As a result of the sluggish economy, it was found that the salaries of outside directors of major corporations have also decreased. Among the top 10 corporations in terms of compensation, seven reduced their salaries, and the annual salary of an outside director at Samsung Electronics, which had exceeded 200 million won for the first time last year, dropped by about 10%, returning to the 100 million won range.
On the 12th, CEO Score, a corporate data research institute, surveyed the annual average salary of outside directors at 247 companies that announced shareholder meetings among the top 500 listed companies by market capitalization as of the 7th, finding that seven of the top 10 companies in compensation, including Samsung Electronics and SK Telecom, reduced their salaries.
Samsung Electronics paid an annual salary of 183.33 million won to its outside directors last year, a decrease of 9.8% compared to the previous year's 201.6 million won. This calculation was made by dividing the total compensation for outside directors by the average number of such directors, and Samsung Electronics still maintained its position as the listed company that pays the highest compensation to outside directors.
In the case of SK Telecom, which ranked second for two consecutive years, the salary was 156.77 million won, down 7% from the previous year. Companies such as SK hynix (153.67 million won), SK (152 million won), SK Square (146 million won), SK IE Technology (121.75 million won), and Samsung C&T (114 million won) also saw their average salaries for outside directors decrease.
The company with the greatest decrease in average salary was SK Innovation, which saw a drop of more than 36%. The effects of the sluggish economy have impacted the salaries of outside directors as well, with 68 of the 247 surveyed companies reducing the average salaries of their outside directors last year. Among these, 15 companies cut salaries by more than 10 million won.
Meanwhile, among the surveyed corporations, 29 companies had average outside director salaries exceeding 100 million won last year, an increase of nine from the previous year (20 companies). Notably, POSCO Holdings (131.21 million won), Hyundai Motor Company (121.4 million won), and SK bioscience (112.98 million won) were found to have raised the average salaries paid to their outside directors.