2%2Fimages%2Fraw%2Fhttps%253A%252F%252Fd1e00ek4ebabms.cloudfront.net%252Fproduction%252F9d999e0b-3b97-4511-915d-0a457cf0cbf9.jpg%3Fsource%3Dnext-article%26fit%3Dscale-down%26quality%3Dhighest%26width%3D700%26dpr%3D1?source=next&amp;fit=scale-down&amp;dpr=2&amp;width=240\" alt=\"Warner Bros Discovery CEO David Zaslav, second left, with actor Dustin Hoffman and his wife, Lisa Hoffman\"\/><\/div>\n<p><\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/aside>\n<p>\u201cWe structured the brand new compensation packages to deal with shareholders\u2019 suggestions by fostering pay-for-performance alignment, making certain industry-standard pay constructions, and incentivising contributions to place the 2 new main media corporations for achievement and shareholder worth creation,\u201d Samuel Di Piazza, chair of the board, mentioned in an announcement.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Zaslav\u2019s pay final yr climbed 4.4 per cent, whilst the corporate posted an $11.5bn loss for 2024 and its bond ranking was lately lower to junk. Each large proxy advisers criticised his pay.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>He&#8217;s to obtain a $3mn base wage together with an opportunity to earn a $12mn money bonus. Zaslav may also earn $15.5mn of shares via an \u201cfairness incentive plan\u201d that&#8217;s distinct from the inventory possibility grant.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/www.ft.com\/content\/15f332db-2677-4fe5-9455-4e2470640e95\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Unlock the Editor\u2019s Digest totally free Roula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favorite tales on this weekly e-newsletter. The long run annual pay bundle of David Zaslav, chief government of Warner Bros Discovery, might drop by about 50 per cent after the corporate splits in 2026, following years of shareholder criticism of his [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":19747,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[5816,1677,3538,8867,841,8957,2239,5815,13453],"class_list":["post-19745","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business","tag-bros","tag-cut","tag-david","tag-package","tag-pay","tag-rebuke","tag-shareholder","tag-warner","tag-zaslavs"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thisbiginfluence.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19745","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thisbiginfluence.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thisbiginfluence.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thisbiginfluence.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thisbiginfluence.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=19745"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/thisbiginfluence.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19745\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thisbiginfluence.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/19747"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thisbiginfluence.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=19745"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thisbiginfluence.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=19745"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thisbiginfluence.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=19745"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}