2022 Top 250 Report – 50th Edition

The 50th annual FW Cook Top 250 Report details long-term incentive practices and trends of the 250 largest companies in the S&P 500 by market capitalization. This study focuses on understanding how long-term incentive (“LTI”) programs are currently designed and how they have evolved since the release of FW Cook’s 2021 report.

Long-term incentive practices generally reflect a continuation of trends observed over the past several years.

Key Takeaways:

• Long-term incentive mix continues to be strongly oriented towards performance awards, which represent 59% of total long-term incentives.
• Total Shareholder Return (“TSR”) continues to increase in prevalence – now used by 72% of companies vs. 60% in 2017 – and remains the most common performance metric among the Top 250 companies, with 96% of companies using relative TSR (“rTSR”).
• Performance goals remained relatively similar to the prior year, though threshold goals for absolute and relative top-line metrics increased in prevalence.
• Above-median rTSR target setting became more widespread with sustained pressure from proxy advisory firms requesting above median performance achievement for target payouts.