Special stock award boosted 2018 compensation to $129.5M

Discovery CEO David Zaslav received $45.843 million in total compensation for 2019, according to documents filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

The total made him one of the highest paid executives in media and in the U.S. corporate world in general. But it paled to last year’s haul, when special option awards attached to signing a new contract pushed Zaslav’s total compensation to $129.5 million.

Zaslav’s salary remained at $3 million in 2019 and he took home $13.5 million in stock awards, down from $14,8 million last year. His 2019 option awards were worth $7 million. He also received non-equity incentive plan compensation of $21.8 million, up from $9 million.

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Jean-Briac Perrette received total compensation of $14.5 million, up from $8.49 million.

Bruce Campbell, chief development, distribution and legal officer’s compensation dropped to $9.2 million from $12.3 million.

CFO Gunnar Wiedenfels’ pay was $7.4 million in his first full year at the company.

Peter Faricy, who joined Discovery in 2018 from Amazon as CEO, global direct to consumer, received $7.3 million.