Goldman Sachs bankers will be among the last to learn about their bonuses after rumours that the bank is fully revising its rewards policy in response to Alistair Darling’s supertax, the Guardian has reported.
The bank, which usually informs staff about its annual payouts before publishing its results, due this Thursday, is to delay telling its 32,000 employees the size and structure of their bonuses until next week.
Goldman Sachs’ employees can expect to share in a bonus and salary pot of $20bn (£12bn) for 2009, which will result in the highest average payouts on Wall Street, of more than $600,000 (£366,000) each.
Bankers at JP Morgan, Citigroup, Bank of America and Morgan Stanley are all expected to receive information about their personal awards later this week.
Citigroup reports tomorrow and its proposed payments to its 10,000 London-based staff are expected to contribute millions to the UK economy following the Treasury’s 50% tax on bonuses worth more than £25,000.
JP Morgan last week estimated that it expects a bill of £300m for its bonus payments, while Citi is expected to face a similar charge – allowing Darling to proclaim that his £550m estimate for revenue from the tax has already been achieved from just two banks.
The newspaper also reported that the remuneration committee at the 73% state-owned bank RBS is expected to meet soon to discuss possible bonus payments to its 22,000 investment bankers.
This year’s bonus pool could reach £1.5bn, compared with £1bn last year. The Treasury has already told RBS that bonuses to anyone receiving a salary of more than £39,000 cannot be paid in cash.
