12.09.2012
By Simon Miller
Banks are too short-termist, chairman-designate of Barclays Sir David Walker told MPs today.
Speaking at the parliamentary commission into banks, Walker aid that investment bankers' focus on short-term targets was "hugely damaging" and favoured rules that would give more detail into how much bankers were paid.
He told MP: “The problem that I think has been most serious is not so much levels of remuneration, but the gearing of remuneration to revenue.
"The inappropriate incentivisation is accountable for a lot of what has gone wrong.”
Walker also predicted that there would be lower payouts in the future with returns on equity falling "which will not only put pressure on how much is available to pay out in remuneration, but also what is available to pay out in dividends".
Walker added that banks should be forced to publish details of pay bands and bringing in riles that senior executives could only sell some of their share awards once they retired but said that a European-wide pay cap was "very retrograde and to be resisted".
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