Comcast

SORRY, COM CAST execs, but one of your most extravagant and controversial benefits is history. The cable and broadband giant that owns Nbcuniversal stopped guaranteeing a risk-free 9% interest rate — 12% for CEO Roberts — on earnings stashed in the company’s Deferred Compensation Plan. The board says it bent to a “few” shareholders who objected to a benefit that pays execs even when the stock price declines. Directors say they still “strongly believe” the guaranteed payments attract and keep talent. Perhaps. Then why did Roberts make $4.7 million of his $36.4 million package last year from the plan? He’s possibly the world’s most unlikely flight risk: He controls a third of Comcast’s voting shares — and its Articles of Incorporation say that he must be chairman, CEO and president “if he is willing and available to serve.” The CEO recently announced that he will donate his $3.2 million salary to COVID-19 relief efforts, and that the company is providing $500 million to support employees who have been impacted by the health crisis. The $4.5 million from the Deferred Compensation Plan that Comcast contributed to Nbcuniversal chairman Burke’s $42.6 million package didn’t keep him from announcing that he’ll retire in August. He ended 2019 with nearly $202 million in the fund. Roberts and other Comcast executives won’t feel much pain from the change in the plan. Execs can park their savings in more conventional funds that directors say “will offer above-market interest.” Directors liked Roberts’ work in 2019. They awarded him a $10 million bonus, slightly more than the target. The board remains 70% male, an improvement from last year, because one more woman, former Bright House Networks and Time Warner Cable executive Nomi Bergman, was tapped as a director.