South African exec Mark Blair pockets $3.37 million in remuneration in 2022

Mr. Price Group Limited in South Africa paid its CEO Mark Blair a total of R56.5 million ($3.37 million) in remuneration at the end of the group’s 2022 fiscal year, which ended on April 2 due to the excellent results that he had delivered to the group since taking over three years ago.

Blair’s R56.5-million ($3.37 million) compensation is more than three times the R18.8 million ($1.12 million) that he received for the 2020-2021 fiscal year, according to figures in Mr. Price’s 2022 annual report.

The R32.93 million ($1.97 million) that he earned as long-term incentives for the year in the form of an allocation in the group’s forfeitable share plan can be attributed to the triple-digit increase in his total salary package during the year.

While defending the mega-pay, the group said Blair’s total reward (fixed and variable elements) was benchmarked in August 2020 against a comparator group of Johannesburg Stock Exchange-listed companies of similar size and industry, and the remuneration was between the 25th and 50th percentile on the market.

Mr Price also stated that Blair, a leading South African business executive who has been the group’s CEO for three years, has an excellent track record, with his team delivering strong results in difficult trading conditions such as COVID-19, lockdowns, and civil unrest that disrupted South Africa’s retail industry.

“Hence, the expectation is that the CEO be paid in line with the market/ comparator group on a total reward basis,” the group said. “The mechanism chosen by the committee was to award once-off restricted shares vesting over a five-year period, instead of increasing base pay.”

Mr. Price reported a 26.4-percent increase in profit from R2.65 billion ($158.3 million) to R3.35 billion ($200.1 million) at the end of its 2022 fiscal year, compared to a 2.6-percent decline in earnings at the end of its 2021 fiscal year.

Under Blair, Mr. Price’s total assets and liabilities have grown from R10.12 billion ($604.5 million) and R2.66 billion ($159 million) in 2018 to R22.68 billion ($1.35 billion) and R10.62 billion ($634.3 million) in 2022, respectively.