Ryanair has restored group CEO Michael O’Leary’s pay to pre-pandemic levels with Mr O’Leary’s combined basic pay and bonus pay this year increasing almost four fold to €975,000.
The outspoken Ryanair boss took a 74% hit to combined basic pay and bonus during the pandemic in 2020/21 and received no bonus with basic pay at €250,000.
Now, the airline’s 2022 annual report reveals that Mr O’Leary’s pay returned to pre-pandemic levels in the 12 months to the end of March of this year following the airline restoring paying bonus payments to its CEO and paying him a €475,000 bonus.
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At the outset of the pandemic in 2020, Mr O’Leary volunteered a 50% reduction in his base pay to €250,000.
The annual report shows that Mr O’Leary’s basic pay doubled returning to its pre-Covid level of €500,000 in the 12 months to the end of March 2022.
The combined basic pay and bonus of €975,000 last year compared to combined pay and bonus payments of €958,000 in the 12 months to the end of March 2020.
In total, Mr O’Leary’s overall pay package for fiscal 2022 amounted to €2.76m and the report states that the 2022 pay package includes a €1.78m non-cash, technical accounting charge for 10m unvested share options granted under Mr O’Leary’s new five-year contract in February 2019.
The report states that up to 50% of Mr O’Leary’s bonus related to a passenger traffic target of 100m and as actual traffic was 97.1m Mr O’Leary received 45% of the available 50% maximum bonus linked to traffic growth and received a bonus of €225,000 for traffic growth.
The remainder €250,000 in bonus payments were granted for customer service and environmental targets laid down by the airline’s remuneration committee.
Mr O’Leary’s basic and bonus pay soared last year as Ryanair revenues increased almost three fold to €4.8bn and the airline’s pre-tax losses more than halved from €1.1bn to €430m in the 12 months to the end of March this year.
The airline almost tripled revenues as passenger numbers rebounded strongly to 97m from 27.5m - although still 35% behind pre-Covid levels.
Mr O’Leary’s paper fortune through his 3.9% share of the airline suffered a hit in the past 12 months as the share price of the airline has declined from €16.79 last July to a current share price of €12.88.
In July of last year, Mr O’Leary’s Ryanair shareholding had a value of €740m based on a share price of €16.79 and this has now declined to €570m based on a share price of €12.88 - a drop of €170m.
Under Mr O’Leary’s current five year deal with the airline, the group CEO stands to make €99m from stock options if profits exceed €2bn for any one year or if the Ryanair share price exceeds €21 for a 28 day period before April 2024.
The report states that “due to the impact of Covid and more recently the invasion of Ukraine, to date, none of the ambitious vesting targets have been achieved”.
In his message to shareholders on the business impact of Covid-19, Mr O’Leary states “we believe that Ryanair has negotiated the unprecedented Covid pandemic in much better shape than any other European airline.”
He added: “We entered this crisis with a strong balance sheet and substantial cash reserves and, while we emerge out of Covid with a sizeable net debt, were able to manage our way through Covid in such a way that we continue to have one of the strongest balance sheets in the industry.”
He said: “While most of our EU competitors are operating between 75% to 85% of their pre-Covid capacity this Summer, Ryanair has grown to 115% of our pre Covid volumes, which will deliver very significant market share gains for our business.”
Ryanair’s Irish revenues last increased almost three fold from €81m to €229.6m. In his report, Mr O’Leary said that Ryanair has increased significantly its market share in Ireland “and has based a record 33 aircraft in Dublin for Summer 2022, to support the Irish Government’s visionary Covid Recovery Incentive Scheme”.
Pre-Covid, Ryanair’s largest market was the UK but last year, Italy was the airline’s strongest market with revenues of €1.1bn followed by Spain with revenues of €873m. The airline’s UK revenues totalled €564m.
The report confirms Ryanair last year received €82m in various European Covid-19 payroll schemes that followed the airline receiving €84m under that heading in fiscal 2021.
Numbers employed by Ryanair last year increased from 15,016 to 19,116 and staff costs increased by 46% from €472m in fiscal year 2021 to €690m in fiscal 2022.
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