Sorrell Gets £22.7m Share Award

WPP Chief Exec Sir Martin Sorrell has received 1.78m shares, worth around £22.7m, under the company's now-discontinued long-term incentive plan, LEAP.

The award relates to Sir Martin's performance between 2009 and 2013, during which time shareholders have seen total returns of about 230 per cent. The LEAP plan was scrapped following a 2012 shareholder revolt, in which disgruntled voters rejected the board's remuneration report including a £6.8m deal for Sorrell: but historic entitlements were not affected. The CEO's deal for 2013, totalling around £17.6m, was approved by 70% of shareholders after extensive negotiations.

Sorrell wrote in an item in the FT in 2012 that he found 'the controversy over my compensation deeply disturbing', reiterating his view that compensation decisions were 'competitively fair against our big US and French competitors, which we consistently outperform'.

Share entitlements from the firm he built up from two employees form a much greater part of Sir Martin's total remuneration than does his base salary, which has stayed between £1m and £1.3m since the beginning of the downturn in 2008.

All articles 2006-23 written and edited by Mel Crowther and/or Nick Thomas, 2024- by Nick Thomas, unless otherwise stated.

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