Netflix co-CEO and chief content officer Ted Sarandos is set to receive $40 million in compensation next year, while chairman and co-CEO Reed Hastings stands to make north of $34 million.
Netflix disclosed the annual salaries and stock option allocation for 2022 for its executive officers in an SEC filing Tuesday. Hastings’ salary for next year will remain $650,000 and he is to receive options valued at $34 million. Sarandos will again get an annual salary of $20 million with an additional $20 million in stock options.
In 2020, Hastings and Sarandos earned $43.2 million and $39.3 million, respectively, in 2020, representing sizable bumps in their compensation.
Netflix elevated Sarandos to the co-CEO spot alongside Hastings in July 2020. At its shareholder meeting that year, “We explained that the dual CEO model formalized the prior working relationship between Reed and Ted and was an effective leadership model to further support our continued growth and international expansion,” Netflix said in 2021 its proxy statement.
Among other top Netflix execs, CFO Spencer Neumann will receive a pay package worth $14 million, comprising $7 million in salary (up from $6 million in 2021) along with $7 million in stock options. Neumann started at the company in January 2019 after serving as CFO of Activision Blizzard.
Greg Peters, COO and chief product officer, will see his annual salary rise from $12 million this year to $16 million in 2022, along with $8 million in stock, for $24 million total next year.
David Hyman, Netflix’s chief legal officer and secretary, will get $11 million in 2022 ($6 million in salary and $5 million in stock options). Chief communications officer Rachel Whetstone, who joined Netflix in 2018, has a pay package in 2022 worth $6.5 million ($5.5 million in salary and $1 million in stock).
Netflix compensates employees with two components: base salary and stock options. “We do not use performance-based bonuses as we believe that they tend to incentivize specific, typically short-term focused behavior rather than encourage long-term stockholder value creation,” the company said in the 2021 proxy statement.
Pictured above: Reed Hastings, Ted Sarandos
