An advisory firm that counsels the largest institutional investors on how to vote at shareholder meetings is recommending investors support Warner Bros. Discovery’s $77.7 billion acquisition by Paramount Skydance but is against a golden parachute proposal that would see executives collect a total of $1.35 billion after the deal goes through.
In a report issued on Wednesday, Institutional Shareholder Services (ISS) said support for the “extraordinary golden parachute” proposal, which it valued at $886.8 million in payments for Warner Bros. Discovery CEO David Zaslav and $466.2 million for the other executives, wasn’t warranted. ISS took issue with an “excise tax gross-up” estimate of $335 million for Zaslav and hundreds of millions he stands to collect just because the deal between the two companies is happening.
