How Should Investors React To Vienna Insurance Group AG’s (VIE:VIG) CEO Pay?
Elisabeth Stadler has been the CEO of Vienna Insurance Group AG (VIE:VIG) since 2016. First, this article will compare CEO compensation with compensation at similar sized companies. Then we’ll look at a snap shot of the business growth. Third, we’ll reflect on the total return to shareholders over three years, as a second measure of business performance. This process should give us an idea about how appropriately the CEO is paid.
View our latest analysis for Vienna Insurance Group
How Does Elisabeth Stadler’s Compensation Compare With Similar Sized Companies?
Our data indicates that Vienna Insurance Group AG is worth €3.0b, and total annual CEO compensation is €1.1m. (This number is for the twelve months until 2017). While we always look at total compensation first, we note that the salary component is less, at €714k. We examined companies with market caps from €1.8b to €5.6b, and discovered that the median CEO compensation of that group was €2.3m.
This would give shareholders a good impression of the company, since most similar size companies have to pay more, leaving less for shareholders. However, before we heap on the praise, we should delve deeper to understand business performance.
You can see, below, how CEO compensation at Vienna Insurance Group has changed over time.
Is Vienna Insurance Group AG Growing?
Vienna Insurance Group AG has increased its earnings per share (EPS) by an average of 39% a year, over the last three years In the last year, its revenue is up 4.6%.
This demonstrates that the company has been improving recently. A good result. It’s nice to see a little revenue growth, as this is consistent with healthy business conditions.
Shareholders might be interested in this free visualization of analyst forecasts. .
Has Vienna Insurance Group AG Been A Good Investment?
With a three year total loss of 1.5%, Vienna Insurance Group AG would certainly have some dissatisfied shareholders. So shareholders would probably think the company shouldn’t be too generous with CEO compensation.
In Summary…
It appears that Vienna Insurance Group AG remunerates its CEO below most similar sized companies. Since the business is growing, many would argue this suggests the pay is modest. Despite some positives, it is likely that shareholders wanted better returns, given the performance over the last three years. We’re not critical of the remuneration Elisabeth Stadler receives, but it would be good to see improved returns to shareholders before the remuneration grows too much.
When I see fairly low remuneration, combined with earnings per share growth, but without big share price gains, it makes me want to research the potential for future gains. CEO compensation is one thing, but it is also interesting to check if the CEO is buying or selling Vienna Insurance Group (free visualization of insider trades).
Or you might prefer examine intently this intuitive graph showing past earnings and revenue.
To help readers see past the short term volatility of the financial market, we aim to bring you a long-term focused research analysis purely driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis does not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements.
The author is an independent contributor and at the time of publication had no position in the stocks mentioned. For errors that warrant correction please contact the editor at editorial-team@simplywallst.com.
