Google to pay new CFO more than $70M

Google Inc. agreed to pay new chief financial officer Ruth Porat more than $70 million US after she takes the post in May, putting her among the highest-paid CFOs in the industry.

Porat, who held the same role at Morgan Stanley, will get a $5-million, one-time signing bonus and a $25-million stock grant this year that will vest through 2017, the Mountain View, Calif.-based technology company said in a regulatory filing Thursday. She will also receive a $40-million biennial stock grant in 2016 that will vest by 2019 and a base salary of $650,000 annually.

Porat is replacing Patrick Pichette, who said this month that he would step down. She will leave Morgan Stanley in April and assume her new position on May 26.

Google is under growing pressure to show it can trim costs as it invests in new businesses to better compete with rivals such as Apple Inc. and Facebook Inc. The company is looking to Porat, one of the financial industry’s most senior female executives, with more than 25 years at Morgan Stanley, to bring greater fiscal discipline. She follows other Wall Street veterans who have moved to Silicon Valley firms.

“We’re tremendously fortunate to have found such a creative, experienced and operationally strong executive,” Google CEO Larry Page said in a statement on Tuesday.

Porat received total compensation of $40.3 million for her first four years as CFO of Morgan Stanley, according to regulatory filings. Her total pay for 2014 hasn’t been disclosed. Porat owned almost 920,000 Morgan Stanley shares, or $32.7 million worth, according to a regulatory filing earlier this month.

Porat also has been granted stock awards that pay out based on the bank’s performance over threeyear periods that haven’t ended.

Pichette’s compensation at Google fell to $5.2 million in 2013 from $38.7 million. The company typically gives equity awards to executives in even-numbered years.

Google on Thursday said it would pay Pichette pro-rated outstanding equity grants that were set to vest in 2016 and 2018, based on the time he would have spent as finance chief.