Who is Shankh Mitra, CEO with a $821-million salary, second only to Elon Musk?

Shankh Mitra, the Indian-born CEO of Welltower, received an $821 million compensation package in 2025, according to The Wall Street Journal. With this, Mitra became the second-highest-paid executive in the world and Tesla boss Elon Musk tops the list.

Shankh Mitra, an Indian-origin US citizen and CEO of Welltower, a publicly traded American real estate investment trust, has become the world's second-highest-paid chief executive after receiving a compensation package worth $821 million in 2025, according to The Wall Street Journal (WSJ). Mitra is second only to Tesla boss Elon Musk, whose compensation package was valued at $158 billion.

The WSJ report highlights a strong rebound in executive compensation after a slowdown in recent years.

More CEOs earned at least $100 million in 2025 than in any year since 2021, while nearly a dozen executives received pay packages exceeding $200 million.

SHANKH MITRA'S JOURNEY BEGAN FROM KOLKATA

Mitra's journey to the top spot began in Kolkata, where he completed a Bachelor of Engineering in Instrumentation and Electronics Engineering from Jadavpur University, according to The Times of India newspaper.

The Welltower CEO later moved to the United States to pursue an MBA in Applied Value Investing from the Columbia Business School, laying the foundation for a career that would take him to the top of corporate America.

Mitra started his professional career at PwC, one of the world's largest professional services networks, where he worked for five years before joining Fidelity Investments as an analyst in 2009.

He later held investment management roles at Citadel and Millennium Management, specialising in real estate securities and portfolio management.

MITRA'S INVESTING ACUMEN PRAISED BY TOP EXECUTIVE

In 2016, Mitra joined Welltower, an S&P 500 real estate investment trust focused on senior housing and healthcare properties. He was promoted to Chief Investment Officer in 2018 and became the company's Chief Executive Officer in 2020, according to the WSJ report.

The WSJ report also noted that at the time of Mitra's appointment, Welltower's Lead Independent Director, Jeffrey H Donahue, praised Mitra's "investing and operational acumen". Donahue also hailed Mitra's leadership and said that Mitra had placed the company in a position of strength.

Responding to his promotion, Mitra told the WSJ that he was "humbled and honoured" to lead the company and thanked the board and his colleagues for their confidence.

Nearly 99% of Mitra's compensation came in the form of stock awards. His package included a $789 million stock grant issued in October, and by the end of the year the shares linked to that award had appreciated to a value of more than $1 billion, the WSJ report revealed.

The compensation given to Mitra is, however, linked to long-term performance. Mitra is expected to receive roughly half of the shares in 2031 if he remains with Welltower.

The remaining shares will vest only if the company increases its market value by 45% and outperforms several major stock market indices over five years.

ANOTHER INDIAN-ORIGIN EXECUTIVE GOT A PACKAGE WORTH $100 BILLION

The WSJ report also noted that three other Welltower executives received compensation packages worth more than $100 million each, making the company only the second in the past decade to have four executives receive nine-figure pay packages in a single year.

Besides Musk and Mitra, the list of the world's highest-paid CEOs includes George Kurtz, who earned $248 million, Hock Tan with $205 million, David Zaslav with $165 million, and Stephen Schwarzman with $126 million.

Another Indian-origin executive, Nikesh Arora, also featured among the top 10, ranking eighth with a compensation package worth $100 million by Palo Alto Networks.

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