Purplebricks’ bonus share pay-out to finance chief

Purplebricks has announced that chief financial officer Stephen Long has been given a shares bonus as part of the company’s performance plan for senior management. 

A statement to shareholders this morning says: “Purplebricks Group plc, a leading UK estate agency business, announces that … 1,500,000 awards over ordinary shares of £0.01 each in the company were granted under the Purplebricks Performance Share Plan to Stephen Long, Chief Financial Officer, a person discharging managerial responsibilities. 

“The awards have an exercise price of £0.01 per share and become exercisable subject to continued employment and performance based on two performance measures relating to the Company's relative and absolute total shareholder return over a three year performance period.”

The shares payout to Long is also subject to the agency’s Remuneration Committee being “satisfied as to overall company performance and other success markers including customer satisfaction.”

The company’s share value has flopped around 85 per cent in the past 12 months and far more over a longer period - the market capitalisation of Purplebricks in 2016 was some £1.2 billion whereas now it is around £70m, and even that follows a stronger performance in recent days.

Earlier this month chief executive Vic Darvey announced he was quitting the company - he leaves this week, and will be replaced by Helena Marston who takes up the role on Monday April 4.

She only joined Purplebricks in May 2020 as Chief People Officer (the agency’s name for head of personnel) and took over the role of Chief Operating Officer at the end of 2021. 

She has no estate agency experience outside of Purplebricks, having held human resources roles at Virgin Media, Kuwait Energy, Jaguar Land Rover and Vodafone.