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Credit Suisse CEO Gottstein earns less than predecessor Thiam

March 18, 2021 at 02:37 am EDT

ZURICH (Reuters) - Credit Suisse Chief Executive Thomas Gottstein earned less than predecessor Tidjane Thiam in his first year in the role, the bank's annual report showed on Thursday, as the bank was hit in 2020 by a slew of legal and impairment headaches and as bonuses were also impacted by higher anticipated credit losses.

Gottstein, who became head of the bank last February after Thiam's abrupt departure, was granted 8.53 million Swiss francs ($9.24 million) in total compensation.

Gottstein has been trying to move Credit Suisse on from a string of bad headlines, spanning a spy scandal that ousted predecessor Thiam to a $450 million write-down on a hedge fund investment. The recent collapse of around $10 billion of funds related to British supply chain financier Greensill has put fresh pressure on him.

His awarded pay compared to 10.7 million Swiss francs Thiam was granted in his last full year at the bank. Thiam's pay had been cut 15% that year.

The report on Thursday showed Thiam was not compensated for the start of 2020.

"For 2020, no compensation payments were made to former Executive Board members who left Credit Suisse, which was also the case for 2019," the bank wrote in the report. "Further, no payments were made to former Executive Board members pursuant to non-compete arrangements."

Executives earned 12% less in total aggregate compensation in 2020, the report showed, while the bank's overall bonus pool fell 7% to 2.949 billion francs.

($1 = 0.9230 Swiss francs)

(Reporting by Brenna Hughes Neghaiwi, editing by Silke Koltrowitz)

Tidjane Thiam

Tidjane Thiam (born 29 July 1962) is an Ivorian businessman and former politician who is the Chief Executive of Prudential plc, the UK-based insurance group. Born in Côte d'Ivoire, he holds dual Ivorian and French citizenship. He studied advanced mathematics and physics in France before joining the management consultants [& Company] in 1986, where he worked until 1994. From 1994 to 1999 he worked in Côte d'Ivoire first as Chief Executive of the National Bureau for Technical Studies (BNETD), reporting directly to the Prime Minister and the President, and from 1998 as both Chairman of the BNETD and Minister of Planning and Development. Following the Ivorian coup of 1999, he resumed a private sector career and rejoined McKinsey in Paris from 2000 to 2002, then worked as a senior executive for Aviva before being recruited by Prudential. When appointed the chief executive of Prudential in 2009, he became the first black person to lead a FTSE 100 company.

His father, Amadou Thiam, a journalist, was born in Senegal and emigrated to Côte d'Ivoire in 1947. He supported Houphouet-Boigny in his fight for the independence of the country and served more than 10 years in the Ivorian cabinet after independence. He was a Grand Officier de la Legion d’honneur, France’s highest order of decoration. Tidjane’s uncle, Habib Thiam, was Prime Minister of Senegal for more than 10 years and also served as President of the National Assembly.

In 1982 Thiam was the first Ivorian to pass the entrance examination to the École Polytechnique in Paris. In 1984, he graduated from the École Polytechnique and in 1986 from the École Nationale Supérieure des Mines de Paris where he was top of his class. He received an MBA from INSEAD in 1988 (Dean's list). In 1989 he took a one-year sabbatical from McKinsey to participate in the World Bank's Young Professionals Program in Washington, D.C. He returned to McKinsey in 1990, working first in New York City and then in Paris. an infrastructure development and economic advisory body with more than 4,000 staff, reporting directly to the President and the Prime Minister. In that role, which had cabinet rank, he was also handling key negotiations with the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank. Thiam was also a key member of the Privatization Committee, in charge of privatising extensive state-owned assets.

Source @ Wikipedia

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