Wall Street Salaries Rose in 2011 for Most Workers, Survey Finds

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http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-04-04/wall-street-salaries-rose-in-2011-for-most-workers-survey-finds.html

Most Wall Street (S5FINL) employees got higher salaries in 2011, with the biggest bumps going to those at boutique banks and alternative asset managers, according to a survey by eFinancialCareers.com.

The online survey of 2,860 financial professionals found that 54 percent received salary increases -- excluding bonus -- and 40 percent reported no change from 2010, according to an e- mailed description of the survey’s findings. Workers at so- called bulge-bracket banks got an average increase of 3 percent, compared with a 14 percent gain for people at boutique banks and a 13 percent raise for those at fund managers.

When year-end bonuses were included, average pay last year fell for workers at companies including Goldman Sachs Group Inc. (GS) and JPMorgan Chase & Co. (JPM)’s investment bank amid declining revenue. As year-end bonuses dropped, some banks raised base salaries that in past years contributed just a fraction of pay for senior employees.

“Historically it’s always been about bonus, and now we’re seeing that salary is another tool that firms have,” Constance Melrose, managing director of eFinancialCareers North America, said in a phone interview. “The less variable component has become more important.”

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1. The point was to raise base salaries and decrease performance bonuses to disincentive excessive risk

taking.