By Giulio Piovaccari
MILAN (Reuters) -Carmaker Stellantis (NYSE:) faces a difficult 12 months with rising pricing pressures, its chief government warned on Tuesday earlier than shareholders voted to approve his bumper 2023 wage package deal.
Having needed to cope with excessive uncooked materials prices and strikes over pay in North America final 12 months, the corporate is now working in an more and more aggressive market, CEO Carlos Tavares mentioned.
“We see that the market is being increasingly aggressive when it comes to pricing. We can’t ignore that,” he instructed the group’s annual basic assembly (AGM).
In a consultative-only vote, on Tuesday about 70% of Stellantis shareholders voted in favour of the 2023 remuneration report for senior managers.
Whole remuneration for Tavares rose 56% to as much as 36.5 million euros ($38.8 million) together with 13 million euros in long-term incentives linked to particular efficiency targets.
That wage has drawn criticism at a time when the Franco-Italian automaker is in search of to chop prices and cut back its workforce as a part of its transition to electrical automobiles (EVs).
The Portuguese CEO, who has made Stellantis one of the crucial worthwhile corporations within the business, had defended his compensation whereas talking at an occasion in France on the eve of Tuesday’s AGM, drawing comparisons with soccer gamers or System 1 drivers.
“Ninety % of my wage is decided by the outcomes of the corporate, so this proves that the corporate’s outcomes are apparently not too unhealthy,” he instructed reporters.
The carmaker this 12 months agreed voluntary redundancy packages for about 3,000 employees, representing 7.5% of its Italian workforce. It additionally introduced layoffs for 600 employees on time contracts in France and for 400 salaried staff in the US.
Stellantis, manufacturers of which embody Fiat, Peugeot (OTC:) and Jeep, has rewarded staff worldwide with a complete of 1.9 billion euros for the group’s efficiency in 2023.
The corporate’s traders permitted Tavares’ remuneration package deal final 12 months however rejected it on the 2022 shareholder assembly within the run-up to the French presidential elections, when each President Emmanuel Macron and his far-right challenger Marine Le Pen strongly and brazenly criticised Tavares’s package deal.
France has a 6% stake within the carmaker and is represented on its board.
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