Bristol-Myers Squibb awarded its CEO nearly $19 million in compensation for 2024, following a challenging year for the pharmaceutical company.
The New Jersey-based company posted a net loss of $8.9 billion last year, a steep swing from the prior year’s $8 billion in net income. Last year the company announced plans to let go of 2,200 employees in 2024 as part of a cost-cutting effort to save $1.5 billion by the end of 2025. Its stock fell as low as $40 a share last summer, half its value of late 2022, and the Wall Street Journal commented “Bristol-Myers goes from Big Pharma to Little Pharma.”
CEO Christopher Boerner was named CEO in November 2023 and awarded $18.8 million for his first full year on the job. He’d previously served as chief operating officer for six months before taking the CEO role and, prior to that, five years as chief commercialization officer. Most of last year’s pay reflected the value of a nearly $14 million stock grant. Boerner’s salary was increased to $1.5 million from $1.2 million and he received $3.2 million in bonus pay described as “non-equity incentive compensation.”
Difficult as 2024 was in many ways, Bristol-Myers’ board said the company exceeded financial targets and made “meaningful progress” toward strengthening its “growth profile” and establishing a younger and more diversified portfolio. While the company posted a large loss under Generally Accepted Accounting Principles, the board noted that “non-GAAP operating income” clocked in at $18.6 billion, exceeding internal targets.
Bristol-Myers’ preferred definition of operating income excludes $12 billion in costs related to the $14 billion acquisition of Karuna Therapeutics, a drug developer.
Since the middle of last year Bristol-Myers shares have recovered about half the ground lost since 2022 and traded Friday at $59 a share.
A spokesman noted that 2024 was Boerner’s first year as CEO and referred other questions to the regulatory filing.
