CEO Pay Watch: Ameriprise Financial

Total compensation: $46,328,277 for the year ended Dec. 31

Salary: $950,000

Non-equity incentive pay: $7,546,000

Other compensation: $680,721

Exercised stock options: $35,169,680

Value realized on vesting shares: $1,981,876

New stock options: 176,830

Note: Minneapolis-based Ameriprise Financial has had one of the better recoveries among Minnesota companies since the low-point of the recession. The financial services firm's total return was 29.3 percent in 2012 and has had an annualized total return of 54.3 percent since March 2009.

CEO James Cracchiolo has led the company from 2000 and been CEO since the 2005 spinoff from American Express. He exercised Ameriprise Financial stock options for the first time in 2012 — shares that were eight or more years old and nearing the end of their 10-year expiration. He also held on to a large percentage of the shares from those transactions.

Cracchiolo's salary and bonus declined 5.3 percent compared to 2011. Cracchiolo and other senior Ameriprise executives earned higher-than-targeted bonuses for 2012 but less than the maximum amount established for 2012 by the company's compensation committee. Cracchiolo's base salary of $950,000 has remained the same for the past three years.