McDonald's CEO Gets Supersized

Posted Apr 9th 2010 3:00PM by Gary Sattler
Filed under: Good news, Press Releases, Products and Services, McDonald's (MCD)

Now we might know exactly why Ronald McDonald might get axed by McDonald's Corp.(MCD). The company could use the money to pay it's CEO, Jim Skinner.

Dow Jones Newswires, via Chicago Breaking Business, reports that CEO Skinner received $17.6 million in compensation for 2009, representing a 30% increase over the previous year. The company is paying its highest executives handsomely for meeting specified performance goals. Who could argue with that? According to the report, "McDonald's payouts under its long-term incentive plan reached the maximum level possible based on the company 'substantially exceeding target performance' on several factors, including operating growth and stock returns."

The reader should take notice that as the Dow was taking a beating on all fronts, and as the markets as a whole lost an incredible amount of their value, McDonald's Corp was still recording growth. The only other Dow component company to do the same was Wal-Mart. I think there's a lesson in there somewhere.

As of this writing, McDonald's Corp. is trading in the range of $68.60. Even in light of the company's recently posted all time high stock price, analyst consensus is still calling McDonald's Corp a buy.

Tags: inthenews, JimSkinner, MCD