Two more Big Phar­ma CEOs en­joyed hefty rais­es in 2018, leav­ing the in­dus­try’s on­ly ma­jor league fe­male chief in firm con­trol of last place

By any mea­sure, Mer­ck had a big year in 2018 as its PD-1 drug cruised in­to first place for the megablock­buster check­point mar­ket. And CEO Ken Fra­zier, who start­ed the year by earn­ing head­lines for di­rect­ly re­buk­ing Pres­i­dent Don­ald Trump, was re­ward­ed with a fat, 19% hike in com­pen­sa­tion.

Fra­zier grabbed a pack­age worth just un­der $21 mil­lion, with $13.4 mil­lion worth of stock and op­tion awards go­ing his way to de­liv­er the goods, on top of his $1.6 mil­lion salary. His com­pen­sa­tion jumped $3.6 mil­lion, though it still fell shy of the $21.7 mil­lion earned in 2016.

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