By ,
Published January 13, 2015
The top executives of Google Inc. (GOOG) took salary cuts and received negligible bonuses in 2004 but hit financial jackpots after the company went public in August, according to regulatory filings.
Last year, Chief Executive Eric Schmidt earned a salary of $81,432, a third of his 2003 salary, and a bonus of just $1,556, according to the company's proxy filed Friday.
Co-founders and presidents Larry Page (search) and Sergey Brin (search) each took a similar cut in pay. They each received a 2004 salary of $43,750 plus a similar bonus of $1,556.
In the second quarter of 2004, Schmidt, Page and Brin requested that their salaries each be slashed to $1 per year. They will continue to be paid $1 in 2005, as per their request, despite a recommendation by the board to boost their pay.
But Schmidt, Brin and Page each have sold Class B shares potentially worth hundreds of millions of dollars since the Web search leader went public and its stock briefly zoomed above $216 from $85 a share. On Friday, it closed at $192.05 on the Nasdaq.
According to regulatory filings, Brin and Page each sold roughly 1.6 million shares of Class B common stock between the IPO in August and the end of March. During that same period, Schmidt sold about 500,000 Class B common shares.
Each share of Google's Class B common stock, which is neither listed nor publicly traded, is entitled to 10 votes per share, compared with one vote for each share of Class A common stock available to public shareholders.
https://www.foxnews.com/story/top-google-execs-to-earn-1-salary-in-2005