Barclays has shed light on the cost of hiring its new IT director from Australia, revealing he was handed £1.6m of shares last month.
The award of shares for Michael Harte is part of a package to buy him out from his pay arrangements at Commonwealth Bank of Australia, where he was chief information officer.
The disclosure is the first one by Barclays about share awards to Harte, whose total pay deals do not need to be published as he is not on the main board. However, because he sits on the executive committee set up by boss Antony Jenkins, any pay he receives in shares needs to be announced to the stock exchange.
It also seems likely that there will be future announcements about Harte’s share awards as the bank described the award as a “partial vesting of a buy out award granted to him in respect of awards he forfeited as a result of accepting employment with Barclays”.
The award of 614,418 shares was revealed in an announcement about stock handed to the members of Jenkins’ team. The share awards are to avoid the EU cap on bonuses which restricts variable bonuses to one times salary or twice, unless shareholders approve.
To ensure pay deals do not fall, bankers have been handing their staff a third payment – known as role-based pay – in shares. The quarterly payments to the 10 members of the executive team and Jenkins amounted to £2.5m. Jenkins received £240,000 and £174,000 went to Harte.
Jenkins, promoted in 2012 in the wake of the Libor rigging scandal, has been trying to restore the reputation of the bank. However, he has faced criticism for the decision in 2013 to raise bonuses even though profits fell – and then defending the move by saying he needed to avoid a “death spiral” of staff walking out.