For fundsters at publicly-traded companies, the Bill Gross saga may hold some lessons about paying your stars.

Joe Morris at the Financial Times reports that Janus [profile] is designating the billionaire bong king as a PM-only, not an executive, and thus can avoid two things: disclosing precisely how much Janus is paying Gross, and shareholder voting on that compensation. Yet Janus does have to describe the factors that go into figuring out that compensation, which in this case (like for many PMs) includes both a base salary and variable pay.

"They can be pretty vague about it," Bridget Hughes associate director of fund analysis at Morningstar, tells the FT.

"If I were them, I would say he is not an executive officer, he is just another portfolio manager who we don't have to disclose," adds Alan Johnson, managing director of consultancy Johnson Associates.

The article puts Janus' move to keep Gross' pay private in the context of Janus shareholders having "a history of rebelling against steep executive compensation." The FT points out that pay for Janus CEO Dick Weil "has fallen nearly 80 per cent since taking the job in 2010." 

Edited by: Neil Anderson, Managing Editor


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