Oracle shareholders have had enough with Larry Ellison’s gargantuan paycheck.

    Like other U.S. companies, the company must submit its top pay packages to an annual shareholder vote. Over the last three years, the best Oracle ORCL 0.33% could muster was two-thirds support, and, in the last two years, a three-fifths majority opposed the plans. This should not come as a surprise. Oracle shareholders have been putting forward resolutions objecting to executive pay for years. And this year looks to be no different.

    Oracle has only managed to gain the little support it has for its pay packages because CEO Larry Ellison owns some 25% of outstanding shares in the company. He’s not going to vote against his own pay, but if you take those shares out of the mix, hardly any shareholders approve of the executive salaries at the company.

    Last year, Ellison made almost $153 million, making him one of the highest paid executives in the U.S. Some 98% of this compensation came from profits on exercising stock options; he only gets $1 in salary. In each of the last seven years, Oracle’s board has awarded Ellison 7 million stock options. It’s not hard to make a vast amount of profit when the odds are that great.

    Despite the lack of support for its pay policies, last year Oracle’s compensation committee determined “that significant changes to our executive compensation program were not warranted,” and it awarded Ellison another 7 million options. The company has not announced any plans to change to its pay practices. A spokesman for Oracle declined to comment.

    Companies often determine how much they pay their CEOs based on how much similar companies pay their chief execs. But none of the CEOs at companies that Oracle itself has identified as peers are paid anywhere near as much as Ellison. A recent Equilar pay surveyfor the New York Times pegs Ellison at No. 3 out of the top 200 highest paid CEOs in the U.S., with $78.4 million in compensation in 2013. That’s just counting the value of the seven million options he received in 2013 rather than the profits made on exercising older options. The closest peer is Cisco’s John Chambers, who made $21 million in 2013, then Paul Jacobs at Qualcomm with $20.4 million.

    The only other peers in the list are HP’s HPQ 5.30% Margaret Whitman at $17.6 million, IBM’s IBM 0.74% Virginia Rometty at $14 million and John Donahoe at eBay with $13.8 million. None of Oracle’s other peers made the top 200.

    So, what is Oracle thinking? It’s far from the largest company in its peer group. IBM’s revenues for 2013, for example, were almost $100 billion, compared to $37 billion at Oracle.

    甲骨文公司（Oracle）股东对拉里•埃里森的巨额薪酬已经忍无可忍。

    甲骨文公司与其他美国公司一样，必须在每年的股东大会上提交高管薪酬方案，由股东投票表决。过去三年中，甲骨文公司所获最高支持率为三分之二；而在过去两年中，有五分之三的大股东对高管薪酬方案持反对意见。而这个结果应该在意料之中。多年来，甲骨文公司的股东一直在提出决议，反对公司的高管薪酬方案，今年也不例外。

    因为甲骨文CEO拉里•埃里森拥有公司约25%的已发行股票，甲骨文公司最后还是获得了对薪酬方案的微弱支持。埃里森不会投票反对自己的薪水，但是，如果刨除埃里森的股份，几乎没有股东会批准这家公司的高管薪酬方案。

    去年，埃里森的薪酬约为1.53亿美元，跻身美国薪水最高的高管之列。他薪酬的98%左右通过行使股票优先购买权获得；而他的薪水只有1美元。过去七年中，甲骨文公司董事会每年都会向埃里森授予700万份股票期权。这么高的几率，，想不取得巨额收益都难。

    虽然缺乏对薪酬方案的支持，但去年，甲骨文公司的薪酬委员会还是决定，“没有充分理由对高管薪酬方案进行重大改革，”同时再次向埃里森授予了700万份期权。甲骨文公司目前尚未公布任何薪酬方案变更计划，公司发言人也拒绝发表评论。

    各家公司通常依据同业公司高管的薪酬确定本公司CEO的薪酬。但是，在甲骨文公司界定的同业公司中，CEO们的薪酬远远低于埃里森的薪酬。高管薪酬研究公司Equilar近期为《纽约时报》（New York Times）开展的薪酬调查显示，2013年，埃里森的薪酬达到7,840万美元，在美国前200名高薪CEO中名列第三。而且，这个排名还只计算了他在2013年获得的700万份股权的价值，不包括行使原有期权获得的收益。思科公司（Cisco）的约翰•钱伯斯2013年的薪水为2,100万美元，与埃里森的薪水最为接近，而高通公司（Qualcomm）的保罗•雅各布以2,040万美元的薪水紧随其后。

    甲骨文的其他同业公司高管的薪水如下：惠普公司（HP）玛格利特•惠特曼1,760万美元；IBM公司（IBM）罗睿兰1,400万美元；购物网站eBay约翰•唐纳荷1,380万美元。他们的薪酬都没能进入前200名。

    那么，甲骨文公司到底怎么想的？甲骨文公司远远不是业内最大的公司。例如，2013年，IBM的收入约为1,000亿美元，而甲骨文公司的收入仅为370亿美元。

    Shareholder votes on executive compensation – commonly known as Say on Pay – are not binding. The board – despite being there to represent shareholders – does not have to act on shareholders’ opinions. But Oracle’s intransigence is extremely unusual.

    At Target, by contrast — which won its Say on Pay vote last year, albeit with a margin of only a couple of percentage points — the board made substantial changes to executive pay that resulted in a dramatic fall in compensation for the CEO. At McKesson and Freeport McMoRan, major defeats in 2013 also led to changes to its executive compensation.

    Typically, companies lose Say on Pay votes when performance is lackluster and the CEOs are paid handsomely, like at Freeport McMoRan. That’s hardly the case at Oracle, whose stock price rise over the past five years has been pretty consistent, and the company has recently begun to pay dividends. On the other hand, net income at Oracle has been basically flat over the last five quarters. Still, great returns to shareholders might be advanced as a reason for inaction at Oracle. What are shareholders complaining about? They benefited from the rise in stock price that allowed Ellison to make $150 million in profit on his stock options.

    Shareholders have rejected executive compensation plans at companies that have had great performance. At McKesson, where returns to shareholders have also been excellent, pay reform went ahead. And Domino’s Pizza and Chipotle Mexican Grill both catastrophically lost Say on Pay votes last month despite exemplary performance. It’s too early to know what changes will be made at these companies, but past experience suggests that the vote will not be ignored.

    The new shareholder proposals at Oracle will be voted on at the company’s October annual meeting, where, unless major changes are announced, the results for the Say on Pay vote would seem to be a foregone conclusion. The AFL-CIO and New York City Employee Retirement System both filed resolutions calling for pay changes because, “recent [pay] plans submitted by the Company for shareholder approval have only cited general [performance] criteria so vague or multitudinous as to be meaningless.” The Nathan Cummings Foundation has filed what is known as a “proxy access” resolution, which would allow shareholders to formally nominate directors … and potentially get them on the compensation committee so they could implement shareholder demands.

    So what is it about Oracle that makes it ignore the wishes of a vast majority of its owners? Ellison founded the firm, so perhaps it’s a case of “it’s my party and I’ll pay if I want to.” Except that many founder firms pay their founders very modestly. Neither Bill Gates nor Steve Ballmer ever received a stock award from Microsoft, taking only a small salary and bonus each year. Their vast holdings in the firm made equity awards pointless. How much more aligned with shareholders could they get? The same could be said about Ellison, except that his board does not say it.

    股东对高管薪酬的投票（即所谓的“薪酬发言权”投票）不具有约束力。虽然公司董事会代表股东，但并不是必须按照股东的意见行事。不过，甲骨文公司董事会毫不妥协的态度极不寻常。

    相比之下，虽然塔吉特百货公司（Target）董事会在去年的“薪水发言权”投票中获胜，尽管优势很微弱，但是董事会还是对高管薪酬方案进行了实质性调整，结果导致公司CEO薪酬大幅缩水。麦克森公司（McKesson）和弗里波特－麦克莫兰铜金公司（Freeport McMoRan）在2013年遭遇的惨败同样也促成了对公司高管薪酬方案的改革。

    通常情况下，如果哪家公司像弗里波特－麦克莫兰铜金公司一样，业绩平淡，CEO却获得高额薪酬，这家公司就会在“薪水发言权”投票中失败。而甲骨文公司的情况却很不一样。过去五年，甲骨文公司股票价格一直在稳定攀升，近期还开始支付股息。此外，甲骨文公司的净收入在过去五个季度中保持基本稳定。而且，甲骨文公司还会因为股东在公司的不作为（不反对薪酬方案）而进一步增加对他们的高额回报。那么，股东们到底在抱怨什么？股票价格的上涨使埃里森获得1.5亿股票期权收益，但同样也给股东们带来了好处。

    有些公司业绩优秀，但股东们依然否决了公司的高管薪酬方案。麦克森公司的股东回报一直不错，依然进行了薪酬改革。尽管达美乐比萨（Domino’s Pizza）和墨西哥烧烤快餐店（Chipotle Mexican Gril）取得了优异的业绩，却都在上月的“薪水发言权”投票中惨败。尽管目前要想知道这两家公司将出台哪些改革措施还太早，但是过去的经验表明，他们不会忽视投票的结果。

    今年10月召开的甲骨文公司年度大会将对新的股东提案进行投票。除非公司宣布重大变更计划，否则“薪水发言权”投票结果似乎已成定局。美国劳工总会与产业劳工组织（AFL-CIO）及纽约市雇员退休体制（New York City Employee Retirement System）提交了决议，呼吁对薪酬方案进行变革，原因是“这家公司近期提交股东批准的（薪酬）方案引用的综合（业绩）标准含糊不清或名目繁多，以至于毫无意义。”卡明斯基金会（Nathan Cummings Foundation）甚至提交了所谓的“代理参与”决议。这个决议将允许股东正式提名董事，还有可能让他们进入薪酬委员会。这样一来，他们就能执行股东们的要求。

    那么，是什么原因让甲骨文公司忽视大多数股东的愿望呢？埃里森是公司的创始人，所以可能是这种情形：“我的地盘我做主。”不过，许多公司也只会向创始人支付适度的薪酬。比尔•盖茨或史蒂夫•鲍尔默从未获得微软公司（Microsoft）的股票奖励，他们每年只获得有限的薪水和奖金。他们持有公司的大量股票，使股权奖励变得毫无意义。股东因此对他们的支持程度会提高多少？埃里森的情况也是一样，只是他的董事会不说而已。

    Perhaps it is the board that is at fault, then. It certainly seems reluctant to stand up to Ellison, despite the presence of an independent chairman, Jeffrey Henley. The problem with the independent chairman, of course, is that he is not independent at all. Henley was CFO at Oracle for 13 years and, according to the company’s proxy filing, still “meets regularly with significant Oracle customers and is instrumental in closing major commercial transactions worldwide.” That’s not an independent director by any sensible definition of the word; that’s an executive. Including Ellison, there are three other executives on the 11-person board. In addition, six directors have been on the board for more than 10 years, a tenure that makes independence very unlikely.

    This is one of the clubbiest boards in the Fortune 500. But how long can it continue to ignore shareholder demands?

    Unlike the other resolutions, the “proxy access” resolution is binding. Similar resolutions recently passed at Nabors Industries and Chesapeake Energy, leading to wholesale director replacements. If it passes at Oracle, these tenured directors may be given the boot. And then Ellison could very well see a sizable pay cut.

    或许，错就错在董事会。虽然存在杰弗里•亨利这位独立董事长，但是董事会似乎不愿意反抗埃里森。当然，独立董事长的问题在于，他根本没有独立性。亨利曾经在这家公司担任了13年的首席财务官。这家公司的代理委托书显示，现在他仍然“定期与公司的重要客户会面，在完成全球主要商业交易中发挥着重要作用。”只要合理定义“独立董事”这个词，亨利无论如何都算不上独立董事，而是一名高管。在甲骨文由11人组成的董事会中，除埃里森外，还有三名公司高管。此外，甲骨文董事会有六名董事在任的时间已经超过了十年，这么长的任期也使得独立性几乎成为不可能。

    这是《财富》美国500强中最排外的董事会之一。但是，它还能忽视股东的要求多久？

    与其他决议不同，“代理参与”决议具有约束力。近期，纳伯斯工业公司（Nabors Industries）和切萨皮克能源公司（Chesapeake Energy）通过了类似的决议，导致了公司董事的大换血。如果甲骨文公司也通过代理参与决议，这些享有终身职位的董事可能就得走人。届时，埃里森也的薪酬很可能会大幅缩水。（财富中文网）

    译者：乔树静/汪皓