At the end of last year, the board of directors approved a golden parachute for Stephane Bancel worth more than $926 million, up from $9.4 million in 2019.
The value of Bancel's change-in-control package has varied as a lot of it is in the stock of the company. Bancel has an exit package that includes a cash severance payment and bonus if the company is sold.
On August 10, Moderna's shares reached an all-time high of $497.49, just before the Food and Drug Administration cleared the Covid vaccine for vulnerable people. The value of the package has dropped by 45% this week, and they were trading at $253.98 on December 31st.
His exit package, which only becomes a reality if the company is sold and he loses his job, is eye popping even at a reduced share price. Requests for comment were not returned by Moderna.
The value of the golden parachute was disclosed in the company's annual proxy report. Most of the pay for executives is tied to the company's volatile equity, according to the filing.
His total compensation for the year was $18.2 million, a 41% increase over the previous year. Bancel's compensation last year included 15 million in stock awards and options as well as a 1.5 million bonus on top of his salary. Moderna provided personal security for Bancel and his family last year.
Moderna President Stephen Hoge's total compensation was a small fraction of his other rewards. He had stock options that he cashed out in 2021. The Chief Technical Officer cashed out $194.3 million in options, which was outside of his usual pay.
Moderna was little known before the Pandemic. The vaccine's success made the company profitable for the first time. Moderna reported a loss of $747 million in 2020. Moderna's share price went up 143% in 2021, as the company successfully rolled out its two-dose Covid vaccine.
The vaccine is the only commercially available product and the company is also developing shots to fight the flu and other infectious diseases. Almost all of the company's revenue was accounted for by the $17.7 billion of shots Moderna sold. Moderna is projecting $19 billion in sales for the year 2022, based on signed sales agreements with governments.
The total compensation of Hoge is $819,000, which includes stock awards and options and a bonus. Hoge's total compensation increased by over 50% in 2020.
A bonus of $756,000 and $5 million in stock awards and options were included in the total pay of Andres. His total compensation increased over the course of the year.
Chief Financial Officer David Meline received a total of $5.2 million in pay, including $4 million in stock awards and options, as well as a $560,000 bonus on top of his salary. The total compensation of Meline dropped from 2020.
The chief commercial officer of Moderna was fired last year. The company is looking for someone with more experience in consumer health. A $1 million payment was made to Le Goff.
Moderna has been criticized by activist groups for not doing more to share its technology with poorer nations, but for making money from the vaccine. The proposal for the annual shareholders meeting was filed by the charity, which owns 368 shares of Moderna common stock. The meeting of Moderna is on April 28.
Moderna's reputation could be damaged, its social license to operate could be threatened, and its relations with the U.S. government could be damaged, because of backlash from not sharing information needed to manufacture its vaccine in low- and middle-income countries.
The board of directors has called on shareholders to vote against the proposal. The board argued that the recommendation would have a negative impact on the safety and quality of the vaccine as well as long-term confidence in the technology used.
Moderna is locked in a patent dispute with the National Institutes of Health, which helped develop the vaccine, over the technology underlying the shots. The White House's chief medical advisor suggested in a call with reporters last week that the National Institute of Health would license the technology if it wins the dispute with Moderna.
The board of Moderna said the company has agreed to supply 650 million doses to Covax, an international alliance that promotes better access to Covid vaccine in lower and middle income countries. Moderna will not enforce its Covid related patents. The company has reached a preliminary agreement to build a vaccine production facility in the East African nation of Kenya.
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