Seven CEOs take top money

Toronto News.Net
Saturday 15th August, 2009

The top 7 highest paid CEOs in the US took home more than $100 million in 2008.

The highest paid CEO in 2008, Blackstone's Stephen Schwarzman, took home $702,440,573 in salary and stock options.

Blackstone has stressed that the $702 million for Schwarzman was not simply compensation, but was mostly the vested portion of his company stock.

Oracle Chief Executive Lawrence Ellison was second on the list, pocketing nearly $557 million, mostly from exercised stock.

The next five highest paid executives were: Ray Irani of Occidental Petroleum, John Hess of Hess Corp, Michael Watford of Ultra Petroleum, Aubrey McClendon of Chesapeake Energy and Bob Simpson of XTO Energy.

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