Salesforce just granted its top execs over $5 million in cash bonuses, including $2.35 million to CEO Marc Benioff

REUTERS/Elijah Nouvelage

• Salesforce is awarding over $5 million in cash bonuses to its top five executives.
• CEO Marc Benioff alone will receive nearly half of that: He'll be paid $2.3 million in bonuses on April 15.
• While the bonuses are an annual occurrence, this year's awards come amid an economic downturn that has led to widespread of layoffs across the country and record unemployment.
• Benioff has pledged not to make any "significant" layoffs at Salesforce for the next 90 days, after urging all CEOs to take 90-day no layoff pledge.
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Salesforce is awarding over $5 million in bonuses to its top five executives, according to a regulatory filing on Monday. CEO Marc Benioff will receive $2.35 million, or nearly half the total.

The bonuses, which will be paid around April 15, are a standard annual occurrence and reflect the executives' performances over past year. This year's payouts, however, provide a starker-than-usual contrast to conditions across the U.S. as the coronavirus pandemic has ravaged the economy, triggering mass layoffs and leading to record rates of unemployment.

Benioff, who had a base salary of $1.55 million in 2019, recently called on all CEOs to take a 90-day "no layoff pledge" as part of an eight-point plan to deal with the coronavirus crisis. He then tweeted that Salesforce, for its part, would not to make any "significant" layoffs for the next 90 days, though notably did not ban them all together. Salesforce is also one of several tech companies that have committed to continuing to pay their hourly workers while offices are closed. Benioff said on the company's earnings call in late February that Salesforce would be able to withstand the impact of the ongoing coronavirus outbreak, though in the company's March 9 10K filing it acknowledged several potential effects from coronavirus, including those it can't yet predict.

Beyond Benioff, the board also approved cash bonuses based on corporate performance goals for CFO Mark Hawkins ($750,000), CTO and cofounder Parker Harris ($750,000), COO Bret Taylor ($675,000), and chief engineering officer Srinivas Tallapragada ($675,000).

The board also approved these executives' salaries and bonuses for the 2021 fiscal year, which started February 1 and will end January 31, 2021.

Here are the salaries and target bonuses for 2020 for Salesforce's top five executives:

• Benioff: salary of $1.55 million with 200% annual target bonus
• CFO Hawkins: salary of $1 million with 100% target bonus
• CTO Parker Harris: salary of $1 million with 100% target bonus.
• Chief engineering officer Srinivas Tallapragada: salary of $950,000 with 100% target bonus
• COO Taylor: a salary of $1 million with 100% target bonus (Taylor became COO on December 12, 2019)

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