- In 2019, Tesla CEO Elon Musk took the top spot in the list of highest-paid CEOs in the US while Apple CEO Tim Cook placed second
In 2019, Tesla CEO Elon Musk took the top spot in the list of highest-paid CEOs in the US while Apple CEO Tim Cook placed second in Bloomberg’s generated chart. According to the Bloomberg Pay Index, in 2019 Musk made $595.3 million which makes him the highest-paid CEO.
Tim Cook, of Apple Inc., ranks second, the index reveals, owing largely to an equity grant he won in 2011. Charter Communications Inc. ‘s Chairman, Tom Rutledge is sixth. Just one Finance person — Blackstone Group Inc. Chief Operating Officer Jonathan Gray — with $107.6 million, makes the top 10.
Four Tech industry CEOs have made it into the top 10 list of the highest-paid CEOs. The companies include Apple, Google, Microsoft, and Intel. While Alphabet chief Sundar Pichai took the eight spot in 2019 with $86.2 million, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella was at the ninth spot with a total of $77.3 million in compensation.
As Intel CEO Robert Swan took the seventh spot ahead of Pichai and Nadella with $99 million in gross compensation in 2019. Notice that overall compensation includes wages, right to stock incentives, promotions, dividends, interest, and benefits.

As per Bloomberg ‘s study, there are no women on the list of top 10 CEOs in the US in 2019. The highest paying female CEOs and executives in 2019 will start with Advanced Micro Devices CEO Lisa Su at the 19th spot with a total salary of $55.8 million, followed by Oracle’s Safra Catz at 36th with $43.4 million.
Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg took the 72nd spot in 2019, with a reported $31.8 million salary. Within the US list of the 100 highest paying executives within 2019, there are only four women executives. In addition to the three listed here, chairman Marillyn Hewson of Lockheed Martin ranked 60th with $32.8 million.
The Bloomberg Pay Index monitors the top 100 paying executives at businesses that apply descriptions of compensation to U.S. regulators. The index figures consist of the salaries, incentives, and benefits that have been doled out over the last year.
These also involve the interest of the stock options issued and the limited shares which can yield potential payoffs. For comparison, all these equity awards are priced at the fiscal year-end of each company, not the date they were awarded. Therefore, the index figures can vary from those reported in filings — often by a lot — depending on shifts in stock prices and dividends.