It comes as leading firms look to boost how much their chief executives can earn as they compete in what they say is an increasingly international market for top talent. A typical FTSE 100 boss earned just over £5million last year with the highest-paid – Pascal Soriot at drugs giant AstraZeneca – landing £17.7million. While UK-based firms are closing the pay gap with their US peers, a typical FTSE 100 boss still earns less than half the £12.2million paid on average last year to the boss of an S&P 500 firm, according to pay advisory firm ISS Corporate. Despite being the FTSE 100’s highest paid boss, Soriot’s pay is still below the average of his global pharmaceutical peers. Shell benchmarks its chief executive’s pay against a wider cohort than AstraZeneca, ranking them by stock market value, annual revenues and assets.