Barclays May Pay Diamond as Much as $16.5 Million in Salary, Bonus, Stock
Barclays Plc CEO Robert "Bob" Diamond
Chris Ratcliffe/Bloomberg
Barclays Plc is set to award Chief Executive Officer Robert Diamond a 6.5 million-pound ($11 million) bonus for 2010, said a person briefed on the matter.
Barclays Plc is set to award Chief Executive Officer Robert Diamond a 6.5 million-pound ($11 million) bonus for 2010, said a person briefed on the matter. Photographer: Chris Ratcliffe/Bloomberg
Barclays Plc (BARC) gave Robert Diamond as much as 10.1 million pounds ($16.5 million) in salary, bonuses and stock, making him the U.K.’s top-paid bank chief executive officer as the government presses lenders to curb remuneration.
Diamond was awarded a 6.5 million-pound bonus for 2010 and a further 2.25 million pounds depending on the lender’s performance, London-based Barclays said in a statement today. His base salary will rise to 1.35 million pounds from 250,000 pounds after he became CEO on Jan. 1.
The government is pushing banks to curb pay after it was forced to bail out the industry during the credit crisis and as it enacts the deepest-ever reductions in public spending. Diamond, 59, told lawmakers last month that his bank, which didn’t receive direct government aid, would exercise restraint when paying bonuses and that was time for firms to end “the period of remorse and apology” and start boosting confidence.
“Diamond tries to convince taxpayers that the era of remorse and regret within banking is over, yet he has no shame in pocketing a seven-figure bonus,” Unite trade union General Secretary Len McCluskey said in a statement today. “There is no possible justification for this highly paid individual taking home this enormous windfall.”
Biggest Bonus
Diamond’s bonus exceeds those of his counterparts at Royal Bank of Scotland Group Plc, Lloyds Banking Group Plc and HSBC Holdings Plc. (HSBA) HSBC, Europe’s biggest bank, paid CEO Stuart Gulliver a 2.9 million-pound bonus for 2010, RBS awarded CEO Stephen Hester a 2 million-pound all-stock bonus, Lloyds CEO Eric Daniels received 1.45 million pounds.
Diamond’s bonus lags behind U.S. competitors: Jamie Dimon, CEO of JPMorgan Chase & Co., was awarded $17.4 million in restricted stock for 2010, according to a Feb. 17 filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. Goldman Sachs Group Inc., the securities firm that set a Wall Street pay record in 2007, gave Chairman and CEO Lloyd Blankfein a $12.6 million stock bonus for 2010.
John Varley, Diamond’s predecessor as CEO, received total compensation of 3.85 million pounds, including a 2.2 million- pound bonus, Barclays said. He was paid 1.1 million pounds for 2009 and didn’t take a bonus. Finance Director Chris Lucas received 2.56 million pounds in salary and bonuses, compared with 2.15 million pounds in 2009, the statement said.
Barclays said its highest-paid executive who isn’t an executive director was awarded 14.3 million pounds, including shares and awards of contingent capital. The second-highest paid may receive as much about 14 million pounds, the bank said.
Barclays’s employee benefit trust purchased about 1.02 million pounds of shares for Jerry del Missier, who jointly oversees its investment bank with Rich Ricci. The trust purchased about 992,000 pounds of shares for Ricci. Neither are executive directors.
To contact the reporter on this story: Jon Menon in London at jmenon1@bloomberg.net Gavin Finch in London at gfinch@bloomberg.net
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Edward Evans at eevans3@bloomberg.net
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