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Twitter CEO Takes No Salary or Stock Grant for Third Year in a Row

Paul Ausick

Published: April 12, 2018 10:00 am

Last Updated: January 12, 2020 1:29 am

Twitter Inc. (NYSE: TWTR) CEO Jack Dorsey “declined all compensation” for 2017, according to the company’s proxy statement filed this morning with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. This is the third consecutive year that Dorsey has foregone any compensation.

According to a profile at Forbes, Dorsey’s net worth as of Wednesday night was $3.6 billion. Included in that total is a 2.39% stake in Twitter valued at $256 million as of Wednesday’s closing share price of $29.39 per share.

Dorsey, who is also CEO of Square Inc. (NYSE: SQ), took a salary of just $2.75 in 2016. The company has not yet filed a proxy statement for this year. Dorsey also owned 65.5 million shares of Square’s class B common stock, according to last year’s proxy filing, valued at around $3.7 billion when converted to class A common shares, based on the latest closing price.

Compensation for Twitter executive chairman included a 2017 salary of $50,000 and 140,000 performance-based stock units valued at around $2 million. CFO Ned Segal received total compensation in 2017 of $14.3 million, according to the New York Post.

Twitter’s annual meeting is scheduled for May 30 and shareholders will vote on a proposal that would require management to report the company’s content-enforcement policies to shareholders. Management recommends a vote against the proposal:

Our board of directors has considered this proposal and believes the preparation of a report as requested by this proposal is unnecessary in light of our current practices, level of public transparency about these matters and our key initiatives. We further believe that the expanded disclosure requested by the proposal could reduce the effectiveness of our safety efforts by providing a roadmap for those bad actors who are seeking to evade abiding by our terms.

Twitter shares traded up about 0.6% Thursday morning, at $29.56 in a 52-week range of $14.12 to $36.80. The 12-month consensus price target on the stock is $27.52.