In 1983 Michael Weinstein was appointed CEO of Ark Restaurants Corp (NASDAQ:ARKR). This report will, first, examine the CEO compensation levels in comparison to CEO compensation at companies of similar size. After that, we will consider the growth in the business. Third, we’ll reflect on the total return to shareholders over three years, as a second measure of business performance. This method should give us information to assess how appropriately the company pays the CEO.

See our latest analysis for Ark Restaurants

How Does Michael Weinstein’s Compensation Compare With Similar Sized Companies?

Our data indicates that Ark Restaurants Corp is worth US$81m, and total annual CEO compensation is US$1.2m. (This is based on the year to 2017). We think total compensation is more important but we note that the CEO salary is lower, at US$1.1m. We examined a group of similar sized companies, with market capitalizations of below US$200m. The median CEO compensation in that group is US$296k.

It would therefore appear that Ark Restaurants Corp pays Michael Weinstein more than the median CEO remuneration at companies of a similar size, in the same market. However, this fact alone doesn’t mean the remuneration is too high. A closer look at the performance of the underlying business will give us a better idea about whether the pay is particularly generous.

The graphic below shows how CEO compensation at Ark Restaurants has changed from year to year.

Is Ark Restaurants Corp Growing?

On average over the last three years, Ark Restaurants Corp has shrunk earnings per share by 10% each year. Its revenue is up 4.2% over last year.

Unfortunately, earnings per share have trended lower over the last three years. And the modest revenue growth over 12 months isn’t much comfort against the reduced earnings per share. It’s hard to argue the company is firing on all cylinders, so shareholders might be averse to high CEO remuneration.

Although we don’t have analyst forecasts, shareholders might want to examine this detailed historical graph of earnings, revenue and cash flow.

Has Ark Restaurants Corp Been A Good Investment?

Ark Restaurants Corp has served shareholders reasonably well, with a total return of 15% over three years. But they probably don’t want to see the CEO paid more than is normal for companies around the same size.

In Summary…

We compared total CEO remuneration at Ark Restaurants Corp with the amount paid at companies with a similar market capitalization. Our data suggests that it pays above the median CEO pay within that group.

We think many shareholders would be underwhelmed with the business growth over the last three years.

While shareholder returns are acceptable, they don’t delight. So you may want to delve deeper, because we don’t think the CEO pay is too low. So you may want to check if insiders are buying Ark Restaurants shares with their own money (free access).

Of course, the past can be informative so you might be interested in considering this analytical visualization showing the company history of earnings and revenue.

To help readers see past the short term volatility of the financial market, we aim to bring you a long-term focused research analysis purely driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis does not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements.

The author is an independent contributor and at the time of publication had no position in the stocks mentioned. For errors that warrant correction please contact the editor at editorial-team@simplywallst.com.