AOL Money & Finance

Viacom's Redstone pays the price

More

viacom

Sumner Redstone, the executive chairman of Viacom, is feeling generous lately. According to an announcement today, he is going to take a cut in pay.

Actually, his pay will fall by 50% to $4.5 million. Also, his compensation will be tied to the performance Viacom's stock. If the stock performs well compared to the S&P, then he will benefit.

This may be a smart move. At the start of the year, Viacom's stock price was in the low 40s. Now, the stock trades at $37.33.

Also, Viacom is revamping the rest of the pay structure for its senior officers -- so as to better incentivize them.

However, in the case of Redstone, it is really laughable. Will this pay package make any difference, given he already has $3 billion in holdings of Viacom stock?

The amazing thing is that he has the guts to actually take any compensation from Viacom. Why not do what other billionaire executives do -- like those at Google and Yahoo! -- and just take $1 for the year?

Tom Taulli is the author of various books, including the Complete M&A Handbook and operates InvestorOffering.com.

Symbol Lookup
IndexesChangePrice
DJIA-17.2410,433.71
NASDAQ-6.832,169.18
S&P 500-0.591,105.65

Last updated: November 25, 2009: 06:45 AM

BloggingStocks Exclusives

Hot Stocks

DailyFinance Headlines

Latest from BloggingBuyouts

TheFlyOnTheWall.com Headlines

BioHealth Investor Headlines

WalletPop Headlines

My Portfolios

Track your stocks here!

Find out why more people track their portfolios on AOL Money & Finance then anywhere else.

BloggingStocks Partners

More from AOL Money & Finance

WalletPop Headlines