Rise of the FTSE 100 fat cats

How the top hundred bosses have pocketed almost £500m between them

THE top ten best-paid chief executives in the FTSE 100 i ndex took home £ 156.7m between them last year, an analysis by the High Pay Centre and the Daily Mail can reveal.

Nine out of the ten best-paid bosses received more than £10m each.

The tenth, Bob Dudley of BP, took home almost £9.3m despite the fact the oil giant is still struggling to recover from the Deepwater oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010.

Seven out of the ten hail from overseas – Ben Van Beurden of Shell, Erik Engstrom, the former boss of Reed Elsevier, Tidjane Thiam, departing boss of the Pru, Antonio Horta-Osorio at Lloyds and Rakesh Kapoor at Reckitt. Don Robert at Experian and BP’s Dudley are both from the US.

That might explain why companies had to offer lucrative packages to lure chiefs to these shores – but does not apply to British-born Sir Martin Sorrell, who took home a stupefying £42.9m from advertising group WPP. Sorrell built up the group, which he founded in the mid 1980s and where he holds a 1.5pc stake. But fellow chiefs in a similar situation, such as Lord Wolfson at Next, are rewarded on a much more modest scale.

In total, the Footsie supremos received just under half a billion pounds between them.

‘This is a staggering sum to be diverted from shareholders to managers,’ said Tim Bush of shareholder lobby group Pirc. ‘You are only talking about chief executives so the total sum, taking other highly paid individuals into account is a lot more, it is just the tip of the iceberg.

‘This excess has been building up for years under all governments.’

Luke Hildyard of the High Pay Centre said the excess had been fuelled by quantitative easing money-printing and a culture of back-scratching. ‘Perhaps the most troubling aspect of these pay packages is that they are largely unearned. The Bank of England has effectively pumped money into the stock market, meaning the value of executive share awards has rocketed.’

The situation has become so extreme that even business organisations such as the Institute of Directors (IoD) have become concerned.

Simon Walker, director general of the IoD, said: ‘The situation is now so excessive that the danger is that businesses lose the public’s support, and the level of outrage would get so substantial that governments are forced to legislate.’

Among the top ten are several individuals who would qualify for the title of highest paid men you’ve never heard of. Engstrom, from Reed Elsevier, the third highest with a £16.2m pay packet, is a 51-year-old Swede who has been in charge of the Anglo-Dutch publishing group since 2009.

Peter Long, 62, who runs Tui Travel, which owns both First Choice and Thomson Holidays, has also kept out of the limelight. Long – who last year received £13.3m – has been at the company for decades.

As chief executive of Hargreaves Lansdown, Ian Gorham has often been overshadowed by the share website’s founder, Peter Hargreaves. But the 45-year-old former Deloitte man, who has been boss of the firm since 2010, is the eighth best-paid executive in the FTSE 100.

Though millions of consumers use Experian for credit checks, not many will know the name of Don Robert. The chief executive, who was recently and controversially appointed as chairman, last year received £10.2m.

Lower down the table is Ian King, the chief executive of defence giant BAE Systems, whose £3.5m package was revealed to shareholders on Budget Day.

Adam Crozier, the boss of ITV, is another who has suffered investor revolts over his pay in the past. Last year almost a quarter of shareholders voted against a package for 2013 that was worth £8.3m.

At the bottom of the table are a few surprising entries, including Ivan Glasenberg, the boss of commodities and mining giant Glencore Xstrata, who is in 97th place. His pay does not even breach the £1m mark, coming in at a mere £917,000. Given that billionaire Glasenberg has an 8.4pc stake and earns multimillions from dividends, he is probably not too upset.

In 100th place is Dave Forsey, the chief executive of Sports Direct, who earns only £150,000 a year but who is a less significant figure at the company than deputy chairman Mike Ashley. The latter has been in a tussle with shareholders after pushing through a controversial bonus scheme that would have paid him £200m last year – only to opt out of it days later. Although the billionaire has not received any direct pay from the company since it floated in 2007, he owns 57.7pc, according to its latest annual report.