The Most Highly Compensated Online Travel CEOs of 2018
Photo Credit: TripAdvisor CEO Stephen Kaufer spoke at Skift Global Forum New York 2017 about the company's future. A survey of compensation for last year found he was the most-compensated, though the company said it was a statistical fluke and not representative of a multi-year average. Skift
Skift Take
TripAdvisor CEO Stephen Kaufer is ordinarily far from being the most-compensated CEO in online travel. This year represented an unusual payout for him. But Skift's annual survey reveals that most online travel CEOs are often more handsomely compensated than what the top bosses in other industries receive, on average.
Stephen Kaufer, CEO of TripAdvisor, was the most-compensated chieftain in online travel last year and — at $43.2 million — the fifth most-highly-compensated CEO among Fortune 500 public companies in the U.S., following only the CEOs at Broadcom, CBS, TransDigm, and Time Warner.
TripAdvisor was quick to point out that the 55-year-old Kaufer received grants of options and restricted stock valued at $42.1 million. The earliest it would ever consider giving him another stock grant as long-term incentive compensation would be 2021.
Kaufer's compensation last year of $1.23 million is much more typical, the company said.
Looking at compensation across the online travel sector became a look at somewhat new names.
Expedia Group's CEO Mark Okerstrom, 45, became president and CEO as of September, 2017, having previously served as the conglomerate's chief financial officer since September 2011.
After that ascension, Okerstrom became 2017's
