On Monday, New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo asked eight of the nation’s largest banks that received significant federal aid under the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) to provide information on the amount of 2009 bonus packages and their structure.
Cuomo also asked the banks to explain the effect bonus pools would have had if banks had not received TARP funds.
The eight TARP banks that have received Cuomo’s letter asking for bonus information are Bank of America Corp. (BAC), Bank of New York Mellon Corp. (BK), Citigroup Inc. (C), Goldman Sachs Group Inc. (GS), J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. (JPM), Morgan Stanley (MS), State Street Corp. (STT) and Wells Fargo & Co. (WFC). Cuomo has asked the TARP banks to provide the bonus information by Feb 8.
According to Cuomo, the full disclosure and transparency of the bonus information are essential as recent government actions have given rise to public accountability issues and TARP banks are struggling with these actions.
Cuomo also said that though the banks have repaid most or their entire TARP loan and still became profitable, many of these banks would have found it difficult without TARP. The banks are now comfortable as the taxpayers gave them financial support during the height of the financial crisis.
Officially, in the first nine months of 2009, the TARP banks have set aside $112 billion for compensation. Therefore, the total annual compensation for 2009 could exceed $150 billion, slightly lower than the record $164 billion paid out before the financial crisis in 2007.
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Read the full analyst report on “STT”
Read the full analyst report on “WFC”
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