Top 2 Merrill Lynch Execs Earned $7.4 Million in 1992

The top two executives at Merrill Lynch & Co. earned $7.4 million apiece in cash, stock and options in 1992, according to documents filed with federal regulators Friday.

In a preliminary filing of its annual proxy statement, Merrill Lynch disclosed that its chairman, William A. Schreyer, received a $600,000 salary, a $4.6-million bonus tied to company performance and $2.2 million in restricted shares and stock options.

Merrill Lynch President Daniel P. Tully, who succeeded Schreyer as chief executive in May, 1992, received a $500,000 salary, a $4.7-million bonus and $2.2 million in restricted shares and stock options.

The $7.4-million pay package for each man is a sizable jump over last year’s reported figures that had Schreyer taking home $5.9 million in salary and bonus and Tully getting $4.97 million.

But company officials explained that last year’s figures did not factor in the payment of a long-term equity award to both men paid in 1992 for performance in 1991.

When that stock incentive package is included, Schreyer’s total 1991 compensation was $7.9 million and Tully’s was $6.7 million, said Merrill Lynch.

Last year, the Securities and Exchange Commission, which oversees the disclosure documents public companies must supply investors, changed its rules requiring corporations to spell out how much top executives are paid in cash and stock and why.

In the newly detailed proxy required for the first time this year by the SEC, Merrill Lynch noted that:

* The firm’s stock outperformed a 10-company group of peer firms, the Standard & Poor’s 500 index and the S&P; financial index in 1992;

* Common stockholders’ net income increased 39% in 1992, while total compensation to Schreyer went up 14% and 34% for Tully in the same period;

* The annual cash compensation paid to the pair in 1992 is lower than that paid to the chief executives at five other firms over a three-year period ending in 1991, the most recent figures available;

* The executives’ base salaries averaged about 10% of the total compensation package, with the balance in cash bonus and long-term stock incentives tied to the company’s earnings.