Standard Bank defends high salaries to executives

Joint Chief Executive of Standard Bank Sim Tshabalala Image: Standard Bank

The issue of bank pay continues to invite objections nationally and globally‚ with increasing calls that variable remuneration‚ in particular‚ be capped as it is excessive.

Shareholder Activist Theo Botha also questioned bankers' pay at the Barclays Africa Group annual general meeting.

Standard Bank Group's remuneration policy had the least votes of the resolutions voted on. The policy was approved by 83.9% of the voting shareholders‚ with 16% against.

Botha asked why Tshabalala and Kruger‚ who are paid a different fixed pay amount‚ received an equal cash bonus of R9.4m when they were responsible for different divisions.

"We go through a detailed process to evaluate the CEOs' delivery," said Remuneration Committee Chairman Ted Woods.

Value judgment by Remuneration Committee

Chairman of Standard Bank's Remuneration Committee, Ted Woods. Image: Standard Bank

"We then have to make a value judgement of the pay for that value delivered. It is clear to me that certain shareholders‚ and I have talked to many in the last two weeks‚ do not agree‚ and others do agree‚ on our decisions of the linkage from the pay to the value they have delivered.

"But we are given by shareholders a task: to set the pay. This year it was our choice to equalise the pay to each one," he said.

Another shareholder‚ Mehluli Ncube‚ questioned the payment of almost equal salaries to two CEOs‚ saying Standard bank was "worse off" when it came to levels of pay.

The bank pointed out it was no longer paying the salaries of the three deputy CEOs who were employed under former Chief Executive Jacko Maree. It said it was satisfied with the joint CEO structure. "The last months that they (the joint CEOs) have been working together have not changed our views‚ in fact it convinces us that the decision we have taken was the right decision‚" said Chairman Fred Phaswana.

Last year‚ Standard Bank paid its executive directors and prescribed officers total fixed remuneration of R37.2m‚ compared with R38.3m in 2012.

Joint Chief Executive Ben Kruger

This excluded the R5.5m paid to former Executive Director Peter Wharton-Hood‚ who resigned in August last year‚ and which took the total to R42.7m.

The bank's remuneration report shows Executive Directors Kruger‚ Tshabalala and Simon Ridley were paid total fixed remuneration of R21.4m for the 2013 financial year. For 2012‚ executive directors' total fixed remuneration‚ for only Maree and Ridley‚ totalled R13.2m.

However‚ it spent R25m on the total fixed-pay of its three deputy CEOs (Tshabalala‚ Kruger and Wharton-Hood)‚ who were considered prescribed officers‚ and a fourth prescribed officer‚ Bruce Hemphill‚ the former Chief Executive of Liberty.

For the 2013 financial year‚ Standard Bank had three prescribed officers: Hemphill‚ David Munro and Peter Schlebusch. They received total fixed remuneration of R15.8m.

Standard Bank said it had recorded good growth in total income in the first four months of this year. However‚ there had been a moderate rise in bad debts because of a tough domestic environment for consumers.

It said the cost:income ratio was broadly in line with the same period last year.