It pays to be king of the Street.
Goldman Sachs is awarding a whopping $100 million payday to its chief, Lloyd Blankfein – for making a big killing while the rest of Wall Street’s banks got clobbered by their wrong-way bets.
It’s the second year in a row that Blankfein, 53, has won the paycheck derby as Wall Street’s highest-paid chief – nearly doubling his prior year’s $54.7 million compensation, also an industry record.
In December, Goldman said in an SEC filing that Blankfein would be awarded $67.9 million. But a Reuters review of regulatory documents filed yesterday found that his pay package jumped significantly thanks to the vesting of stock.
His pay package for 2007 breaks into two huge parts: basic pay and bonuses totaling $53.97 million and another $45.76 million windfall from the vesting of stock, according to the filings.
Other top executives at Goldman are also walking away with huge awards.
The two co-presidents – Gary Cohn and Jon Winkelried – will collect $66.9 million each. CFO David Viniar gets $56.9 million while Chief Administrative Officer Edward Forst collects $43.4 million.
Goldman Sachs has become the most profitable firm in Wall Street history by avoiding damaging losses from last year’s collapse of the junk mortgage market and its risky derivative securities.
Goldman’s top managers, led by Blankfein, are credited with wisely placing huge bets that the long housing boom would crash. They escaped potential billions in losses by also finding counter-parties to take their then-unusual bets just before the housing industry collapsed.
Their bold moves helped Goldman’s profit jump 22 percent, to a record $11.6 billion, or $24.73 a share, in fiscal 2007.
Blankfein was promoted to chairman and CEO in June 2006, replacing Hank Paulson, who left to become US Treasury Secretary.
In addition to 2007’s salary and bonuses, Goldman’s top executives also cleaned up on their side investments in private equity, venture capital and hedge funds managed by Goldman Sachs, filings said.
Blankfein’s profit from side bets totaled $11.1 million for the year. Cohn made $6.5 million, Winkelried got $2.2 million, and Viniar reaped $6.1 million.