This article was written by Andrew Clark, for guardian.co.uk on Monday 1st March 2010 20.24 UTC
They’re not all overpaid. One Wall Street banking boss, Citigroup’s chief executive Vikram Pandit, has embraced austerity by turning down a bonus and receiving a modest $128,750 in remuneration for 2009.
While still an eminently survivable wage, Pandit’s package amounted to a sharp pay cut by any terms. His compensation was down 99.7% on his 2008 haul of $38.2m. Back then, much of his pay was made up of share awards that have since sunk in value.
Citi lost $1.6bn during 2009 but has staggered back onto its feet and recently raised sufficient funds to repay the public. Pandit, 52, can’t be blamed for the entirety of Citi’s difficulties – he took the top job in December 2007, replacing Chuck Prince who was dumped when the board realised just how much trouble the bank was in.
Pandit pledged early last year to work for just $1 annually until the firm was back making sustainable profits. It seems that he made that promise after receiving his salary for 2009.
He earned far less than one of his own top traders, John Havens, who trousered $11m for the year. And considerable less than chief execs at rival banks such as Goldman Sachs’ Lloyd Blankfein, who got $9m, JP Morgan’s Jamie Dimon, who took home $17m and Wells Fargo’s John Stumpf who topped the table with $18m.
guardian.co.uk © Guardian News and Media Limited 2010
