The highest-paid CEO in America works for a company that has never made a profit

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last updated 8 January 2015

Which company has the best paid CEO in America? You'd think a household name, right?

Nope. Beating out the CEO of every single household name from Walmart to GE, from Apple to Goldman Sachs, is Charif Souki of Cheniere Energy, a small fracking firm that is just 2 percent of the size of energy mammoth Exxon Mobil. Souki made $142 million last year. Cheniere Energy has enthusiastic market support, as its stock has risen 1,800 percent since 2008, but it has never actually made a profit.

Of course, that $142 million pales in comparison to certain titans of the hedge fund management industry. David Tepper of Appaloosa Management earned $3.5 billion last year. Steven A. Cohen, the head of SAC Capital, was the second best-paid hedge fund manager last year, raking in $2.4 billion — even after the firm plead guilty to insider trading charges. And John Paulson of Paulson and Co. wasn't far behind with $2.3 billion.

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John Aziz is the economics and business correspondent at TheWeek.com. He is also an associate editor at Pieria.co.uk. Previously his work has appeared on Business Insider, Zero Hedge, and Noahpinion.