Apple Inc's Tim Cook, with an annual compensation of $65.2 million last year, has topped the best pay-for-performance rating conducted for 100 highly-paid chief executive officers in the US, according to Bloomberg Pay Index.
The iPhone maker paid just 0.2 percent of three-year average economic profit of $28.6 billion to its head, revealing that investors are earning better returns for every dollar they pay Cook.
The Bloomberg ranking is based on an executive's pay expressed as a percentage of his or her company's economic profit.
After assuming charge as the CEO of the world's richest company three years ago, 54-year-old Cook increased its revenues by 69 per cent to $183 billion and net income by 53 per cent to $39.5 billion. Sales of iPhones saw more than two-fold increase to $102 billion during the past three fiscal years.
"A good leader like Cook builds a team around him that can do the job," Dan Ernst, an analyst at Hudson Square Research in New York, told Bloomberg.
Cook is ranked the 17th-highest paid US executive.
Apple gave him $9.2 million last year, comprising salary of $1.8 million, $6.7 million in bonus and $699,133 for security, said Bloomberg, citing regulatory filings by the company in January. It excluded 80,000 restricted stock units granted to him in August 2011, as part of his compensation for 2014. After factoring in the stock split in the ratio of 7:1 in June, his holding stood at 560,000 restricted shares worth about $56 million last September.
Microsoft Corporation's Satya Nadella was ranked second in the list of CEOs who offered best deals for investors. The world's biggest software maker paid 0.4 per cent of its $12.1 billion economic profit to Nadella last year.
The third-best deal for investors was Exxon Mobil Corp's Rex Tillerson, who was given 0.7 per cent of the company's $4.8 billion three-year average economic profit. Coca-Cola Co's Muhtar Kent occupied the fourth place as he was paid $33.8 million, or 1.2 per cent of its $2.8 billion economic profit in 2014.
The CEO of Qualcomm Inc., Steven Mollenkopf, who was paid $37.1 million, or 1.7 per cent of company's $2.1 billion three-year average economic profit last year, was ranked at fifth position in the index.
Larry Ellison, the founder of Oracle Corp, stood at sixth position, receiving more than $100 million in 2014. Oracle paid 2.1 per cent of the $4.8 billion economic profit to Ellison.
