P.A.M. CEO Daniel Cushman receives 13% raise, total compensation jumps 183%

by Jeff Della Rosa ([email protected]) 1,425 views 

Daniel Cushman, president and CEO of P.A.M. Transportation Services, received a 13.1% salary increase in 2017, and his total compensation rose 183.1% to $2.457 million for the year, according to the company’s proxy statement.

The Tontitown-based carrier filed the proxy statement with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission on (Tuesday) March 20.

Cushman’s base salary rose to $565,448, and he received a $240,000 bonus along with $1.638 million in stock awards in 2017. Cushman’s existing salary is $600,000, the proxy shows.

Allen West, vice president of finance, chief financial officer, secretary and treasurer, received a 6.1% raise, and his total compensation increased 90.3% to $571,120. West’s base salary increased to $311,702, and he received a $250,013 bonus in 2017. West’s existing salary is $320,000, according to the proxy.

The company’s 2018 annual shareholders meeting will take place at 11 a.m. April 25 at 12225 Stephens Road in Warren, Mich., about 911 miles or more than 13 hours from P.A.M. corporate headquarters. The location for the annual meeting is also the address for Central Transport, a privately-held less-than-truckload carrier, and several members of the P.A.M. Board of Directors have or had ties to Central Transport’s parent company, CenTra Inc.

Shareholders of record as of March 8 can vote on whether to reelect the eight existing directors to serve until the next meeting and reappoint the company’s accountant Grant Thornton LLP. As of March 8, the company had nearly 6.176 million shares of common stock, entitling the shareholders a vote. No shareholder proposals are expected to come to a vote, but if a shareholder wanted to submit a proposal for a vote at the 2019 annual meeting, the deadline to do so is Nov. 20, 2018.

Following are the directors running for reelection this year: Frederick Calderone, Cushman, Scott Davis, Norman Harned, Franklin McLarty, Manuel Moroun, chairman Matthew Moroun and Daniel Sullivan.

The Moroun family owns Warren-based CenTra, and Calderone retired from the company after working there for 20 years as a vice president. In 2007, Harned retired from CenTra as vice president, secretary and treasurer after working there for 35 years.

More than 50% of the company’s voting power is controlled by Matthew Moroun and the Warren, Mich.-based Moroun Trust in which he’s co-trustee along with Hal Briand.

P.A.M. has decided to be treated as a controlled company under NASDAQ listing rules, and this allows the company to not be required to have a majority of independent directors on the board, a compensation committee that only has independent directors and a nominating committee with only independent directors.

Matthew Moroun owns 63.22% of P.A.M. shares, including the 3.092 million shares in trust, for a total of 3.904 million shares. Cushman owns 1.07% of shares, for a total of 66,483 shares, and is the only other director or executive officer who owns more than 1% of shares. Following are stockholders who own more than 5% of shares:

Dimensional Fund Advisors LP of Austin, Texas, with 370,180 or 5.99% of total shares and Renaissance Technologies LLC of New York with 362,100 or 5.86% of total shares.

Shares of P.A.M. (NASDAQ: PTSI) closed Tuesday at $36.60. In the past 52 weeks, shares have ranged between $43.20 and $14.50.