CEO Pay: Schwarzman Tops Corporate Library List

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In fact, 7 of the 10 highest paid chiefs were from the energy industry. That dominance, Hodgson says, is "almost entirely due to the runup in the price of a barrel of oil rather than necessarily that CEO running the company better than another similar [chief executive]," he says. (Oracle and Ultra did not immediately return calls seeking comment and Hess maintained that its CEO earned just $21 million last year. Occidental spokesperson Richard Kline noted that more than 91% of Irani's pay was tied to performance and that the company's shareholders have all received "substantial benefits" during Irani's tenure.)

The other four energy chiefs among the top 10 were Aubrey K. McClendon of Chesapeake Energy (CHK) ($114,286,867), Bob R. Simpson of XTO Energy (XTO) ($103,485,972), Mark G. Papa of EOG Resources (EOG) ($90,471,784), and Eugene M. Isenberg of Nabors Industries (NBR) ($79,333,079). None of the four companies immediately returned requests for comment.

Big Bonus at Chesapeake

Particularly interesting, notes Hodgson, was the pay for Chesapeake's CEO, whose nearly $80 million bonus was the highest received by any of the CEOs in the Corporate Library's study, despite a big decline in Chesapeake's stock price for 2008. That bonus, Hodgson notes, will be reinvested in the company's "Founder Well Participation Program," or into new natural gas and oil wells explored by Chesapeake Energy. "This is Wild West stuff," Hodgson says of McClendon's unusual arrangement. Also extraordinary: McClendon was forced to sell 30 million company shares, or substantially all of his holdings, in October 2008, to satisfy margin loan calls.

The 10 highest paid CEOs weren't all equity-rich founders and don't all hail from energy companies. No. 10 on the Corporate Library's list was Michael S. Jeffries, the 17-year veteran CEO of teen retailer Abercrombie & Fitch (ANF). Jeffries, whose total realized compensation was nearly $72 million for 2008, received more than $2 million in perquisites, including $1.3 million in personal aircraft usage and associated tax gross-ups, the Corporate Library reports, along with a discretionary "stay bonus" of $6 million for remaining chairman and CEO through December 2008. (Abercrombie representatives were not immediately available to comment on the report.)

Hodgson calls the retention bonus "questionable" given the amount of stock Jeffries holds, saying "you have to question the decision-making of a board that's concerned enough to pay a retention bonus to someone who's been there for 17 years."

With Brian Burnsed in New York

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