Elon Musk’s pay packet as CEO zooms past all globally, Tim Cook stands a distant second

Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk is not just among the wealthiest globally but is also among the most highly compensated CEOs in the world. According to the Fortune 500 report for 2021, among the top 10 highest-paid CEOs globally after Musk include tech and biotech CEOs, including the heads of Apple (Tim Cook), Netflix (Reed Hastings), and Microsoft (Satya Nadella).

In 2021, Musk ‘realised’ compensation worth almost $23.5 billion, from exercising some Tesla stock options awarded in a 2018 multiyear ‘moonshot’ grant. That was by far the biggest CEO payday in 2021, according to Fortune.

Tesla ranked 65 on this year’s Fortune 500. The company had a blockbuster in 2021, bringing in $53.8 billion in revenue, up 71 percent from 2020. Meanwhile, the Apple CEO earned $770.5 million in 2021 alone, mostly as a part of a 10-year grant of shares worth $1.7 billion. The tech giant ranks 3 on the Fortune 500.

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The company faced challenges because of the global chip shortage, but successfully began manufacturing the equipment in-house, the report said. Hang, the co-founder of NVIDIA, and Reed Hastings of Netflix bagged third and fourth spots, respectively.