It’s a cash crash!
With the economy still struggling, Wall Street workers are expecting the worst bonus season since the crash of 2008.
Wall Street compensation anaylsts estimate that the average bonus this year will be $101,000 — a 16.5 percent decline from last year and almost a 50 percent decline since 2006, when the average was $191,360.
‘‘I don’t think this year’s bonuses are going to be very good,’’ said Dan Shaffer, CEO of Shaffer Asset Management. ‘‘I don’t believe the typical bonuses, as we used to know them, exist anymore.’’
Last week, the downsizing continued. Citigroup moved to fire as many as 150 employees in its trading and investment-banking unit amid expectations of company-wide bonus reductions of as much as 10 percent.
Executives at JPMorgan, the largest Wall Street bank by assets, told Bloomberg that its bonus pool will be off by at least 2 percent. The analyst firm Options Group anticipates that almost one in five Street workers won’t get a bonus at all.
The cutbacks, which often account for a large percentage of a Wall Street worker’s pay, will have a ripple effect through the New York City economy — in the restaurant business, for example.
“Many restaurateurs are still grappling with the effects of Hurricane Sandy. It would have a cumulative financial impact on restaurants in the city,” said Andrew Moesel, spokesman for the New York State Restaurant Association. “Wall Street is one of the financial engines that drive this city.”
State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli noted, “Over the past few years the revenues generated from the securities industry have been declining as a percentage of city and state revenues.”
The overall bonus pool dropped 13.5 percent between 2010 and 2011, to $19.7 billion — money that spurs the local economy with spending and taxes. DiNapoli did not have an overall bonus estimate for 2012 yet but expected the number to be lower.
Alan Johnson, managing director of Johnson Associates, blamed the economic downturn, taxes and regulations.
“When we talk about bonuses, that is bonuses for people who have a job, because these firms are not hiring, certainly not here in New York, and the pay is only up marginally,” Johnson said.
“Firms are looking to [outsource and locate operations] in other parts of the world and to hire people [elsewhere] because New York is a pretty expensive, hostile place to do business.”
One trading veteran told The Post, “I know some people who were let go before end of the third quarter so they would not have to be paid a bonus this year — even on a pro-rated basis.”
The trader added: “Unless you are lucky enough to be in one of these business lines that made money this year, you might be getting more coal than money in your stocking.”