It was the Tories' turn left on economics more than their turn right on social issues that won their red wall seats. They will be out on their arse with this kind of reheated Thatcherism.
I find the idea of bonuses a bit much to be perfectly honest. Call me old-fashioned. You get a good salary to do your job as professionally as possible. Any bonus should only be a tiny bit on top for something that is really going beyond the call of duty, as it were.
If you are the owner of a business then by all means take the rewards of your hard work. But the difficulty with bonuses in banking is this - many started out as partnerships where they were the owners but then turned into corporates for all sorts of sensible reasons. But they kept the partnership mentality - and so bonuses were granted as if bankers are the owners of the business with the risks that go with that. But they're not and the risks have largely been borne by others when things have gone wrong - other employees, shareholders, customers and taxpayers. Bankers have wanted all the advantages of ownership with few, if any, of the downsides.
The cap and other regulatory measures have been attempts to correct that. But really what's needed is to go back to first principles: you're an employee, you get asked to do a professional job in return for a good salary. You do that. You don't get to behave as if you are an entrepreneur with all the risks and rewards of entrepreneurship. If you want to do that, off you go and try that.
Bonuses are always tricky - there is an argument for them in my mind where if you through your abilities massively increase the Bank’s returns through new business or some particular skill or insight then it’s sensible for a bank to reward you for their extra revenue where you could theoretically sit there and “do your job” with your client book as it is. It’s not perfect but it’s a good incentive to get more out of your people.
This all depends however on the bank having the correct incentive structure and the people in place to judge that it’s being done sensibly which isn’t always so.
One situation I witnessed personally in a bank I was embedded in before the crash was that the private bankers were incentivised for bonuses by increasing their book/revenue in three areas and one of these was the amount of client assets they directed into their in-house structured products.
Being separate from the bank’s incentive and salary structures I was able to watch with impartiality and most of the bankers were sensible but there was one particular arsehole who took the piss.
He was head of the private banking team that looked after the smaller clients - generally legacy grannies with up to a million on account.
Because he was obsessed with his bonus he started pumping all these old dears assets into 5 year structured products in 2007…. So old people mainly who had their wealth tied up for 5 years with big penalties for early withdrawal in instruments that were screwed by the crash.
He had absolutely no shame whatsoever and would sit in meetings with a big smug face when he was congratulated for putting millions into the in-house structured products.
I still to this day do not know why he wasn’t censured or the bank and I still see him swanning around, knowing he has a big property portfolio off the back of putting his bonuses before sense and decency and desperately want to drag him down an alley and give him a beating.
So I think bonuses have a place but the calculation has to be very careful and the oversight too - those who oversee the bonus distribution should be held liable if the bonuses are the result of bad unethical practice.
Bad taste joke of the day. After the Blue Origin unmanned suborbital launch went off nominal, and the flight was terminated, the following was commented on Arstechnica...
"Oh, sure, Jeff Bezos can abort things in Texas... everyone else has to go to New Mexico."
The incident is another reason not to fly (if you want to go suborbital) on the Virgin Galactic death trap - the Blue Origin system can fly unmanned, which means lots more testing and has a functioning, demonstrated escape system.
If there had been people on this flight they would be alive, and members of a small club.
It was the Tories' turn left on economics more than their turn right on social issues that won their red wall seats. They will be out on their arse with this kind of reheated Thatcherism.
Actually, this was exactly the kind of thing I expected post-Brexit and I said so at the time. It was well-signalled in advance by the likes of JRM and Farage that one thing the Kippers wanted was to stop the EU from "interfering" in some of their schemes.
I find the idea of bonuses a bit much to be perfectly honest. Call me old-fashioned. You get a good salary to do your job as professionally as possible. Any bonus should only be a tiny bit on top for something that is really going beyond the call of duty, as it were.
If you are the owner of a business then by all means take the rewards of your hard work. But the difficulty with bonuses in banking is this - many started out as partnerships where they were the owners but then turned into corporates for all sorts of sensible reasons. But they kept the partnership mentality - and so bonuses were granted as if bankers are the owners of the business with the risks that go with that. But they're not and the risks have largely been borne by others when things have gone wrong - other employees, shareholders, customers and taxpayers. Bankers have wanted all the advantages of ownership with few, if any, of the downsides.
The cap and other regulatory measures have been attempts to correct that. But really what's needed is to go back to first principles: you're an employee, you get asked to do a professional job in return for a good salary. You do that. You don't get to behave as if you are an entrepreneur with all the risks and rewards of entrepreneurship. If you want to do that, off you go and try that.
Oh good grief. Bonuses are awful things for staff, designed entirely for the benefit of the employer, not the employee. How can you can possibly have worked around bankers for this long and not understood this?
Bonuses do several things, none of which are in the interests of the vast majority of employees, even at top levels:
- They allow the firm to manage staffing costs in years where the overall firm has performed poorly - They trick people into working long hours, under the illusion that they'll get paid back at the end of the year, which never quite works out - They manage staff retention, since there tends to be some time between bonuses being earned and vested (eg: earned over the calendar year, but paid at end of March following annual reviews, so you can't quit between say July and March or you lose over half an annual bonus - probably more, depending on how long your notice period is - They encourage competitiveness amongst staff as there's generally known to be a limited "bonus pool" - They make total comp packages opaque when recruiting, since you won't actually know what you get until you've been in the job a while - By the same token, they make it harder for employees to benchmark compensation, both internally and externally
In short, bonuses are awful. It would be in the interests of all but the top few per cent of performers to just negotiate a fixed salary in advance that was a bit below salary plus target bonus.
Sometimes I wonder if bonuses have a life of their own. An acquaintance has worked at a large high-tech company as a mid-level pleb for over fifteen years, and says he gets a solid >10% bonus every year. It just becomes expected, as though it is part of the salary. What are the tax implications of having it part of a bonus instead of salary?
And I know I've asked about bonuses when being interviewed for jobs in the past, and was often asked about bonuses when interviewing. Yet surely bonuses should be given for exceptional work, not as standard?
I also think there are two different areas here: low-level bonuses for staff at the lower levels, and humongous bonuses for the top staff. The former is easier to justify than the latter...
I find the idea of bonuses a bit much to be perfectly honest. Call me old-fashioned. You get a good salary to do your job as professionally as possible. Any bonus should only be a tiny bit on top for something that is really going beyond the call of duty, as it were.
If you are the owner of a business then by all means take the rewards of your hard work. But the difficulty with bonuses in banking is this - many started out as partnerships where they were the owners but then turned into corporates for all sorts of sensible reasons. But they kept the partnership mentality - and so bonuses were granted as if bankers are the owners of the business with the risks that go with that. But they're not and the risks have largely been borne by others when things have gone wrong - other employees, shareholders, customers and taxpayers. Bankers have wanted all the advantages of ownership with few, if any, of the downsides.
The cap and other regulatory measures have been attempts to correct that. But really what's needed is to go back to first principles: you're an employee, you get asked to do a professional job in return for a good salary. You do that. You don't get to behave as if you are an entrepreneur with all the risks and rewards of entrepreneurship. If you want to do that, off you go and try that.
The counter position is that a corporate financier who’s bonus is a percentage of revenues is really just a commission based salesman.
I find the idea of bonuses a bit much to be perfectly honest. Call me old-fashioned. You get a good salary to do your job as professionally as possible. Any bonus should only be a tiny bit on top for something that is really going beyond the call of duty, as it were.
If you are the owner of a business then by all means take the rewards of your hard work. But the difficulty with bonuses in banking is this - many started out as partnerships where they were the owners but then turned into corporates for all sorts of sensible reasons. But they kept the partnership mentality - and so bonuses were granted as if bankers are the owners of the business with the risks that go with that. But they're not and the risks have largely been borne by others when things have gone wrong - other employees, shareholders, customers and taxpayers. Bankers have wanted all the advantages of ownership with few, if any, of the downsides.
The cap and other regulatory measures have been attempts to correct that. But really what's needed is to go back to first principles: you're an employee, you get asked to do a professional job in return for a good salary. You do that. You don't get to behave as if you are an entrepreneur with all the risks and rewards of entrepreneurship. If you want to do that, off you go and try that.
You're more knowledgeable about these matters than me of course, but looking at the world of finance and indeed large corporations in general I would have said the real problem is our model of corporate governance is simply not working.
It is the job of shareholders to (a) ensure the board are operating correctly (b) that remuneration is set at the right level and (c) that managers and executives are held accountable for their actions.
And that simply isn't happening, largely because major corporations now appear to be mostly owned by other major corporations who all benefit from the lack of proper oversight and therefore want to keep it that way.
I don't have any easy solutions, and I can imagine anything I suggest might cause even more problems than it would solve. For example, giving individual voters the same weight regardless of the size of their shareholding would be an obvious way round it, but that would just make firms incredibly vulnerable to malicious interference. Or saying every bonus had to have the approval of 100% of shareholders before being paid, which would effectively mean none would be paid, but would hobble governance to a very great degree.
But wouldn't there be a case to start with that aspect?
I find the idea of bonuses a bit much to be perfectly honest. Call me old-fashioned. You get a good salary to do your job as professionally as possible. Any bonus should only be a tiny bit on top for something that is really going beyond the call of duty, as it were.
If you are the owner of a business then by all means take the rewards of your hard work. But the difficulty with bonuses in banking is this - many started out as partnerships where they were the owners but then turned into corporates for all sorts of sensible reasons. But they kept the partnership mentality - and so bonuses were granted as if bankers are the owners of the business with the risks that go with that. But they're not and the risks have largely been borne by others when things have gone wrong - other employees, shareholders, customers and taxpayers. Bankers have wanted all the advantages of ownership with few, if any, of the downsides.
The cap and other regulatory measures have been attempts to correct that. But really what's needed is to go back to first principles: you're an employee, you get asked to do a professional job in return for a good salary. You do that. You don't get to behave as if you are an entrepreneur with all the risks and rewards of entrepreneurship. If you want to do that, off you go and try that.
Oh good grief. Bonuses are awful things for staff, designed entirely for the benefit of the employer, not the employee. How can you can possibly have worked around bankers for this long and not understood this?
Bonuses do several things, none of which are in the interests of the vast majority of employees, even at top levels:
- They allow the firm to manage staffing costs in years where the overall firm has performed poorly - They trick people into working long hours, under the illusion that they'll get paid back at the end of the year, which never quite works out - They manage staff retention, since there tends to be some time between bonuses being earned and vested (eg: earned over the calendar year, but paid at end of March following annual reviews, so you can't quit between say July and March or you lose over half an annual bonus - probably more, depending on how long your notice period is - They encourage competitiveness amongst staff as there's generally known to be a limited "bonus pool" - They make total comp packages opaque when recruiting, since you won't actually know what you get until you've been in the job a while - By the same token, they make it harder for employees to benchmark compensation, both internally and externally
In short, bonuses are awful. It would be in the interests of all but the top few per cent of performers to just negotiate a fixed salary in advance that was a bit below salary plus target bonus.
I understand all of this very well indeed. Bonuses benefit a fortunate few. It is one reason why I think they are not generally a good idea, certainly not to the extent they have been entrenched in banking.
And to answer @ydoethur's point above, there are a whole range of measures which need to be taken. A proper look at the structure of banking, what works well, what doesn't etc is needed. Not just a "let's get rid of a horrid EU law and deregulate" approach. Because that is the sort of short-term thinking which has - in common with other issues - led to so many problems. And which this government risks repeating.
Sorry, but this thread header is unmitigated shit. The writer appears to be under the illusion that the financial services sector is a net negative and big bang and the deregulation of the 1980s was some sort of mistake. Its risible.
@Cyclefree knows rather more about the dirty of the UK financial services sector than you.
That's certainly true, but its also true that if all you have is a hammer, its tempting to treat everything as a nail. I'm sure Cyclefree is well justified in being jaded and seeing the worst of the financial services sector, that after all is/was her job, but that doesn't necessarily mean that the financial services sector is a net negative for the UK. The best of the financial services working practices presumably never came across Cyclefree's desk.
People who work in social services might see the dirty or worst in parenting, but it doesn't mean that parents are a negative either.
I find the idea of bonuses a bit much to be perfectly honest. Call me old-fashioned. You get a good salary to do your job as professionally as possible. Any bonus should only be a tiny bit on top for something that is really going beyond the call of duty, as it were.
If you are the owner of a business then by all means take the rewards of your hard work. But the difficulty with bonuses in banking is this - many started out as partnerships where they were the owners but then turned into corporates for all sorts of sensible reasons. But they kept the partnership mentality - and so bonuses were granted as if bankers are the owners of the business with the risks that go with that. But they're not and the risks have largely been borne by others when things have gone wrong - other employees, shareholders, customers and taxpayers. Bankers have wanted all the advantages of ownership with few, if any, of the downsides.
The cap and other regulatory measures have been attempts to correct that. But really what's needed is to go back to first principles: you're an employee, you get asked to do a professional job in return for a good salary. You do that. You don't get to behave as if you are an entrepreneur with all the risks and rewards of entrepreneurship. If you want to do that, off you go and try that.
Bonuses are always tricky - there is an argument for them in my mind where if you through your abilities massively increase the Bank’s returns through new business or some particular skill or insight then it’s sensible for a bank to reward you for their extra revenue where you could theoretically sit there and “do your job” with your client book as it is. It’s not perfect but it’s a good incentive to get more out of your people.
This all depends however on the bank having the correct incentive structure and the people in place to judge that it’s being done sensibly which isn’t always so.
One situation I witnessed personally in a bank I was embedded in before the crash was that the private bankers were incentivised for bonuses by increasing their book/revenue in three areas and one of these was the amount of client assets they directed into their in-house structured products.
Being separate from the bank’s incentive and salary structures I was able to watch with impartiality and most of the bankers were sensible but there was one particular arsehole who took the piss.
He was head of the private banking team that looked after the smaller clients - generally legacy grannies with up to a million on account.
Because he was obsessed with his bonus he started pumping all these old dears assets into 5 year structured products in 2007…. So old people mainly who had their wealth tied up for 5 years with big penalties for early withdrawal in instruments that were screwed by the crash.
He had absolutely no shame whatsoever and would sit in meetings with a big smug face when he was congratulated for putting millions into the in-house structured products.
I still to this day do not know why he wasn’t censored or the bank and I still see him swanning around, knowing he has a big property portfolio off the back of putting his bonuses before sense and decency and desperately want to drag him down an alley and give him a beating.
So I think bonuses have a place but the calculation has to be very careful and the oversight too - those who oversee the bonus distribution should be held liable if the bonuses are the result of bad unethical practice.
I saw one, where there was ceiling for profit related bonuses, but additional bonus for expanding the business, in certain areas.
They were surprised that when traders went over the profit limit, they started selling below the market price - which expanded the business, according to the definitions created.
I've avoided the coverage, but I was out of curiosity watching the queue live-feed last night for a bit.
I wondered about the motivations of the people who are prepared to queue for so long. It's a pilgrimage of sorts isn't it; one I wouldn't make as I'm not interested enough.
Even for cynics the dignity and sombreness of the occasion and the decorum and dedication of the queue-ers - and the organisation and regality of it all - cannot fail to impress. I saw the guards change twice whilst I watched.
And it is, of course, being viewed worldwide. Our image abroad and the popularity of the monarchy is even more assured I think.
The queue goes right outside my flat. It is most surreal walking past, especially at night.
Are there any reports of people trying to cut in the queue at points? I'm hearing none but that is surprising isn't it? I guess the other queue-ers wouldn't countenance it?
It's a pilgrimage. Cutting the queue would be like taking a helicopter to Santiago de Compostela.
If you are a Muslim your first loyalty is to Allah and Muhammad of course
A lot of the historic hostility towards Jews is that they owe their primary allegiance to their co-religionists, rather than their host nation.
"...is a perception that...", rather. I don't think it's actually true in most cases, and an unfortunate generalisation that has caused a lot of grief. As someone who is neither very patriotic nor at all religious, I'm ill-suited to comment, but my impression is that most Jews, Muslims and Christians feel their primary loyalty is to their families, with religion and nationality usually some way down the list.
Aren't most people primarily loyal to their families? It's not surely reserved just to the religious.
4 years jail without trial in the UK. Scandalous and completely unacceptable, not just for the suspect but also the interests of justice as witnesses recollections will be less reliable and accurate 4 years on.
When Petkovic’s trial did start, on 7 March 2021, its progress was then heavily delayed by the failure of the court’s air conditioning system in heatwave conditions. The trial collapsed in chaos on 27 July and the jury was discharged.
“The prison staff would not attend if the temperature in the court went above 23 degrees,” said Swan, of Stokoe Partnership solicitors.
I know some cases last a long time, but this doesn't sound like one of those.
I find the idea of bonuses a bit much to be perfectly honest. Call me old-fashioned. You get a good salary to do your job as professionally as possible. Any bonus should only be a tiny bit on top for something that is really going beyond the call of duty, as it were.
If you are the owner of a business then by all means take the rewards of your hard work. But the difficulty with bonuses in banking is this - many started out as partnerships where they were the owners but then turned into corporates for all sorts of sensible reasons. But they kept the partnership mentality - and so bonuses were granted as if bankers are the owners of the business with the risks that go with that. But they're not and the risks have largely been borne by others when things have gone wrong - other employees, shareholders, customers and taxpayers. Bankers have wanted all the advantages of ownership with few, if any, of the downsides.
The cap and other regulatory measures have been attempts to correct that. But really what's needed is to go back to first principles: you're an employee, you get asked to do a professional job in return for a good salary. You do that. You don't get to behave as if you are an entrepreneur with all the risks and rewards of entrepreneurship. If you want to do that, off you go and try that.
Bonuses are always tricky - there is an argument for them in my mind where if you through your abilities massively increase the Bank’s returns through new business or some particular skill or insight then it’s sensible for a bank to reward you for their extra revenue where you could theoretically sit there and “do your job” with your client book as it is. It’s not perfect but it’s a good incentive to get more out of your people.
This all depends however on the bank having the correct incentive structure and the people in place to judge that it’s being done sensibly which isn’t always so.
One situation I witnessed personally in a bank I was embedded in before the crash was that the private bankers were incentivised for bonuses by increasing their book/revenue in three areas and one of these was the amount of client assets they directed into their in-house structured products.
Being separate from the bank’s incentive and salary structures I was able to watch with impartiality and most of the bankers were sensible but there was one particular arsehole who took the piss.
He was head of the private banking team that looked after the smaller clients - generally legacy grannies with up to a million on account.
Because he was obsessed with his bonus he started pumping all these old dears assets into 5 year structured products in 2007…. So old people mainly who had their wealth tied up for 5 years with big penalties for early withdrawal in instruments that were screwed by the crash.
He had absolutely no shame whatsoever and would sit in meetings with a big smug face when he was congratulated for putting millions into the in-house structured products.
I still to this day do not know why he wasn’t censored or the bank and I still see him swanning around, knowing he has a big property portfolio off the back of putting his bonuses before sense and decency and desperately want to drag him down an alley and give him a beating.
So I think bonuses have a place but the calculation has to be very careful and the oversight too - those who oversee the bonus distribution should be held liable if the bonuses are the result of bad unethical practice.
I saw one, where there was ceiling for profit related bonuses, but additional bonus for expanding the business, in certain areas.
They were surprised that when traders went over the profit limit, they started selling below the market price - which expanded the business, according to the definitions created.
It is remarkable how often you need to spend time explaining to people that given any rule book people will try to find ways around it...
You would expect that people would learn over time but a lot of people never seem to grasp the fact...
Bloomberg reporting now that the dollar strength is 'ripping' through markets and a well as the pound at $1.14 the euro is €0.9963
This is not just a UK problem as much as you seem to want to portray it as
The US does not have the energy price problem that Europe does.
The fall in the Euro and the Pound vs the dollar is directly driven by this - the expectation of economic problems and the long term effects of borrowing large amounts of money to deal with the issue.
I find the idea of bonuses a bit much to be perfectly honest. Call me old-fashioned. You get a good salary to do your job as professionally as possible. Any bonus should only be a tiny bit on top for something that is really going beyond the call of duty, as it were.
If you are the owner of a business then by all means take the rewards of your hard work. But the difficulty with bonuses in banking is this - many started out as partnerships where they were the owners but then turned into corporates for all sorts of sensible reasons. But they kept the partnership mentality - and so bonuses were granted as if bankers are the owners of the business with the risks that go with that. But they're not and the risks have largely been borne by others when things have gone wrong - other employees, shareholders, customers and taxpayers. Bankers have wanted all the advantages of ownership with few, if any, of the downsides.
The cap and other regulatory measures have been attempts to correct that. But really what's needed is to go back to first principles: you're an employee, you get asked to do a professional job in return for a good salary. You do that. You don't get to behave as if you are an entrepreneur with all the risks and rewards of entrepreneurship. If you want to do that, off you go and try that.
Bonuses are always tricky - there is an argument for them in my mind where if you through your abilities massively increase the Bank’s returns through new business or some particular skill or insight then it’s sensible for a bank to reward you for their extra revenue where you could theoretically sit there and “do your job” with your client book as it is. It’s not perfect but it’s a good incentive to get more out of your people.
This all depends however on the bank having the correct incentive structure and the people in place to judge that it’s being done sensibly which isn’t always so.
One situation I witnessed personally in a bank I was embedded in before the crash was that the private bankers were incentivised for bonuses by increasing their book/revenue in three areas and one of these was the amount of client assets they directed into their in-house structured products.
Being separate from the bank’s incentive and salary structures I was able to watch with impartiality and most of the bankers were sensible but there was one particular arsehole who took the piss.
He was head of the private banking team that looked after the smaller clients - generally legacy grannies with up to a million on account.
Because he was obsessed with his bonus he started pumping all these old dears assets into 5 year structured products in 2007…. So old people mainly who had their wealth tied up for 5 years with big penalties for early withdrawal in instruments that were screwed by the crash.
He had absolutely no shame whatsoever and would sit in meetings with a big smug face when he was congratulated for putting millions into the in-house structured products.
I still to this day do not know why he wasn’t censored or the bank and I still see him swanning around, knowing he has a big property portfolio off the back of putting his bonuses before sense and decency and desperately want to drag him down an alley and give him a beating.
So I think bonuses have a place but the calculation has to be very careful and the oversight too - those who oversee the bonus distribution should be held liable if the bonuses are the result of bad unethical practice.
I saw one, where there was ceiling for profit related bonuses, but additional bonus for expanding the business, in certain areas.
They were surprised that when traders went over the profit limit, they started selling below the market price - which expanded the business, according to the definitions created.
The sofas are too far from the food, and too low down. These low tables - you get them in coffee shops sometimes - always sadden me. They make consumption of food very difficult.
If you are a Muslim your first loyalty is to Allah and Muhammad of course
A lot of the historic hostility towards Jews is that they owe their primary allegiance to their co-religionists, rather than their host nation.
"...is a perception that...", rather. I don't think it's actually true in most cases, and an unfortunate generalisation that has caused a lot of grief. As someone who is neither very patriotic nor at all religious, I'm ill-suited to comment, but my impression is that most Jews, Muslims and Christians feel their primary loyalty is to their families, with religion and nationality usually some way down the list.
Aren't most people primarily loyal to their families? It's not surely reserved just to the religious.
beyond family , people are surprisingly loyal to clubs, charity , groups they are a member of etc -more so than even being loyal to their country - Thats why I always argue that the Third sector or charity sector is far more better placed than the state to take responsibility for many things . Even in economics staff satisfaction is higher working for a coopperative than either the state or in the private sector
Bloomberg reporting now that the dollar strength is 'ripping' through markets and a well as the pound at $1.14 the euro is €0.9963
This is not just a UK problem as much as you seem to want to portray it as
Yes and no. USD strength absolutely is the main dynamic in FX right now. I would expect it to continue and think there is every chance that Cable will go to parity or close to it next year. But sterling has also lost ground against the Euro in recent weeks - probably because the ECB now shows more signs of getting real on inflation than the BOE does. And since late 2015 sterling is down about 20% against the Euro, because of... well we all know what.
I find the idea of bonuses a bit much to be perfectly honest. Call me old-fashioned. You get a good salary to do your job as professionally as possible. Any bonus should only be a tiny bit on top for something that is really going beyond the call of duty, as it were.
If you are the owner of a business then by all means take the rewards of your hard work. But the difficulty with bonuses in banking is this - many started out as partnerships where they were the owners but then turned into corporates for all sorts of sensible reasons. But they kept the partnership mentality - and so bonuses were granted as if bankers are the owners of the business with the risks that go with that. But they're not and the risks have largely been borne by others when things have gone wrong - other employees, shareholders, customers and taxpayers. Bankers have wanted all the advantages of ownership with few, if any, of the downsides.
The cap and other regulatory measures have been attempts to correct that. But really what's needed is to go back to first principles: you're an employee, you get asked to do a professional job in return for a good salary. You do that. You don't get to behave as if you are an entrepreneur with all the risks and rewards of entrepreneurship. If you want to do that, off you go and try that.
Bonuses are always tricky - there is an argument for them in my mind where if you through your abilities massively increase the Bank’s returns through new business or some particular skill or insight then it’s sensible for a bank to reward you for their extra revenue where you could theoretically sit there and “do your job” with your client book as it is. It’s not perfect but it’s a good incentive to get more out of your people.
This all depends however on the bank having the correct incentive structure and the people in place to judge that it’s being done sensibly which isn’t always so.
One situation I witnessed personally in a bank I was embedded in before the crash was that the private bankers were incentivised for bonuses by increasing their book/revenue in three areas and one of these was the amount of client assets they directed into their in-house structured products.
Being separate from the bank’s incentive and salary structures I was able to watch with impartiality and most of the bankers were sensible but there was one particular arsehole who took the piss.
He was head of the private banking team that looked after the smaller clients - generally legacy grannies with up to a million on account.
Because he was obsessed with his bonus he started pumping all these old dears assets into 5 year structured products in 2007…. So old people mainly who had their wealth tied up for 5 years with big penalties for early withdrawal in instruments that were screwed by the crash.
He had absolutely no shame whatsoever and would sit in meetings with a big smug face when he was congratulated for putting millions into the in-house structured products.
I still to this day do not know why he wasn’t censored or the bank and I still see him swanning around, knowing he has a big property portfolio off the back of putting his bonuses before sense and decency and desperately want to drag him down an alley and give him a beating.
So I think bonuses have a place but the calculation has to be very careful and the oversight too - those who oversee the bonus distribution should be held liable if the bonuses are the result of bad unethical practice.
I saw one, where there was ceiling for profit related bonuses, but additional bonus for expanding the business, in certain areas.
They were surprised that when traders went over the profit limit, they started selling below the market price - which expanded the business, according to the definitions created.
It is remarkable how often you need to spend time explaining to people that given any rule book people will try to find ways around it...
You would expect that people would learn over time but a lot of people never seem to grasp the fact...
I was interested in the surprise that derivatives traders (maths geeks with greed), when given a formula for how much money they would get, optimised the outcome for themselves.
To me, that was a "Pope is Catholic" moment.
EDIT : It wasn't even really finding a way round the rules. They just used a very literal interpretation of the rules.
4 years jail without trial in the UK. Scandalous and completely unacceptable, not just for the suspect but also the interests of justice as witnesses recollections will be less reliable and accurate 4 years on.
When Petkovic’s trial did start, on 7 March 2021, its progress was then heavily delayed by the failure of the court’s air conditioning system in heatwave conditions. The trial collapsed in chaos on 27 July and the jury was discharged.
“The prison staff would not attend if the temperature in the court went above 23 degrees,” said Swan, of Stokoe Partnership solicitors.
I know some cases last a long time, but this doesn't sound like one of those.
This isi also startling:
"At the time, the custody time limit – the amount of time that someone can be held on remand – was six months. That was extended in September 2020 to eight months because of the pressures on the system from Covid.
However, cases such as Petkovic’s, where a trial has started but collapsed for whatever reason, are not covered by any custody limits, and his file was pushed to the back of a long queue,"
What would be the maximum sentence / time served. It doesn’t sound as if there is a specific victim who needs the closure of a conviction so perhaps just release him on the basis that he is unlikely to be sentenced to >6 years (I think it’s 1/3 off for good behaviour?)
I find the idea of bonuses a bit much to be perfectly honest. Call me old-fashioned. You get a good salary to do your job as professionally as possible. Any bonus should only be a tiny bit on top for something that is really going beyond the call of duty, as it were.
If you are the owner of a business then by all means take the rewards of your hard work. But the difficulty with bonuses in banking is this - many started out as partnerships where they were the owners but then turned into corporates for all sorts of sensible reasons. But they kept the partnership mentality - and so bonuses were granted as if bankers are the owners of the business with the risks that go with that. But they're not and the risks have largely been borne by others when things have gone wrong - other employees, shareholders, customers and taxpayers. Bankers have wanted all the advantages of ownership with few, if any, of the downsides.
The cap and other regulatory measures have been attempts to correct that. But really what's needed is to go back to first principles: you're an employee, you get asked to do a professional job in return for a good salary. You do that. You don't get to behave as if you are an entrepreneur with all the risks and rewards of entrepreneurship. If you want to do that, off you go and try that.
You're more knowledgeable about these matters than me of course, but looking at the world of finance and indeed large corporations in general I would have said the real problem is our model of corporate governance is simply not working.
It is the job of shareholders to (a) ensure the board are operating correctly (b) that remuneration is set at the right level and (c) that managers and executives are held accountable for their actions.
And that simply isn't happening, largely because major corporations now appear to be mostly owned by other major corporations who all benefit from the lack of proper oversight and therefore want to keep it that way.
I don't have any easy solutions, and I can imagine anything I suggest might cause even more problems than it would solve. For example, giving individual voters the same weight regardless of the size of their shareholding would be an obvious way round it, but that would just make firms incredibly vulnerable to malicious interference. Or saying every bonus had to have the approval of 100% of shareholders before being paid, which would effectively mean none would be paid, but would hobble governance to a very great degree.
But wouldn't there be a case to start with that aspect?
I find the idea of bonuses a bit much to be perfectly honest. Call me old-fashioned. You get a good salary to do your job as professionally as possible. Any bonus should only be a tiny bit on top for something that is really going beyond the call of duty, as it were.
If you are the owner of a business then by all means take the rewards of your hard work. But the difficulty with bonuses in banking is this - many started out as partnerships where they were the owners but then turned into corporates for all sorts of sensible reasons. But they kept the partnership mentality - and so bonuses were granted as if bankers are the owners of the business with the risks that go with that. But they're not and the risks have largely been borne by others when things have gone wrong - other employees, shareholders, customers and taxpayers. Bankers have wanted all the advantages of ownership with few, if any, of the downsides.
The cap and other regulatory measures have been attempts to correct that. But really what's needed is to go back to first principles: you're an employee, you get asked to do a professional job in return for a good salary. You do that. You don't get to behave as if you are an entrepreneur with all the risks and rewards of entrepreneurship. If you want to do that, off you go and try that.
Oh good grief. Bonuses are awful things for staff, designed entirely for the benefit of the employer, not the employee. How can you can possibly have worked around bankers for this long and not understood this?
Bonuses do several things, none of which are in the interests of the vast majority of employees, even at top levels:
- They allow the firm to manage staffing costs in years where the overall firm has performed poorly - They trick people into working long hours, under the illusion that they'll get paid back at the end of the year, which never quite works out - They manage staff retention, since there tends to be some time between bonuses being earned and vested (eg: earned over the calendar year, but paid at end of March following annual reviews, so you can't quit between say July and March or you lose over half an annual bonus - probably more, depending on how long your notice period is - They encourage competitiveness amongst staff as there's generally known to be a limited "bonus pool" - They make total comp packages opaque when recruiting, since you won't actually know what you get until you've been in the job a while - By the same token, they make it harder for employees to benchmark compensation, both internally and externally
In short, bonuses are awful. It would be in the interests of all but the top few per cent of performers to just negotiate a fixed salary in advance that was a bit below salary plus target bonus.
I understand all of this very well indeed. Bonuses benefit a fortunate few. It is one reason why I think they are not generally a good idea, certainly not to the extent they have been entrenched in banking.
And to answer @ydoethur's point above, there are a whole range of measures which need to be taken. A proper look at the structure of banking, what works well, what doesn't etc is needed. Not just a "let's get rid of a horrid EU law and deregulate" approach. Because that is the sort of short-term thinking which has - in common with other issues - led to so many problems. And which this government risks repeating.
Better regulation is the answer. The idea that bonuses are not a good idea is normally a contention held by people who have not been in receipt of them. Very few people refuse them when offered, rather like highly paid public sector workers never refuse even higher pension benefits or early retirement. As David Coulthard said that the people who believe that money doesn't buy happiness are those who never had any. A little crass, but probably roughly true.
Bloomberg reporting now that the dollar strength is 'ripping' through markets and a well as the pound at $1.14 the euro is €0.9963
This is not just a UK problem as much as you seem to want to portray it as
Yes and no. USD strength absolutely is the main dynamic in FX right now. I would expect it to continue and think there is every chance that Cable will go to parity or close to it next year. But sterling has also lost ground against the Euro in recent weeks - probably because the ECB now shows more signs of getting real on inflation than the BOE does. And since late 2015 sterling is down about 20% against the Euro, because of... well we all know what.
It's not just the banker bonus cap Liz Truss wants to scrap. The EU working time directive is in her sights too. Sunak resisted previous No10 pressure on both (Sources say Johnson planned a 'dump the directive' flourish in his July 'joint event' with Sunak that never happened) https://twitter.com/paulwaugh/status/1570677929952280576
The WTD is very harmless for all employers other than supremely exploitative ones. If an employee wants the overtime they sign a disclaimer.
It is somewhat ironic that Johnson, one of the most slothful and non-productive workers our nation has ever seen was such a fan of the WTD's abolition. Although being unable to differentiate work from partying like it's 1999 may have been a justification for him to formally extend working hours above 48 per week.
However, abolishing the WTD sends a message and with Tories doing the abolishing the message will be "Work until you drop and we will pay you your (minimal) wages"
I suspect that it might not go down well except in the leafy shires of the retired.
Sorry, but this thread header is unmitigated shit. The writer appears to be under the illusion that the financial services sector is a net negative and big bang and the deregulation of the 1980s was some sort of mistake. Its risible.
@Cyclefree knows rather more about the dirty of the UK financial services sector than you.
That superior knowledge would have zero bearing on the point you are replying to.
You can disagree with @cyclefree (which I do, frequently) but that doesn’t mean the article is “risible” or “unmitigated shit”
I find the idea of bonuses a bit much to be perfectly honest. Call me old-fashioned. You get a good salary to do your job as professionally as possible. Any bonus should only be a tiny bit on top for something that is really going beyond the call of duty, as it were.
If you are the owner of a business then by all means take the rewards of your hard work. But the difficulty with bonuses in banking is this - many started out as partnerships where they were the owners but then turned into corporates for all sorts of sensible reasons. But they kept the partnership mentality - and so bonuses were granted as if bankers are the owners of the business with the risks that go with that. But they're not and the risks have largely been borne by others when things have gone wrong - other employees, shareholders, customers and taxpayers. Bankers have wanted all the advantages of ownership with few, if any, of the downsides.
The cap and other regulatory measures have been attempts to correct that. But really what's needed is to go back to first principles: you're an employee, you get asked to do a professional job in return for a good salary. You do that. You don't get to behave as if you are an entrepreneur with all the risks and rewards of entrepreneurship. If you want to do that, off you go and try that.
Bonuses are always tricky - there is an argument for them in my mind where if you through your abilities massively increase the Bank’s returns through new business or some particular skill or insight then it’s sensible for a bank to reward you for their extra revenue where you could theoretically sit there and “do your job” with your client book as it is. It’s not perfect but it’s a good incentive to get more out of your people.
This all depends however on the bank having the correct incentive structure and the people in place to judge that it’s being done sensibly which isn’t always so.
One situation I witnessed personally in a bank I was embedded in before the crash was that the private bankers were incentivised for bonuses by increasing their book/revenue in three areas and one of these was the amount of client assets they directed into their in-house structured products.
Being separate from the bank’s incentive and salary structures I was able to watch with impartiality and most of the bankers were sensible but there was one particular arsehole who took the piss.
He was head of the private banking team that looked after the smaller clients - generally legacy grannies with up to a million on account.
Because he was obsessed with his bonus he started pumping all these old dears assets into 5 year structured products in 2007…. So old people mainly who had their wealth tied up for 5 years with big penalties for early withdrawal in instruments that were screwed by the crash.
He had absolutely no shame whatsoever and would sit in meetings with a big smug face when he was congratulated for putting millions into the in-house structured products.
I still to this day do not know why he wasn’t censured or the bank and I still see him swanning around, knowing he has a big property portfolio off the back of putting his bonuses before sense and decency and desperately want to drag him down an alley and give him a beating.
So I think bonuses have a place but the calculation has to be very careful and the oversight too - those who oversee the bonus distribution should be held liable if the bonuses are the result of bad unethical practice.
That sort of incentive creates an obvious conflict of interest which then has to be managed. Usually better not to create the conflict in the first place.
It was the Tories' turn left on economics more than their turn right on social issues that won their red wall seats. They will be out on their arse with this kind of reheated Thatcherism.
I am not so sure. We liked Thatcherism because it indulged our ambitious fantasies.
We may never get annualised bonuses of £5m per year over our careers as till jockies at Morrisons, but we can dare to dream!
Bloomberg reporting now that the dollar strength is 'ripping' through markets and a well as the pound at $1.14 the euro is €0.9963
This is not just a UK problem as much as you seem to want to portray it as
Yes and no. USD strength absolutely is the main dynamic in FX right now. I would expect it to continue and think there is every chance that Cable will go to parity or close to it next year. But sterling has also lost ground against the Euro in recent weeks - probably because the ECB now shows more signs of getting real on inflation than the BOE does. And since late 2015 sterling is down about 20% against the Euro, because of... well we all know what.
yes 50 cent could soon name himself 50p
Perhaps Jayzee will become Jayzed at the same time.
I find the idea of bonuses a bit much to be perfectly honest. Call me old-fashioned. You get a good salary to do your job as professionally as possible. Any bonus should only be a tiny bit on top for something that is really going beyond the call of duty, as it were.
If you are the owner of a business then by all means take the rewards of your hard work. But the difficulty with bonuses in banking is this - many started out as partnerships where they were the owners but then turned into corporates for all sorts of sensible reasons. But they kept the partnership mentality - and so bonuses were granted as if bankers are the owners of the business with the risks that go with that. But they're not and the risks have largely been borne by others when things have gone wrong - other employees, shareholders, customers and taxpayers. Bankers have wanted all the advantages of ownership with few, if any, of the downsides.
The cap and other regulatory measures have been attempts to correct that. But really what's needed is to go back to first principles: you're an employee, you get asked to do a professional job in return for a good salary. You do that. You don't get to behave as if you are an entrepreneur with all the risks and rewards of entrepreneurship. If you want to do that, off you go and try that.
You're more knowledgeable about these matters than me of course, but looking at the world of finance and indeed large corporations in general I would have said the real problem is our model of corporate governance is simply not working.
It is the job of shareholders to (a) ensure the board are operating correctly (b) that remuneration is set at the right level and (c) that managers and executives are held accountable for their actions.
And that simply isn't happening, largely because major corporations now appear to be mostly owned by other major corporations who all benefit from the lack of proper oversight and therefore want to keep it that way.
I don't have any easy solutions, and I can imagine anything I suggest might cause even more problems than it would solve. For example, giving individual voters the same weight regardless of the size of their shareholding would be an obvious way round it, but that would just make firms incredibly vulnerable to malicious interference. Or saying every bonus had to have the approval of 100% of shareholders before being paid, which would effectively mean none would be paid, but would hobble governance to a very great degree.
But wouldn't there be a case to start with that aspect?
I find the idea of bonuses a bit much to be perfectly honest. Call me old-fashioned. You get a good salary to do your job as professionally as possible. Any bonus should only be a tiny bit on top for something that is really going beyond the call of duty, as it were.
If you are the owner of a business then by all means take the rewards of your hard work. But the difficulty with bonuses in banking is this - many started out as partnerships where they were the owners but then turned into corporates for all sorts of sensible reasons. But they kept the partnership mentality - and so bonuses were granted as if bankers are the owners of the business with the risks that go with that. But they're not and the risks have largely been borne by others when things have gone wrong - other employees, shareholders, customers and taxpayers. Bankers have wanted all the advantages of ownership with few, if any, of the downsides.
The cap and other regulatory measures have been attempts to correct that. But really what's needed is to go back to first principles: you're an employee, you get asked to do a professional job in return for a good salary. You do that. You don't get to behave as if you are an entrepreneur with all the risks and rewards of entrepreneurship. If you want to do that, off you go and try that.
Oh good grief. Bonuses are awful things for staff, designed entirely for the benefit of the employer, not the employee. How can you can possibly have worked around bankers for this long and not understood this?
Bonuses do several things, none of which are in the interests of the vast majority of employees, even at top levels:
- They allow the firm to manage staffing costs in years where the overall firm has performed poorly - They trick people into working long hours, under the illusion that they'll get paid back at the end of the year, which never quite works out - They manage staff retention, since there tends to be some time between bonuses being earned and vested (eg: earned over the calendar year, but paid at end of March following annual reviews, so you can't quit between say July and March or you lose over half an annual bonus - probably more, depending on how long your notice period is - They encourage competitiveness amongst staff as there's generally known to be a limited "bonus pool" - They make total comp packages opaque when recruiting, since you won't actually know what you get until you've been in the job a while - By the same token, they make it harder for employees to benchmark compensation, both internally and externally
In short, bonuses are awful. It would be in the interests of all but the top few per cent of performers to just negotiate a fixed salary in advance that was a bit below salary plus target bonus.
I understand all of this very well indeed. Bonuses benefit a fortunate few. It is one reason why I think they are not generally a good idea, certainly not to the extent they have been entrenched in banking.
And to answer @ydoethur's point above, there are a whole range of measures which need to be taken. A proper look at the structure of banking, what works well, what doesn't etc is needed. Not just a "let's get rid of a horrid EU law and deregulate" approach. Because that is the sort of short-term thinking which has - in common with other issues - led to so many problems. And which this government risks repeating.
Better regulation is the answer. The idea that bonuses are not a good idea is normally a contention held by people who have not been in receipt of them. Very few people refuse them when offered, rather like highly paid public sector workers never refuse even higher pension benefits or early retirement. As David Coulthard said that the people who believe that money doesn't buy happiness are those who never had any. A little crass, but probably roughly true.
I like my father's take - "Millions can't buy happiness. But they can buy a lot of time with a psychiatrist."
The University of Oxford has been rated the best in Britain, taking the top spot in a UK university ranking for the first time in 12 years and beating its rival Cambridge.
Bloomberg reporting now that the dollar strength is 'ripping' through markets and a well as the pound at $1.14 the euro is €0.9963
This is not just a UK problem as much as you seem to want to portray it as
Yes and no. USD strength absolutely is the main dynamic in FX right now. I would expect it to continue and think there is every chance that Cable will go to parity or close to it next year. But sterling has also lost ground against the Euro in recent weeks - probably because the ECB now shows more signs of getting real on inflation than the BOE does. And since late 2015 sterling is down about 20% against the Euro, because of... well we all know what.
The fact that 2015 was a spike which wasn't replicated in any of the other past fifteen years since Brown and the GFC crashed sterling's exchange rate?
Pound to Euro exchange rate is presently €1.14 Pound to Euro exchange rate in October 2010 was ... €1.13
4 years jail without trial in the UK. Scandalous and completely unacceptable, not just for the suspect but also the interests of justice as witnesses recollections will be less reliable and accurate 4 years on.
When Petkovic’s trial did start, on 7 March 2021, its progress was then heavily delayed by the failure of the court’s air conditioning system in heatwave conditions. The trial collapsed in chaos on 27 July and the jury was discharged.
“The prison staff would not attend if the temperature in the court went above 23 degrees,” said Swan, of Stokoe Partnership solicitors.
I know some cases last a long time, but this doesn't sound like one of those.
23 degrees isn’t that hot?
That's easily 14 degrees lower than the classrooms I had to teach in and the children had to work in. Albeit I suppose the day in court would be longer.
If they were getting pissy about 23 degrees I'd say a disciplinary would be in order, because most non-air-conditioned rooms (I.e. most rooms) in England must exceed that on a regular basis in summer.
I find the idea of bonuses a bit much to be perfectly honest. Call me old-fashioned. You get a good salary to do your job as professionally as possible. Any bonus should only be a tiny bit on top for something that is really going beyond the call of duty, as it were.
If you are the owner of a business then by all means take the rewards of your hard work. But the difficulty with bonuses in banking is this - many started out as partnerships where they were the owners but then turned into corporates for all sorts of sensible reasons. But they kept the partnership mentality - and so bonuses were granted as if bankers are the owners of the business with the risks that go with that. But they're not and the risks have largely been borne by others when things have gone wrong - other employees, shareholders, customers and taxpayers. Bankers have wanted all the advantages of ownership with few, if any, of the downsides.
The cap and other regulatory measures have been attempts to correct that. But really what's needed is to go back to first principles: you're an employee, you get asked to do a professional job in return for a good salary. You do that. You don't get to behave as if you are an entrepreneur with all the risks and rewards of entrepreneurship. If you want to do that, off you go and try that.
You're more knowledgeable about these matters than me of course, but looking at the world of finance and indeed large corporations in general I would have said the real problem is our model of corporate governance is simply not working.
It is the job of shareholders to (a) ensure the board are operating correctly (b) that remuneration is set at the right level and (c) that managers and executives are held accountable for their actions.
And that simply isn't happening, largely because major corporations now appear to be mostly owned by other major corporations who all benefit from the lack of proper oversight and therefore want to keep it that way.
I don't have any easy solutions, and I can imagine anything I suggest might cause even more problems than it would solve. For example, giving individual voters the same weight regardless of the size of their shareholding would be an obvious way round it, but that would just make firms incredibly vulnerable to malicious interference. Or saying every bonus had to have the approval of 100% of shareholders before being paid, which would effectively mean none would be paid, but would hobble governance to a very great degree.
But wouldn't there be a case to start with that aspect?
I find the idea of bonuses a bit much to be perfectly honest. Call me old-fashioned. You get a good salary to do your job as professionally as possible. Any bonus should only be a tiny bit on top for something that is really going beyond the call of duty, as it were.
If you are the owner of a business then by all means take the rewards of your hard work. But the difficulty with bonuses in banking is this - many started out as partnerships where they were the owners but then turned into corporates for all sorts of sensible reasons. But they kept the partnership mentality - and so bonuses were granted as if bankers are the owners of the business with the risks that go with that. But they're not and the risks have largely been borne by others when things have gone wrong - other employees, shareholders, customers and taxpayers. Bankers have wanted all the advantages of ownership with few, if any, of the downsides.
The cap and other regulatory measures have been attempts to correct that. But really what's needed is to go back to first principles: you're an employee, you get asked to do a professional job in return for a good salary. You do that. You don't get to behave as if you are an entrepreneur with all the risks and rewards of entrepreneurship. If you want to do that, off you go and try that.
Oh good grief. Bonuses are awful things for staff, designed entirely for the benefit of the employer, not the employee. How can you can possibly have worked around bankers for this long and not understood this?
Bonuses do several things, none of which are in the interests of the vast majority of employees, even at top levels:
- They allow the firm to manage staffing costs in years where the overall firm has performed poorly - They trick people into working long hours, under the illusion that they'll get paid back at the end of the year, which never quite works out - They manage staff retention, since there tends to be some time between bonuses being earned and vested (eg: earned over the calendar year, but paid at end of March following annual reviews, so you can't quit between say July and March or you lose over half an annual bonus - probably more, depending on how long your notice period is - They encourage competitiveness amongst staff as there's generally known to be a limited "bonus pool" - They make total comp packages opaque when recruiting, since you won't actually know what you get until you've been in the job a while - By the same token, they make it harder for employees to benchmark compensation, both internally and externally
In short, bonuses are awful. It would be in the interests of all but the top few per cent of performers to just negotiate a fixed salary in advance that was a bit below salary plus target bonus.
I understand all of this very well indeed. Bonuses benefit a fortunate few. It is one reason why I think they are not generally a good idea, certainly not to the extent they have been entrenched in banking.
And to answer @ydoethur's point above, there are a whole range of measures which need to be taken. A proper look at the structure of banking, what works well, what doesn't etc is needed. Not just a "let's get rid of a horrid EU law and deregulate" approach. Because that is the sort of short-term thinking which has - in common with other issues - led to so many problems. And which this government risks repeating.
Better regulation is the answer. The idea that bonuses are not a good idea is normally a contention held by people who have not been in receipt of them. Very few people refuse them when offered, rather like highly paid public sector workers never refuse even higher pension benefits or early retirement. As David Coulthard said that the people who believe that money doesn't buy happiness are those who never had any. A little crass, but probably roughly true.
It's not really true. Freedom from daily worry buys one level of happiness, and the comfort to live reasonably well, have leisure and choose ones's own options also buys another. Beyond that, extreme wealth, as the key priority and organising principle for one's life, is often a symptom of deep internal unhappiness and confusion, rather than the other way around.
There was a good Radio 4 programme about this last year, which seemed to want to start out celebrating the masters of the universe, and ended up quoting a large number of psychologists, and their studies of the dysfunctions and motivation of the very richest.
Sorry, but this thread header is unmitigated shit. The writer appears to be under the illusion that the financial services sector is a net negative and big bang and the deregulation of the 1980s was some sort of mistake. Its risible.
@Cyclefree knows rather more about the dirty of the UK financial services sector than you.
That's certainly true, but its also true that if all you have is a hammer, its tempting to treat everything as a nail. I'm sure Cyclefree is well justified in being jaded and seeing the worst of the financial services sector, that after all is/was her job, but that doesn't necessarily mean that the financial services sector is a net negative for the UK. The best of the financial services working practices presumably never came across Cyclefree's desk.
People who work in social services might see the dirty or worst in parenting, but it doesn't mean that parents are a negative either.
Two points:
1.I don't think it is a net negative. It's precisely because I think it can do worthwhile things that I want it to operate well. That is why I do what I do.
2. I have done advisory work as well as investigations so I have seen a lot of good practice. Indeed as part of investigative work I have to know what is good to see how far others have fallen short. It's precisely because I know of some very good bankers and traders indeed that it infuriates me to see so many others taking the piss.
My general view is that we often learn best and the most from our mistakes. And so learning from what has gone wrong in this sector is key to making it work as well as it can and should.
I would be more relaxed about what the government is proposing if I felt this was its motivation. But somehow I doubt it.
I find the idea of bonuses a bit much to be perfectly honest. Call me old-fashioned. You get a good salary to do your job as professionally as possible. Any bonus should only be a tiny bit on top for something that is really going beyond the call of duty, as it were.
If you are the owner of a business then by all means take the rewards of your hard work. But the difficulty with bonuses in banking is this - many started out as partnerships where they were the owners but then turned into corporates for all sorts of sensible reasons. But they kept the partnership mentality - and so bonuses were granted as if bankers are the owners of the business with the risks that go with that. But they're not and the risks have largely been borne by others when things have gone wrong - other employees, shareholders, customers and taxpayers. Bankers have wanted all the advantages of ownership with few, if any, of the downsides.
The cap and other regulatory measures have been attempts to correct that. But really what's needed is to go back to first principles: you're an employee, you get asked to do a professional job in return for a good salary. You do that. You don't get to behave as if you are an entrepreneur with all the risks and rewards of entrepreneurship. If you want to do that, off you go and try that.
Bonuses are always tricky - there is an argument for them in my mind where if you through your abilities massively increase the Bank’s returns through new business or some particular skill or insight then it’s sensible for a bank to reward you for their extra revenue where you could theoretically sit there and “do your job” with your client book as it is. It’s not perfect but it’s a good incentive to get more out of your people.
This all depends however on the bank having the correct incentive structure and the people in place to judge that it’s being done sensibly which isn’t always so.
One situation I witnessed personally in a bank I was embedded in before the crash was that the private bankers were incentivised for bonuses by increasing their book/revenue in three areas and one of these was the amount of client assets they directed into their in-house structured products.
Being separate from the bank’s incentive and salary structures I was able to watch with impartiality and most of the bankers were sensible but there was one particular arsehole who took the piss.
He was head of the private banking team that looked after the smaller clients - generally legacy grannies with up to a million on account.
Because he was obsessed with his bonus he started pumping all these old dears assets into 5 year structured products in 2007…. So old people mainly who had their wealth tied up for 5 years with big penalties for early withdrawal in instruments that were screwed by the crash.
He had absolutely no shame whatsoever and would sit in meetings with a big smug face when he was congratulated for putting millions into the in-house structured products.
I still to this day do not know why he wasn’t censured or the bank and I still see him swanning around, knowing he has a big property portfolio off the back of putting his bonuses before sense and decency and desperately want to drag him down an alley and give him a beating.
So I think bonuses have a place but the calculation has to be very careful and the oversight too - those who oversee the bonus distribution should be held liable if the bonuses are the result of bad unethical practice.
That sort of incentive creates an obvious conflict of interest which then has to be managed. Usually better not to create the conflict in the first place.
Absolutely. In this situation you had a combination of a banker with a massive chip on his shoulder about being surrounded by wealth (won’t go into details but if you mention his name to anyone they would immediately refer to him as “that chippy ____”) and wanting to show he had made it mixed with the bank in question where the top was obsessed with structured products and so they were pushing country heads to increase that pot, country heads were pushing heads of banking divisions to push them because they were being pushed and their bonuses depended on them and so on down the line.
I think I’m quite relaxed about remuneration and bonuses in many respects but that really pissed me off and was very happy to have my independence from it.
I find the idea of bonuses a bit much to be perfectly honest. Call me old-fashioned. You get a good salary to do your job as professionally as possible. Any bonus should only be a tiny bit on top for something that is really going beyond the call of duty, as it were.
If you are the owner of a business then by all means take the rewards of your hard work. But the difficulty with bonuses in banking is this - many started out as partnerships where they were the owners but then turned into corporates for all sorts of sensible reasons. But they kept the partnership mentality - and so bonuses were granted as if bankers are the owners of the business with the risks that go with that. But they're not and the risks have largely been borne by others when things have gone wrong - other employees, shareholders, customers and taxpayers. Bankers have wanted all the advantages of ownership with few, if any, of the downsides.
The cap and other regulatory measures have been attempts to correct that. But really what's needed is to go back to first principles: you're an employee, you get asked to do a professional job in return for a good salary. You do that. You don't get to behave as if you are an entrepreneur with all the risks and rewards of entrepreneurship. If you want to do that, off you go and try that.
You're more knowledgeable about these matters than me of course, but looking at the world of finance and indeed large corporations in general I would have said the real problem is our model of corporate governance is simply not working.
It is the job of shareholders to (a) ensure the board are operating correctly (b) that remuneration is set at the right level and (c) that managers and executives are held accountable for their actions.
And that simply isn't happening, largely because major corporations now appear to be mostly owned by other major corporations who all benefit from the lack of proper oversight and therefore want to keep it that way.
I don't have any easy solutions, and I can imagine anything I suggest might cause even more problems than it would solve. For example, giving individual voters the same weight regardless of the size of their shareholding would be an obvious way round it, but that would just make firms incredibly vulnerable to malicious interference. Or saying every bonus had to have the approval of 100% of shareholders before being paid, which would effectively mean none would be paid, but would hobble governance to a very great degree.
But wouldn't there be a case to start with that aspect?
I find the idea of bonuses a bit much to be perfectly honest. Call me old-fashioned. You get a good salary to do your job as professionally as possible. Any bonus should only be a tiny bit on top for something that is really going beyond the call of duty, as it were.
If you are the owner of a business then by all means take the rewards of your hard work. But the difficulty with bonuses in banking is this - many started out as partnerships where they were the owners but then turned into corporates for all sorts of sensible reasons. But they kept the partnership mentality - and so bonuses were granted as if bankers are the owners of the business with the risks that go with that. But they're not and the risks have largely been borne by others when things have gone wrong - other employees, shareholders, customers and taxpayers. Bankers have wanted all the advantages of ownership with few, if any, of the downsides.
The cap and other regulatory measures have been attempts to correct that. But really what's needed is to go back to first principles: you're an employee, you get asked to do a professional job in return for a good salary. You do that. You don't get to behave as if you are an entrepreneur with all the risks and rewards of entrepreneurship. If you want to do that, off you go and try that.
Oh good grief. Bonuses are awful things for staff, designed entirely for the benefit of the employer, not the employee. How can you can possibly have worked around bankers for this long and not understood this?
Bonuses do several things, none of which are in the interests of the vast majority of employees, even at top levels:
- They allow the firm to manage staffing costs in years where the overall firm has performed poorly - They trick people into working long hours, under the illusion that they'll get paid back at the end of the year, which never quite works out - They manage staff retention, since there tends to be some time between bonuses being earned and vested (eg: earned over the calendar year, but paid at end of March following annual reviews, so you can't quit between say July and March or you lose over half an annual bonus - probably more, depending on how long your notice period is - They encourage competitiveness amongst staff as there's generally known to be a limited "bonus pool" - They make total comp packages opaque when recruiting, since you won't actually know what you get until you've been in the job a while - By the same token, they make it harder for employees to benchmark compensation, both internally and externally
In short, bonuses are awful. It would be in the interests of all but the top few per cent of performers to just negotiate a fixed salary in advance that was a bit below salary plus target bonus.
I understand all of this very well indeed. Bonuses benefit a fortunate few. It is one reason why I think they are not generally a good idea, certainly not to the extent they have been entrenched in banking.
And to answer @ydoethur's point above, there are a whole range of measures which need to be taken. A proper look at the structure of banking, what works well, what doesn't etc is needed. Not just a "let's get rid of a horrid EU law and deregulate" approach. Because that is the sort of short-term thinking which has - in common with other issues - led to so many problems. And which this government risks repeating.
Better regulation is the answer. The idea that bonuses are not a good idea is normally a contention held by people who have not been in receipt of them. Very few people refuse them when offered, rather like highly paid public sector workers never refuse even higher pension benefits or early retirement. As David Coulthard said that the people who believe that money doesn't buy happiness are those who never had any. A little crass, but probably roughly true.
"Better regulation." Indeed. We should try it some time.
It was the Tories' turn left on economics more than their turn right on social issues that won their red wall seats. They will be out on their arse with this kind of reheated Thatcherism.
I am not so sure. We liked Thatcherism because it indulged our ambitious fantasies.
We may never get annualised bonuses of £5m per year over our careers as till jockies at Morrisons, but we can dare to dream!
Who knows, poor people can vote Tory just like rich people can vote Labour. But the argument about the left turn on economics being the main driver of red wall Labour to Tory switchers was something I picked up from a Tory pollster.
Sorry, but this thread header is unmitigated shit. The writer appears to be under the illusion that the financial services sector is a net negative and big bang and the deregulation of the 1980s was some sort of mistake. Its risible.
@Cyclefree knows rather more about the dirty of the UK financial services sector than you.
That superior knowledge would have zero bearing on the point you are replying to.
You can disagree with @cyclefree (which I do, frequently) but that doesn’t mean the article is “risible” or “unmitigated shit”
It has stimulated some interesting discussion. Which is what headers are meant to do.
I find the idea of bonuses a bit much to be perfectly honest. Call me old-fashioned. You get a good salary to do your job as professionally as possible. Any bonus should only be a tiny bit on top for something that is really going beyond the call of duty, as it were.
If you are the owner of a business then by all means take the rewards of your hard work. But the difficulty with bonuses in banking is this - many started out as partnerships where they were the owners but then turned into corporates for all sorts of sensible reasons. But they kept the partnership mentality - and so bonuses were granted as if bankers are the owners of the business with the risks that go with that. But they're not and the risks have largely been borne by others when things have gone wrong - other employees, shareholders, customers and taxpayers. Bankers have wanted all the advantages of ownership with few, if any, of the downsides.
The cap and other regulatory measures have been attempts to correct that. But really what's needed is to go back to first principles: you're an employee, you get asked to do a professional job in return for a good salary. You do that. You don't get to behave as if you are an entrepreneur with all the risks and rewards of entrepreneurship. If you want to do that, off you go and try that.
Oh good grief. Bonuses are awful things for staff, designed entirely for the benefit of the employer, not the employee. How can you can possibly have worked around bankers for this long and not understood this?
Bonuses do several things, none of which are in the interests of the vast majority of employees, even at top levels:
- They allow the firm to manage staffing costs in years where the overall firm has performed poorly - They trick people into working long hours, under the illusion that they'll get paid back at the end of the year, which never quite works out - They manage staff retention, since there tends to be some time between bonuses being earned and vested (eg: earned over the calendar year, but paid at end of March following annual reviews, so you can't quit between say July and March or you lose over half an annual bonus - probably more, depending on how long your notice period is - They encourage competitiveness amongst staff as there's generally known to be a limited "bonus pool" - They make total comp packages opaque when recruiting, since you won't actually know what you get until you've been in the job a while - By the same token, they make it harder for employees to benchmark compensation, both internally and externally
In short, bonuses are awful. It would be in the interests of all but the top few per cent of performers to just negotiate a fixed salary in advance that was a bit below salary plus target bonus.
And yet bankers don't do this. And that bias- chasing the unlikely megajackpot over the certain jackpot- is consistent with why the City gets into trouble from time to time. It's human nature, which is why the Lottery (ginormous top prize, but overall you lose) is more popular than Premium Bonds (in the long run you win, but the top prize is less showy). But it's not necessarily something to reward and magnify.
I think the game theory of bonuses is that they're a cheap way to motivate lots of people. Not the ones who get the bonuses, but all those below them in the hierarchy who think "if I work my socks off for a decade, I'll get promoted to a position to get a chance of a bonus like that."
Sorry, but this thread header is unmitigated shit. The writer appears to be under the illusion that the financial services sector is a net negative and big bang and the deregulation of the 1980s was some sort of mistake. Its risible.
@Cyclefree knows rather more about the dirty of the UK financial services sector than you.
That superior knowledge would have zero bearing on the point you are replying to.
You can disagree with @cyclefree (which I do, frequently) but that doesn’t mean the article is “risible” or “unmitigated shit”
It's a bit word salady isn't it? Why lead a piece about some people in the 2020s with a random precis of a book about some different people in the 1980s?
Which seems to completely miss the point btw. The key to the Lloyd's debacle is how dim everybody involved was. You did not have to be a genius to see that if you have syndicates cross-insuring each others' excess of loss you are straight into a vicious spiral. I don't see that point among the 13.
Bloomberg reporting now that the dollar strength is 'ripping' through markets and a well as the pound at $1.14 the euro is €0.9963
This is not just a UK problem as much as you seem to want to portray it as
Yes and no. USD strength absolutely is the main dynamic in FX right now. I would expect it to continue and think there is every chance that Cable will go to parity or close to it next year. But sterling has also lost ground against the Euro in recent weeks - probably because the ECB now shows more signs of getting real on inflation than the BOE does. And since late 2015 sterling is down about 20% against the Euro, because of... well we all know what.
I still have my Brexit portfolio on - dollar-weighted - which has mitigated some of the shocks of the past few months. I can see no reason to change in the near future.
It was the Tories' turn left on economics more than their turn right on social issues that won their red wall seats. They will be out on their arse with this kind of reheated Thatcherism.
I am not so sure. We liked Thatcherism because it indulged our ambitious fantasies.
We may never get annualised bonuses of £5m per year over our careers as till jockies at Morrisons, but we can dare to dream!
Who knows, poor people can vote Tory just like rich people can vote Labour. But the argument about the left turn on economics being the main driver of red wall Labour to Tory switchers was something I picked up from a Tory pollster.
Poor people can of course go and get a job in the City. Should they be motivated sufficiently. Otherwise, @Mexicanpete's point is well made indeed I made a similar one yesterday. It is all about aspiration. Maggie got this.
Random sample from the live stream (for @thart if he's still with us).
Asian woman White bloke (a rev as it turns out) White couple White woman White woman White woman White woman White bloke White bloke White woman White woman
OK I am prepared to say that the queue to pay respect is pretty white.
Don't like this double line business either. Would be well stressed if I was on the outer line.
It was the Tories' turn left on economics more than their turn right on social issues that won their red wall seats. They will be out on their arse with this kind of reheated Thatcherism.
Actually, this was exactly the kind of thing I expected post-Brexit and I said so at the time. It was well-signalled in advance by the likes of JRM and Farage that one thing the Kippers wanted was to stop the EU from "interfering" in some of their schemes.
So this was as inevitable as the sun rising......
The final act was always going to be about a final betrayal.
The first one happened ages ago when the EEA types were bagged off. But since their plan was a bit of a double cross anyway (vote Leave to get Brexit, then ally with Remainers to get their desired flavour) it's hard to feel that sorry for them.
Since then, Brexit has always been an uneasy alliance of walled garden types and buccaneers. The catch is that the walled garden vision is more popular in the country, but the buccaneers supplied the money for the campaign and the politicians now in charge.
Sorry, but this thread header is unmitigated shit. The writer appears to be under the illusion that the financial services sector is a net negative and big bang and the deregulation of the 1980s was some sort of mistake. Its risible.
@Cyclefree knows rather more about the dirty of the UK financial services sector than you.
Isn't the real dilemma this: The financial services sector in the UK (and no doubt worldwide) has exceedingly dirty and immoral elements. It is enclosed and privileged, legally protected and in many respects is a licence to print money for the few.
This is for two reasons: In the modern world it is essential - we can't do without it. It has made itself, like the internet, a basic utility.
Secondly it handles trillions all the time. Everyone in the sector knows that the way it makes money is that a miniscule rake of from a trillion is gigantic. 1% is £10 bn, 1% of 1% is £100m and so on.
Comments
This is not just a UK problem as much as you seem to want to portray it as
This all depends however on the bank having the correct incentive structure and the people in place to judge that it’s being done sensibly which isn’t always so.
One situation I witnessed personally in a bank I was embedded in before the crash was that the private bankers were incentivised for bonuses by increasing their book/revenue in three areas and one of these was the amount of client assets they directed into their in-house structured products.
Being separate from the bank’s incentive and salary structures I was able to watch with impartiality and most of the bankers were sensible but there was one particular arsehole who took the piss.
He was head of the private banking team that looked after the smaller clients - generally legacy grannies with up to a million on account.
Because he was obsessed with his bonus he started pumping all these old dears assets into 5 year structured products in 2007…. So old people mainly who had their wealth tied up for 5 years with big penalties for early withdrawal in instruments that were screwed by the crash.
He had absolutely no shame whatsoever and would sit in meetings with a big smug face when he was congratulated for putting millions into the in-house structured products.
I still to this day do not know why he wasn’t censured or the bank and I still see him swanning around, knowing he has a big property portfolio off the back of putting his bonuses before sense and decency and desperately want to drag him down an alley and give him a beating.
So I think bonuses have a place but the calculation has to be very careful and the oversight too - those who oversee the bonus distribution should be held liable if the bonuses are the result of bad unethical practice.
"Oh, sure, Jeff Bezos can abort things in Texas... everyone else has to go to New Mexico."
The incident is another reason not to fly (if you want to go suborbital) on the Virgin Galactic death trap - the Blue Origin system can fly unmanned, which means lots more testing and has a functioning, demonstrated escape system.
If there had been people on this flight they would be alive, and members of a small club.
So this was as inevitable as the sun rising......
And I know I've asked about bonuses when being interviewed for jobs in the past, and was often asked about bonuses when interviewing. Yet surely bonuses should be given for exceptional work, not as standard?
I also think there are two different areas here: low-level bonuses for staff at the lower levels, and humongous bonuses for the top staff. The former is easier to justify than the latter...
But that sounds so grubby…
And to answer @ydoethur's point above, there are a whole range of measures which need to be taken. A proper look at the structure of banking, what works well, what doesn't etc is needed. Not just a "let's get rid of a horrid EU law and deregulate" approach. Because that is the sort of short-term thinking which has - in common with other issues - led to so many problems. And which this government risks repeating.
People who work in social services might see the dirty or worst in parenting, but it doesn't mean that parents are a negative either.
They were surprised that when traders went over the profit limit, they started selling below the market price - which expanded the business, according to the definitions created.
You would expect that people would learn over time but a lot of people never seem to grasp the fact...
The fall in the Euro and the Pound vs the dollar is directly driven by this - the expectation of economic problems and the long term effects of borrowing large amounts of money to deal with the issue.
These low tables - you get them in coffee shops sometimes - always sadden me. They make consumption of food very difficult.
To me, that was a "Pope is Catholic" moment.
EDIT : It wasn't even really finding a way round the rules. They just used a very literal interpretation of the rules.
I suspect that it might not go down well except in the leafy shires of the retired.
We may never get annualised bonuses of £5m per year over our careers as till jockies at Morrisons, but we can dare to dream!
The University of Oxford has been rated the best in Britain, taking the top spot in a UK university ranking for the first time in 12 years and beating its rival Cambridge.
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/uk-university-rankings-revealed-the-times-league-table-dbxtwgm70
And that's without even factoring in the quality of our commas.
Pound to Euro exchange rate is presently €1.14
Pound to Euro exchange rate in October 2010 was ... €1.13
If they were getting pissy about 23 degrees I'd say a disciplinary would be in order, because most non-air-conditioned rooms (I.e. most rooms) in England must exceed that on a regular basis in summer.
There was a good Radio 4 programme about this last year, which seemed to want to start out celebrating the masters of the universe, and ended up quoting a large number of psychologists, and their studies of the dysfunctions and motivation of the very richest.
1.I don't think it is a net negative. It's precisely because I think it can do worthwhile things that I want it to operate well. That is why I do what I do.
2. I have done advisory work as well as investigations so I have seen a lot of good practice. Indeed as part of investigative work I have to know what is good to see how far others have fallen short. It's precisely because I know of some very good bankers and traders indeed that it infuriates me to see so many others taking the piss.
My general view is that we often learn best and the most from our mistakes. And so learning from what has gone wrong in this sector is key to making it work as well as it can and should.
I would be more relaxed about what the government is proposing if I felt this was its motivation. But somehow I doubt it.
Perhaps I will be proved wrong.
I think I’m quite relaxed about remuneration and bonuses in many respects but that really pissed me off and was very happy to have my independence from it.
Anyway, a presto.
I think the game theory of bonuses is that they're a cheap way to motivate lots of people. Not the ones who get the bonuses, but all those below them in the hierarchy who think "if I work my socks off for a decade, I'll get promoted to a position to get a chance of a bonus like that."
Which seems to completely miss the point btw. The key to the Lloyd's debacle is how dim everybody involved was. You did not have to be a genius to see that if you have syndicates cross-insuring each others' excess of loss you are straight into a vicious spiral. I don't see that point among the 13.
[immediately cable moves to 1.40...]
Asian woman
White bloke (a rev as it turns out)
White couple
White woman
White woman
White woman
White woman
White bloke
White bloke
White woman
White woman
OK I am prepared to say that the queue to pay respect is pretty white.
Don't like this double line business either. Would be well stressed if I was on the outer line.
Anyway, enough with queues.
The first one happened ages ago when the EEA types were bagged off. But since their plan was a bit of a double cross anyway (vote Leave to get Brexit, then ally with Remainers to get their desired flavour) it's hard to feel that sorry for them.
Since then, Brexit has always been an uneasy alliance of walled garden types and buccaneers. The catch is that the walled garden vision is more popular in the country, but the buccaneers supplied the money for the campaign and the politicians now in charge.
This could get messy.
resigned in disgust after only getting a £100 000 bonus.
This is for two reasons: In the modern world it is essential - we can't do without it. It has made itself, like the internet, a basic utility.
Secondly it handles trillions all the time. Everyone in the sector knows that the way it makes money is that a miniscule rake of from a trillion is gigantic. 1% is £10 bn, 1% of 1% is £100m and so on.
Is something happening?
The Obamas should live in Chicago. The city gave them much, and they abandoned it.
Here are some numbers on Chicago's largest problem: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crime_in_Chicago
You may want to compare them to London's just to give readers some perspective.
(The single number I find most distressing is this one from 2020: 45.6%.)