Converging Risks Lead to Increased EP Spending and Perks
The perks of being an American CEO increasingly include greater executive protection and exclusive travel arrangements, especially amid converging and evolving risks.
Public companies in the United States are required to report expenses of more than $10,000 that benefit their executives, including certain expenses that are classified as executive protection (EP). A study by executive consulting firm Equilar show an increase in EP-related expenses—particularly direct security-related expenses—at large companies.
Equilar’s in-depth report, “Executive Security Perks: Evolving Trends in a New Era of Risk,” documents that the trend has been building for several years and predates the tragic assassination of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson in December 2024.
The median expense for direct security-related expenses on CEOs, which includes residential alarm and surveillance systems, personal security guards, and cybersecurity, increased 94.7 percent from 2020 to 2024. The median security expense for all of a company’s executives was $106,530; the median amount spent on CEO-specific security was $77,976.
Overall, one-third of companies (33.8 percent) reported executive security expenses, which is a steady increase from the 23.3 percent that reported such expenses in 2020.
“The trend of increased expenditure on security will continue for at least the next 24 months. This is based primarily on converging risks—global instability, socioeconomic and political tension,” Ben Joelson, principal and head of security risk and resilience at The Chertoff Group told Equilar. “Additionally, at some point—which is difficult to define but easier to recognize—expenditures on executive safety and security shift the definition of ‘duty of care,’ which means ordinary, reasonably prudent companies feel compelled to follow their publicly traded peers and invest in protection of key leaders. Both paradigms will lead to continued expenditures and associated disclosures, particularly as many large companies still lack an inhouse executive protection function, in spite of changes in paradigms.”
The report also examined expense disclosures of other security-related expenses, including expenses related to air transportation and ground transportation. Prevalence in both of these areas remained relatively steady between 2020 and 2024, while expenses in air transportation increased.
The report does not detail what is included in what the report calls “aircraft perks;” however, a press release on preliminary results said it included personal use of corporate aircraft. The prevalence of aircraft perks increased slight from 50.4 percent in 2020 to 54.2 percent in 2024. However, the value of the expenditures increased from a 2020 low of $104,206 to $172,840 in 2024.
Similarly, the prevalence of executive automotive expenses increased slightly from 43.1 percent in 2020 to 46.4 percent in 2024. However, the associated value of those expenditures rose more modestly, from a median of $38,534 in 2020 to $52,957 in 2024.
“Risk can never be fully eliminated, but it can be effectively managed,” Joelson concluded. “Companies are generally very adept at managing financial and even reputational risk—applying these same frameworks and lessons learned to physical security challenges is a great way to improve program effectiveness with incremental effort.”
For more on executive protection from Security Managment and ASIS International, see these resources:
Focus on Executive Protection for Female Executives
Essentials of Executive Protection Certificate Course
On-Demand Webinar: Executive Protection 2.0: A Left-of-Bang Mindset
