Bloomberg: Wall Street Executives Scored $3 Billion as Banks Rose and Fell

[marmar]

Wall Street Executives Scored $3 Billion as Banks Rose and Fell

By Tom Randall and Jamie McGee

Sept. 26 (Bloomberg) -- Wall Street's five biggest firms paid more than $3 billion in the last five years to their top executives, while they presided over the packaging and sale of loans that helped bring down the investment-banking system.

Merrill Lynch & Co., once the largest U.S. brokerage, paid its chief executives the most, with Stanley O'Neal taking in $172 million from 2003 to 2007 and John Thain $86 million after a month's work last year. The company agreed to be acquired by Bank of America Corp. for about $50 billion on Sept. 15. Bear Stearns Cos.'s James ``Jimmy'' Cayne made $161 million before the company collapsed and was sold to JPMorgan Chase & Co. in June.

Democrats and Republicans in Congress are demanding that limits be placed on executive pay as part of the $700 billion financial rescue plan proposed by U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson. The former Goldman Sachs Group Inc. CEO, who received about $111 million between 2003 and 2006, said in testimony to Congress on Sept. 24 that he would accept such limits as part of the plan, after initially opposing them.

``Shareholders and boards should have done something about this a long time ago,'' said Charles Elson, director of the Weinberg Center for Corporate Governance at the University of Delaware in Newark. ``They justified these levels of pay on the idea that they're all geniuses. I think that balloon has burst.''

Wall Street firms have shared profits liberally with employees. The five biggest -- Goldman, Morgan Stanley, Merrill, Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. and Bear Stearns -- paid their 185,687 employees $66 billion in 2007, as problems with subprime mortgages mounted, including about $39 billion in bonuses. That amounts to average pay of $353,089 per employee, including an average bonus of $211,849. The five firms had combined net income of $93 billion during the five years through 2007. ........(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601109&sid=a96vQtgKS3BM&refer=home

[SammyWinstonJack]

1. ...

:grr:

[Not the Only One]

2. I feel so sad for these poor Americans. Double the bailout to $1.4T!

Let them all choke on their Kobe steaks.

[antigop]

3. Shareholders in some companies have tried to reign in exec comp-- but resolutions are non-binding

Shareholder resolutions are non-binding. They can send a message but the board doesn't have to do anything. And the boards are usually stacked with CEO cronies.

[2Design]

4. Go get it back and put it toward the bailout - this is where you need

to get the money from George not us poor people