Wynn Resorts said its top three corporate executives would take a 20% pay cut for the first three months of the year as the casino operator continues to deal with the economic fallout from the coronavirus pandemic.
In a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission Wednesday morning, Wynn said the salary reductions for CEO Matt Maddox, President and CFO Craig Billings, and general counsel Ellen Whittemore began on New Year’s Day and will last until April 1.
According to the filing, Maddox’s salary will be reduced to $1.9 million, Billings’ salary will be $1.14 million and Whittemore will earn $665,000.
This is the second time Maddox’s compensation has changed during the pandemic, which shut down Wynn’s Las Vegas properties for 78 days and the Encore Boston Harbor for more than three months.
Last March, Maddox traded the remainder of his $1.9 million base salary in exchange for common stock in Wynn that he could redeem at the end of 2020. Directors and other executives at the time relinquished between 33% and 100% of their salaries.
In August, Maddox gave up his annual stock grant of 140,000 shares that were added to another 176,247 shares awarded to 240 company employees in Boston and Las Vegas for their work in planning, executing, and managing the disruption caused by COVID-19.
The latest salary move comes as the company has cut the hours of its Las Vegas Strip workforce due to the continued reduction in Las Vegas visitation from the pandemic. Las Vegas tourism officials said 2020 visitation to the city is down more than 54% through November.
The company’s Encore has curtailed midweek operations since July and furloughed an undisclosed number of its employees. Wynn has been in a dispute with the Las Vegas Culinary Union over scheduling changes for workers covered under the company’s collective bargaining agreement.
In October, Encore Las Vegas limited its operating schedule to just four nights a week, due to reduced demand. A month later, Massachusetts’ governor said the state’s three casinos had to close between 9:30 p.m. and 5 a.m. each day due to overnight curfews after COVID-19 cases spiked.
Shares of Wynn, traded on the Nasdaq, closed at $110.85, up 66 cents or 0.60%
Howard Stutz is the executive editor of CDC Gaming. He can be reached at hstutz@cdcgaming.com. Follow @howardstutz on Twitter.
