Railway boss Richard Lutz received more than twice as much money from his company last year as a year earlier. According to the annual report published on Thursday, the remuneration of the CEO was 2.24 million euros. His base salary was almost 970,000 euros. Added to this was a bonus of more than 1.26 million euros.
Infrastructure board member Berthold Huber ended up with a total remuneration of 1.41 million euros (2021: 662,000 euros), HR board member Martin Seiler earned 1.39 million euros (2021: 659,000 euros).
A performance-related bonus was paid to all Management Board members in the past year. According to the annual reports, the board members did not receive such bonuses in 2021 and 2020.
Deutsche Bahn “is back in the black again,” said CEO Lutz. Despite the burden on the railway business from the consequences of the pandemic, the Ukraine war and sharply increased inflation, the group closed the 2022 financial year with a “significant” operating profit. It was around 1.3 billion euros – but the bottom line was a loss of 227 million euros. In 2021, however, the minus was still 911 million euros.
Group sales grew by 19.1 percent year-on-year to around EUR 56.3 billion. That was a new record, the railway said. “Climate-friendly mobility is booming,” explained Lutz. “The demand is right and is currently growing strongly.” In 2023 there could be 150 million travelers in long-distance transport, which would also be a new record number.
The long-distance trains were more unpunctual than ever before: only 65.2 percent reached their destination on time in 2022, as DB explained. In 2021 it was still 75.2 percent. The network is more heavily loaded than before the pandemic, explained Lutz. “It’s too old, too prone to failure and doesn’t have enough capacity.” At the same time, Germany is modernizing and building at a record level.
In a special report, the Federal Court of Auditors recently drew attention to the devastating situation of the state-owned company. The railways press debts of more than 32 billion euros. According to the report, the goals and strategies of companies and politicians are largely unrecognizable.
