CEO Dave Calhoun took home $32.8 million in pay for 2023, up 45% compared with the $22.5 million earned in 2022. Last year was a good one for the company, but 2024 hasn’t started out as well.
Boeing filed its annual proxy statement on Friday evening, including a summary of compensation for major executives. Calhoun’s pay includes $1.4 million in salary and $30.2 million in stock awards. Other compensation makes up the balance.
It was the highest annual pay for a Boeing CEO this century, company filings show, despite Calhoun declining a $2.8 million bonus.
Some of the $30.2 million is performance-based pay, which is set according to a variety of financial metrics. One is free cash flow, which took off last year, rising to $4.4 billion from $2 billion in 2022.
Free cash flow in 2024 is expected to fall as the company deals with the aftermath of the 737 MAX 9 emergency-door-plug blowout on Jan. 5. The incident has led to more oversight by the Federal Aviation Administration; more costs for Boeing, such as compensation paid to airline customers for missed deliveries and lost capacity to handle passengers; and slower production of MAX jets.
Boeing said Calhoun’s 2024 performance-based compensation target would be reduced to $13.25 million from $17 million. The target performance pay is essentially what is earned if things go as expected. The final pay awarded can move higher or lower depending on how the company, and its CEO, do relative to the goals set by the board of directors.
Advertisement – Scroll to Continue
Boeing added that it will link Calhoun’s2024 compensation to two new safety and production quality goals. Part of one goal includes the “design and deployment of an employee culture survey,” The second goal includes the “development and implementation of operational control limits for several programs, including the 737 program.”
More than 50% of the 2024 performance award is tied to the two goals.
This is Calhoun’s final year as CEO. He announced his departure in March without the board naming a successor. The search is on for the next CEO.
Advertisement – Scroll to Continue
Company filings show Calhoun made a bit less than $100 million between 2020 and 2023 running the company. Boeing stock was at about $330 a share when he took over; shares closed at $183.14 on Friday.
The stock is down about 30% so far this year, making it the fifth-worst-performing stock in the
Most of the declines came after the door blowout.
Write to Al Root at allen.root@dowjones.com
