In his first four months at the Swiss bank, the Dutch CEO Ralph Hamers of UBS received a reward of 4.2 million Swiss francs, or nearly 3.8 million euros. That’s a lot more than he earned every year as ING’s CEO.
Hamers became a board member at UBS in september and has been at the helm of Switzerland’s largest bank since 1 november. He received 1.2 million francs in ordinary salary and 3 million francs in variable remuneration, such as bonuses. UBS increased the pot for bonuses by 24 percent to nearly 2.8 billion euros, after the bank performed better than expected in coronavirus year 2020.
His predecessor Sergio Ermotti at UBS received a total reward of 13.3 million francs in 2020. Ermotti becomes chairman of Swiss Re reinsurer.
In 2019, Hamers received a total reward of approximately 2 million euros at ING. In 2018, there was still a lot of fuss when the Supervisory Board of ING Hamers wanted to significantly increase its total remuneration to around 3 million euros. According to ING, the measure was intended to keep the salary at the top competitive and market-conform. But after fierce reactions in politics and society, the bank abandoned the plan.
By the way, there is a shadow over Hammers at UBS. As a former CEO of ING, he is being prosecuted for failing to supervise money laundering at the bank. Hamers led ING when in 2018 it was fined 775 million euros for negligence in combating money laundering. UBS has so far always expressed confidence in hammers.
