Posts by Bryan Liou
2nd Quarter 2026
Johnson Associates projects year-end incentives to vary across sectors Trends & Projections: “Year of the Bank” as results significantly outpace other sectors. Hedge funds capitalize on inflows and volatility. Traditional asset management higher on market appreciation. Fundraising challenges and delayed distributions plague private markets. Geopolitical turmoil and credit stress key factors in second half.
Read MoreJuly 2026 Webinar: Evolving Financial Services Pay Strategies
Location: Virtual Tuesday, July 28th | 11:00 AM ETBryan Liou and Chris Connors, Managing Directors at Johnson Associates, unpacked the top compensation and talent trends shaping financial services in 2026. Insights spanned private markets, hedge funds, asset management, wealth management, family offices, banks, and insurance.Topics addressed:Industry-specific trends and challenges across sectorsModern sales compensation designAI, talent, and…
Read MoreFinancial Services Compensation Webcast March 2026
Location: Virtual On Wednesday, March 18 at 11:00 AM ET, Johnson Associates presented its annual Financial Services Compensation Briefing. Alan Johnson covered where 2025 incentives ultimately landed across the industry, what the current environment means for carry and long-term incentive design, and how emerging structural forces like AI adoption may reshape compensation going forward.
Read More2026 Private Markets: Evolving Landscape and Compensation Outlook
Johnson Associates explores five forces that are reshaping the private markets industry, each of which has a direct impact on 2026 compensation and carried interest.
Read More2025 Public Financial Services Compensation Highlights
Johnson Associates’ annual financial services proxy review points to several market trends across the last three years. 2024 was the first year named executive officers at non-alternatives firms received carried interest awards. The firms that granted carry to NEOs in 2024 continued to do so in 2025. No new companies have initiated awards, though we…
Read MoreMove Over, Private Equity. It’s Great to Be a Banker Again
It is a golden moment for banks. Trading profits are at record highs, and so are employee bonuses. Mergers, acquisitions and other deals are piling up at the second-fastest pace in at least a decade, producing billions of dollars in fees. The good times for banks represent a flip of fortunes. Since the 2008 financial crisis, Wall Street’s biggest paydays…
Read MoreReplacing vs. Buying Out Carried Interest
Clients have increasingly asked how carry buyouts should work as employees change firms. We expect this trend to grow as exits slow and carry payouts become less certain. This short one-pager shows how a carry-for-carry trade compares to a cash buyout. The illustrative example walks through the trade-offs across timing, payout variability, vesting, and the…
Read MoreAsset Manager Team Compensation Set to Increase Despite Market Volatility, Uncertainty
Wall Street year-end incentives are expected to be flat to slightly positive across all sectors for 2026, despite geopolitical turmoil and stress in the credit markets, according to a report from Johnson Associates, a financial services compensation consultant. “I think certainly some of the gloss is off of private equity,” says Alan Johnson, founder of…
Read MoreWall Street Bankers on Pace for Big Pay Bumps in 2026 Amid AI Gold Rush
As the AI boom spurs activity across almost every corner of Wall Street, bankers are coming out on top in compensation hikes. “The big banks had a very good 2025. They’re doing at least as well, if not better, this year, and pay will be up significantly,” Alan Johnson, managing director of Johnson Associates, said in an interview. “They’re going to…
Read MoreDealmakers Tipped for 20% Higher Bonuses After Bumper First Quarter
Investment bankers working on big M&A and equity capital markets deals could be in line for 20% higher bonuses this year after a surge in first quarter revenue. “We do expect bigger bonuses this cycle, and they will be heavily skewed toward top-tier dealmakers,” said Chris Connors, a managing director at Johnson Associates. “There is real competition…
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