Canadian bank CEOs leave some money on the table for once
Royal Bank of Canada's chief executive officer announced yesterday that he is voluntarily turning down nearly $5 million in 2008 compensation, while his counterpart at the Bank of Nova Scotia saw his pay package slashed by 20 per cent. Hours later, Bank of Montreal's CEO also decided to give up $4.1 million in rewards.
http://www.thestar.com/business/article/581270
But why? Isn't Canadian banking just fine and dandy?
All three banks are facing a proposal that seeks to give shareholders an advisory vote on executive compensation and a separate resolution urging a "comprehensive review" of executive pay. Moreover, some politicians are concerned Ottawa has committed $125 billion to buy insured mortgages from financial institutions without seeking any solid guarantees on how they will actually use the money.
Oh. That helps explain it.
I guess they figure if they voluntarily give up a bit of their salary, that'll pre-empt any attempts to force them to give it up. It's likely that they voluntarily gave up less money than they might have been forced to give up if they'd waited to have it done to them.
That number keeps rising with every article I read. The NDP put the bank bailout at somewhere over $100 billion. Now it's $125B? Banksters!