Wednesday, May 9, 2012

Did Moynihan's pay really quadruple last year?

An oft-cited figure in today's Bank of America protests was that CEO Brian Moynihan had a more than four-fold raise last year, despite the company losing 58 percent of its stock price.

It's true, in a way. But Moynihan's pay actually decreased when you look at a more accurate representation of how the company rewarded his performance.

According to an SEC filing, Moynihan was paid $1.2 million in 2010, and $7.5 million in 2011. Those figures refer mostly to take-home pay, or cash and stock received in the calendar year. It also includes compensation granted for an earlier year not received until that year.

Bank of America also discloses its compensation decisions in its annual proxy document, or what the bank's board decides to award its executives based on the prior year's performance.

In that measure, the Charlotte bank reduced Moynihan's annual pay to $7 million for his work in 2011, down from $10 million for 2010. A piece of the award will pay out between March 2012 and March 2013, and a larger piece between March 2015 and December 2016, depending on how the bank's finances fare.

It'll still land Moynihan in the 1 percent, but it shows the bank's board did not think he deserved a raise this year.

1 comments:

DawnW said...

Of course this does not make the "big" headlines...wouldn't want 99% of the protesters to actually have facts about a topic.