Apple CEO Tim Cook Receives Criticism Over $100 Mln Pay Packag

(RTTNews) - Apple, Inc. (AAPL) CEO Tim Cook has been receiving severe criticism on reports that the company is awarding him a $100 million pay package. A powerful investor rights group is urging the investors to not accept the deal in the company's upcoming shareholder meeting. Institutional Shareholder Services (ISS) said that the pay package's design and its magnitude is was not clarified by the company. "There are significant concerns regarding the design and magnitude of the equity award made to CEO Cook in FY21... Half of the award lacks performance criteria," said the agency in a letter on Wednesday. Apple filed a proxy filing with the US Securities and Exchange Commission where it said that it is going to offer the CEO $82.3 million in stock apart from his $3 million in salaries. Adding up the compensations like target hitting bonus of $12 million, Cook already receives, the total package adds up to $98.7 million. "Given that CEO Cook will be eligible for retirement treatment after one year from the grant date, the retentive value of the award is limited," ISS added. Cook is receiving 333,987 restricted stock units as a part of the first stock plan he received back in 2011 when he took office adding to $384 million. The agency also valued the equity award at $75 million to which it has severe objections. "Half of the $75 million award is purely time-based, and the award would continue to vest in full in the event of his retirement," ISS wrote. Tim Cook had received $14.8 million in the previous year. His salary of $3 million makes him by far the highest earner in the company, getting 1447 times more than the average pay of the workers. Cook is valued at $2.3 billion by Forbes. Humongous pay deals have been dealt with severe action on the part of the investors recently as the investors are voting against the deals. However, Apple is not bound to listen to the investor votes and it has maintained silence over the matter.