“You’ll hear about some multimillion-dollar trader that got some multimillion-dollar increase in pay while you got less pay,” Alan Johnson, president and founder of Johnson Associates, said in an interview. “You’re not going to be able to make everybody happy and, unfortunately, this year you’re going to make many people unhappy. There are limited funds in a terrible environment.”
Along with the bonus disappointments, Wall Street should also brace for job cuts of as much as 10%, Johnson said.
“They’re figuring out they don’t need as many people as they did even in February,” he said. “The pandemic makes this so much worse from a personal, societal standpoint. So there’s a hesitancy to do this quickly.” He expects the cuts to come in the fourth quarter and the start of 2021.
Bloomberg / August 10, 2020