Eight of the 10 highest-paid CEOs of publicly traded managed care insurers saw their total compensation increase in 2018.
Two top industry executives, Anthem Inc.'s Gail Boudreaux and HealthEquity Inc.'s Jon Kessler, saw triple-digit percentage increases in their total adjusted compensation compared to the prior year.
Broudreaux's compensation jumped to $14.2 million from annualized pay of $3.4 million in 2017. She replaced Joseph Swedish Anthem's CEO and president in November 2017. HealthEquity's Kessler saw his total year-over-year compensation skyrocket 530.4% in 2018 to $4.3 million.
Both executives received substantial boosts from restrictive stock grants and option awards within their 2018 pay.
Centene Corp. Chairman and CEO Michael Neidorff remained the highest-paid top executive at a public managed care insurer, earning $26.1 million in 2018, up 3.4% versus 2017. He earned roughly 396x more than the median employee salary at Centene, based on figures reported by the company.
The second- and third-highest paid CEOs in 2018 were Cigna Corp.'s David Cordani and UnitedHealth Group Inc.'s David Wichmann, earning $19.0 and $18.1 million, respectively.

