Barclays announces £38.5m bonuses on budget day
Source: The Guardian
Barclays has been accused of trying to "bury bad news" by announcing it has given its top nine bankers bonuses worth £38.5m while the City is distracted by the budget.
The bank, which promised it was "changing" in the wake of the Libor rate-rigging scandal, awarded the head of its investment banking division, Rich Ricci, £17.5m worth of shares. He immediately cashed in all of the shares.
Barclays chief executive Antony Jenkins was awarded 1.8m shares worth £5.3m. He cashed in half of the shares.
Last month Barclays said Jenkins and Ricci would not be collecting a bonus this year after the bank was fined £290m over the Libor rate-rigging scandal.
Read more: http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2013/mar/20/barclays-bonuses-budget-day
Continuing their pattern of our austerity and their prosperity.
And with a name right out of Dickens - Rich Ricci.
= new reply since forum marked as read
In investment banking circles, this is what qualifies as a joke. Famed for his Cheltenham get-up of green three-piece suit and trilby hat, Barclays' fabulously rich Rich Ricci has named one of his racehorses Fat cat in the hat.
Here's a pic of him from the above link:
While he and the others are enjoying their millions (and as The Guardian noted, hoping that the release of Budget news in the UK dominates the news and drowns out the info about their additional millions of pounds), the pay gap at Barclays is increasing and the UK is predicting deeper spending cuts.
More here from The Independent:
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/news/the-rich-gets-richer-barclays-chief-rich-ricci-lands-18m-windfall-8542749.html
Nine executives in total received share fortunes worth a combined £40 million today in what is likely to stoke further controversy over pay deals at the bank following its Libor rate rigging scandal and mis-selling controversies.
The timing of the announcement to coincide with the Budget also attracted criticism, although Barclays claimed it planned today's release months before the Chancellor set the date.
Details of the share awards come after Barclays revealed in its annual report earlier this month that 428 workers were paid more than £1 million last year, including five who got more than £5 million despite a year of scandal and falling profits.
The report also highlighted a widening pay gap at the bank as it showed there were more than 71,500 staff who received less than £25,000 last year.
Budget 2013: Osborne to promise even deeper spending cuts after election
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2013/mar/20/budget-2013-osborne-spending-cuts?google_editors_picks=true
Areas so far protected from austerity to be targeted after 2015
George Osborne will pledge to introduce even deeper spending cuts after the next general election by imposing a new cap on parts of the welfare budget and other areas which have so far been immune from the coalition's austerity plans.
With Fatcatinthehat and this isn't from The Onion!!
