What did top brass get paid in 2011? Here's a peek; Banikarim beats Gannett veterans to stock windfall

Corporate has just revealed some first crucial details about what the most senior executives got paid in 2011, a year when 700 newspaper workers got laid off, thousands more were furloughed, earnings and revenue tanked, and Gannett’s stock price dove 11%.

Documents filed yesterday with government regulators show the board of directors awarded nearly 300,000 restricted shares of stock to 13 executives, including CEO Gracia Martore. Her stake alone would be worth nearly $800,000 at today's closing share price.

The shares represent only part of what the executives got paid overall. Still to come in the months ahead: more details about their other stock awards, plus their salaries, bonuses and other benefits.

Banikarim

Another recipient of the new share rewards is Maryam Banikarim, who was named chief marketing officer last March. Reflecting her broad authority, she got more shares than several longer-serving executives -- including USA Today Publisher Dave Hunke.

Banikarim's would be worth $302,000 vs. $252,000 for Hunke, also based on today's closing price. (See table, below; bigger view.)

The shares awarded to Banikarim and to another spring hire -- Chief Digital Officer David Payne -- are in addition to those awards they got here and here when they signed on.

Martore and eight others got fewer shares -- in her case, substantially so -- than a year before, according to the documents filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.

That doesn’t necessarily mean their total compensation for 2011 was lower than in 2010, however. The board of directors may think these restricted shares will eventually be worth more than those granted last year. Also, directors could give the executives more of their total pay in cash or other types of stock. The final figures will be disclosed in March, when Corporate releases the annual proxy report to shareholders.

Awards like IOUs
The restricted stock units disclosed yesterday are like stock IOUs. They give Martore and the others the right to claim their shares four years from now: Dec. 31, 2015. Delaying the RSUs encourages the executives to stay with the company, and gives them another incentive to work toward a higher stock price -- benefiting all shareholders.

There’s no way to know how much the RSUs will be worth at the end of 2015. But assuming shares are valued the same as today’s closing price -- $13.73 -- the RSUs would be worth six figures for all of the executives. In Martore’s case: about $770,000.

RSUs are among four major components of annual pay. The others are salary and bonus, both paid in cash. The fourth is stock options, which let executives buy shares at fixed prices, no matter how much they're worth on the open market.

For example, in 2010, when Martore was the company’s No. 2 executive, her total compensation was valued at $8.2 million. RSUs that year accounted for $1.7 million of the total.

Martore’s salary: $950K
When she was promoted to CEO three months ago, Martore declined a raise in her base salary, which is $950,000.

Yesterday’s documents show the board awarded Martore nearly 57,000 RSUs for 2011 vs. 90,000 in 2010.

Only one executive employed both years got more: Paul Davidson, CEO of the U.K. newspaper division Newsquest, who got nearly 24,000 vs. 20,000 in 2010.

Related: this spreadsheet shows projected values of the 2011 RSUs for each of the 13 executives, plus the number awarded in 2010. Here's a snapshot of the spreadsheet: