A report has revealed that EA’s Andrew Wilson and Activision’s Bobby Kotick are among the ‘most overpaid CEOs in the US’.
As You Sow, a non-profit, has also revealed the staggering the pay gaps between employees and CEOs since 2015.
The 2019 list has been published, and it makes for very interesting reading. The non-profit looks at data such as salary, what percentage of shareholders approved it, and the gap between the CEO’s income and their employees’ to come up with the top 100 ‘overpaid’ CEOs.
Activision’s Kotick gets an eye-watering salary of $28,698,375, which is 306 times more than his average employee, reports PC Gamer.
Bear in mind that Activision recently let go hundreds of employees, despite celebrating record profits.
All this considered, 92 percent of the company’s shareholders still voted to approve this salary. So he comes in at 45 on the list.
Wilson of EA earns $7 million more a year, with an unbelievable salary of $35,728,764. This is 371 times more than his average employee. Similarly to Activision, 97 percent of EA’s shareholders approved this salary. He comes in at 98 on the list.
The report says: “According to Institutional Shareholder Services (ISS) the average pay for a CEO in the S&P 500 grew from $11.5 million in 2013 to $13.6 million in 2017. An analysis by the Economic Policy Institute, which includes the cashing in of stock options, found that ‘in 2017 the average CEO of the 350 largest firms in the U.S. received $18.9 million in compensation, a 17.6 percent increase over 2016.'”
It was announced earlier this month that Activision and Bungie had decided to part ways, and the news left a lot of people wondering why.
Well, it looks like it was all down to the money that Bungie was pulling in from franchises like Destiny, or rather, the lack of money, as Destiny 2 failed to meet financial expectations.

During a recent earnings report, Activision talked about its decision to let go of Bungie and the Destiny series, describing the decision as both “mutual” and “amicable.”
Coddy Johnson, President and Chief Operating Officer at Activision Blizzard said [via GameSpot]: “Bungie gets to focus on the [Destiny IP] that they have created and we get to focus on our biggest opportunities on our biggest franchises with our best resources,
“Our decision was reached with mutual agreement with Bungie to sell back the commercial rights. And for us at least, it was rooted in really our strategy overall.”

Thanks to the existing deal between the parties, Bungie gets to keep ownership of the Destiny franchise. Johnson said: “We did not own the underlying Destiny IP, and we do for all of our other major franchises, which we think is not just a differentiator for us in the industry,
“But also controlling the underlying IP gives us the chance to move in with new experiences and new engagement models which also come with new revenue streams and, structurally, higher economics when you own the IP.”

The gaming community isn’t thrilled about the breakup, with lots of people predicting that without Activision Blizzard, Destiny will fail.
I guess the problem wasnt @Activision it was @Bungie all along. Smart move from Activision to leave the franchise. Destiny is a sinking ship.
— jaybngs (@jaybngs) February 15, 2019
The stock for the mother company (Activision/Blizzard) lost half its value since the beginning of the year, mainly because of bungie getting out of the publishing contract for Destiny. It’s the investment world, full of sharks. Nothing to do with Warcraft and the other games.
— Ioannis Theodoridis (@mythryll) February 13, 2019