Endeavour Mining boss sacked over £5m fee

One of the FTSE 100’s highest-paid bosses has been sacked after making an ‘irregular payment’ of almost £5m. 

Sebastien de Montessus, the chief govt and president of Canadian gold agency Endeavour Mining, was ousted late final night time for ‘serious misconduct’. 

This adopted an investigation by the board into an ‘irregular payment’, value an estimated £4.7m, made by the Frenchman. 

CEO and president Sebastien de Montessus ousted for ‘serious misconduct’

Endeavour turned conscious of it throughout a overview of its acquisitions and gross sales of components of the enterprise. 

It is unclear the place the fee was directed and a overview is ongoing into the small print. 

De Montessus, 49, who has led the gold miner since 2016, additionally faces separate allegations over his private conduct with colleagues – plunging it into even additional scandal about its tradition. 

The allegations had been reported in October by means of a ‘confidential whistleblowing channel’ and prompted an exterior investigation, the corporate mentioned in an announcement to the London market. 

Endeavour’s Canadian-listed shares plunged as a lot as 10pc on Thursday to hit a greater than two-month low of C$25.86. London-listed shares additionally fell 1.3pc in after-hours buying and selling. 

The firm is among the largest west African gold producers with mines throughout the Cote d’Ivoire, Burkina Faso and Senegal. 

And de Montessus has persistently topped the listing as top-of-the-line earners within the City. 

In 2021 he was the highest-paid FTSE 100 boss, incomes as a lot as £18.8m as a reward for the corporate efficiently shifting its main itemizing from Canada to London. 

More than 80pc of his pay was weighted in the direction of firm efficiency. And he later raked in £8.9m in 2022, in keeping with the latest annual report.  

But regardless of de Montessus’s hefty pay packet, he has been no stranger to alleged impropriety. 

In 2019, he was investigated over a corruption scandal at Areva, a state-owned French nuclear vitality producer he used to run. 

The gold miner is listed on the FTSE 100  

The accusations had been made across the group’s £1.5bn hostile bid for the London-listed miner Centamin. De Montessus denied the allegations. 

Prior to Endeavour, de Montessus led mining funding firm La Mancha between 2012 and 2016. 

Endeavour has appointed Ian Cockerill, the deputy chair of the board, as its new chief govt.

He has 4 many years of expertise within the gold business and was chief govt of Gold Fields and Anglo Coal, which is a subsidiary of Anglo American. 

The group posted revenues of over £1bn in its latest quarter and has pinned hopes on a powerful efficiency within the three months to the top of December. 

But Wayne Lam, analyst at Royal Bank of Canada, mentioned the de Montessus ousting might create ‘substantial near-term uncertainty’ for Endeavour. 

And the announcement makes de Montessus the second high-profile FTSE 100 chief to be ousted in latest months over critical misconduct. 

Former BP chief govt Bernard Looney stop in September after the oil large mentioned he dedicated ‘serious misconduct’ in deceptive its board about previous relationships with colleagues. 

The board, led by business veteran Helge Lundy, has since stripped Looney of £32m in pay and bonuses. 

Other bosses who had been additionally lately uncovered embrace former NBC Universal boss Jeff Shell, who missed out on a £34m inventory award in April after being fired for having an inappropriate relationship with a CNBC presenter. 

And Steve Easterbrook, the British former chief govt of McDonald’s, handed again £84m in severance pay after he was fired in a probe over his relationships with workers

In an announcement, Sébastien de Montessus mentioned:

“In 2021 I instructed a creditor of Endeavour to offset an amount owed to the company to pay for essential security equipment to protect our partners and employees in a conflict zone. The decision had no additional cost to the company and did not benefit me personally in any way. I omitted to inform the board that I had arranged for this offset, which I have freely accepted was a lapse in judgement.

This week I was given 48 hours’ notice of the concerns and no proper opportunity to answer them. As to the other investigation: no misconduct of any kind was discovered because none occurred. I am proud of what we have built together at Endeavour over the past 8 years. I will take my time to consider my position with my advisers.”