Where Have All the $100 Million CEOs Gone?

There have been fewer 'moonshot' pay packages for 2024, but median CEO pay climbed to $16.4 million

- Theo Francis

The new boss at Starbucks came very close. The leaders of Apple and GE were close too. But so far, no CEO has scored a $100 million payday for 2024.

If the tally holds, it would be the first time in a decade without a $100 million pay package for a public-company chief executive. Such stock-heavy "moonshot" pay deals, popularized by Elon Musk and Tesla, have drawn investor and court scrutiny in recent years.

Even without a new entry in the $100 million club, CEO compensation at the biggest U.S. companies continued to climb in 2024 and is on track to set a record. More than half of the S&P 500 CEOs in a Wall Street Journal analysis made at least $16.4 million last year, up from $15.9 million in 2023, according to data from MyLogIQ.

The pay packages came in a year when corporate profits swelled and U.S. stock markets hit records. The economic mood has darkened in recent weeks after President Trump launched a trade war that investors and CEOs worry could dent consumer spending and squeeze profits.

Credit Musk for both the boom and the bust in giant pay deals.

His multibillion-dollar pay package from Tesla in 2018—valued at more than $2 billion at the time—foreshadowed a flurry of moonshot arrangements. Like his, most were tied to a series of stock-price and financial-performance conditions.

Companies called the pacts powerful incentives for executives to stick around and hit ambitious goals. Critics called them risky, either as giveaways with readily achievable targets or as incentives to make risky bets in the hope of cashing in.