geo chief executive Paul Walsh earned £14.8 million during his final year at the drinks giant.The pay details, which were revealed in the company's annual report released Monday, show that most of the earnings came from incentive plans linked to the company's performance and were paid to Walsh in the form of shares.
Walsh earned £1.3 million in fixed pay for the 12 months ended 30 June, the report said. However, 83% of his total pay is in incentives linked to Diageo's share price, which has risen by 80% over the past three years.
Walsh, who will stay on to assist his successor Ivan Menezes for a year, is to continue his involvement with Diageo's portfolio of Scotch whiskeys for a period of "up to five years”, with a salary of £80,000 per year, according to Diageo.
Elsewhere in the report, Diageo revealed that while 42% of its business is now in 'faster growing markets', Western Europe remains 'the spiritual home of the company'.
"Western Europe continued to be a challenging trading environment. Our Southern European markets and Ireland faced another very tough year and net sales declined 11%", John Kennedy, president at Diageo Western Europe said.
Kennedy continued, "Marketing investment, while lower overall, was focused on the biggest opportunities primarily on our strategic brands, Captain Morgan and Tanqueray as well as on Guinness which made share gains in the last quarter in Great Britain and Ireland."
"Overall we are addressing the challenges we see in Southern Europe and Ireland and we are capturing growth in the stronger markets of Western Europe.”
