When David Zlaslav assumed the top spot at Warner Bros Discovery in 2022, the stock price was $20+ per share. As of today, the stock price is $13.12 per share. That’s nearly four successive years of failure in ‘publicly traded company’ speak.
And yet, during these years of failed leadership and shortsighted vision, David Zlaslav’s annual pay (salary/bonuses/stock options) rocketed from $39.3million in 2022 to $49.7million in 2023, to upwards of $50million in 2024 (it would have been higher if the shareholders didn’t vote ‘no’ as a collective).
So how did Zlaslav do it? With the help of the Warner Bros Discovery board of directors..and with the compensation subcommittee comprised of four members of that board.
Out of thirteen WBD board members, the majority were board members at AT&T before it merged with WBD (whom Zlaslav kept on as allies during the merger with WBD) and on the Discovery Channel board when Slaslav was running it. We call this ‘in the tank’.
And not to be outdone, Zlaslav put together a four person subcommittee for CEO compensation…with two board members who were on the pre-merger AT&T board, one who had been on the Discovery board and one who was/is on the Liberty Board which was/is owned by WBD owner–John Malone…and John Malone is a firm believer in executives getting rich at the expense of shareholders. It’s his go-to move.
Bottom line: Zlaslav compensation followers should expect nothing but higher pay until WBD is either sold or until Zlaslav has moved the last deck chair around on the Titanic and everyone realizes the emporor had no idea what he was doing and just made pr-driven moves to buy himself more time.