Shell has revealed boss Wael Sawan’s pay package swelled to £8.6 million last year despite sharply lower profits as it outlined plans for higher shareholder returns amid cuts to costs and spending.
The group’s annual report, published ahead of the oil giant’s capital market day event for shareholders, showed Mr Sawan’s total pay lifted by 9% from £7.9 million in 2023 as he landed a £2.9 million annual bonus and £3.9 million in long-term share awards.
The pay boost came in spite of Shell’s annual results in January revealing a 16% drop in profits for 2024, with earnings coming in at 23.7 billion dollars (£18.4 billion), down from 28.3 billion dollars (£21.9 billion) in 2023.
The report also showed Mr Sawan’s annual salary lifted by 3.9% to £1.45 million last year and has risen again by 5.5% to £1.54 million in 2025.
It said the wider workforce also received a 5.5% pay rise.
Campaign group Global Witness branded Mr Sawan’s pay “obscene”.
Patrick Galey, investigations lead at Global Witness, said: “After a year of unchartered climate extremes and huge energy bills, which are set to spike again in many countries this year, Wael Sawan’s obscene pay packet will feel like a slap in the face for millions.
“It’s maddening to know that Big Oil bosses like Sawan are raking it in, as they double down on the oil and gas that’s fuelling climate devastation, and continue to profit from an energy crisis that’s leaving so many of us poorer.”
Details on Shell’s executive pay came as the London-listed group set out five-year plans to ramp up cost savings and cut spending as it pledged to “deliver more value with less emissions”.
The oil giant told investors it would now look to strip out a cumulative five billion US dollars to seven billion US dollars (£3.9 billion to £5.4 billion) a year by the end of 2028.
This is up from the previous aim for two billion dollars to three billion dollars (£1.5 billion to £2.3 billion) by the end of 2025.
It has already delivered more than 3 billion dollars (£2.3 billion) of cost savings under current plans, with its annual report showing a 7% drop in its workforce to 96,000 at the end of last year, including so-called “portfolio companies” within the group.
The group said it would continue to keep a tight rein on contractor costs, which are already down by 30% since 2023, as well as using artificial intelligence and tech to make savings.
“We will continue to focus on lowering our structural costs, which will be increasingly non-portfolio driven, leveraging cost saving opportunities through AI, technology and in our procurement processes,” Shell said.
It also committed to lowering its spending to 20 billion dollars to 22 billion dollars (£15.5 billion to £17 billion) a year over the next three years, while boosting investor returns through share buybacks and dividend payouts.
Other targets outlined included aims to grow its top-line production across the group’s upstream and integrated gas business by 1% a year over the next five years.
It added it would seek to grow sales of liquefied natural gas (LNG) by 4% to 5% a year through to 2030.
In its plan, the firm said it would spend up to 10% of total equity and debt on lower carbon businesses by the end of the decade, having last year significantly watered down its climate pledges.
Chief financial officer Sinead Gorman said on Tuesday that Shell would spend two to three billion dollars (£1.5 billion to £2.3 billion) on its renewables and energy solutions business over the next three years.
It cautioned over plans to shut some chemicals operations across Europe, saying it also wants to explore “strategic and partnership opportunities in the US”.
The group does not have chemicals operations in the UK.
Mr Sawan said he wanted the firm to be the “world’s leading integrated gas and LNG business”.
He added: “Today we are raising the bar across our key financial targets, investing where we have competitive strengths and delivering more for our shareholders.”
Last year, Shell controversially dropped a plan to reduce net carbon intensity by 45% by 2035 and instead said it would aim for a 100% reduction by 2050.
It also revealed plans to reduce the “net carbon intensity” of the energy it sells by 15% to 20% by 2030 compared with 2016, having previously targeted a 20% reduction.
Its LNG business has attracted anger from sustainability-conscious investors, with a group led by UK and Australian pension funds recently filing a resolution at its upcoming annual general meeting questioning Shell’s LNG plans and how they line up with its 2050 net zero aims.
