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Citigroup has cut bonuses for its 250 top employees under a program that links their salaries to turnaround efforts aimed at boosting shareholder returns at U.S. Banks and correcting compliance shortcomings.
City’s so-called transformation bonus program was introduced three years ago to boost the group’s financial performance and encourage its risk and control system to improve after ordering regulators to take action after attracting attention that they accidentally wired 900mn.
Citi paid 53% to employees eligible for the program in 2024, according to a bank submission Tuesday. This is down from 94% in 2022 and 80% in 2023.
Payments for 2024 were strengthened by a rise linked to total shareholder returns over the lifetime of the bonus program.
The payment amount criteria include delivering targets set by the bank’s audit team and “timely execution” of a remedial plan created in response to a consent order agreed by the lender and the Federal Reserve in 2020, City said.
According to a filing on Tuesday, the bank’s compensation committee does not expect to continue its bonus program.
In signs of City’s ongoing operational issues, the bank was fined $136 million in September by US regulators for failing to correct long-standing issues in risk and data management. It also meant that last year 81TN would only send $280 to client accounts. This is an error that reversed after 90 minutes and was classified as a “near miss” by the bank.
In 2024, CEO Jane Fraser’s wages rose 33% to $34.5 million. She was not qualified for the transformation bonus open to around 250 top employees. Finance Chief Mark Mason’s salary increased 13% to $15.1 million.
Fraser attempted to address City’s longstanding operational and profitability challenges with a dramatic restructuring of the bank, fired thousands of employees and hired several well-known jobs, including bank chief Vis Raghavan.
Raghavan, who joined the company from JPMorgan Chase last year and just started his job in June, was paid $22.6 million in 2024 by his new employer, giving him the second highest wage among executives whose wages were disclosed in his application on Tuesday.
Citi’s profits rose 37% last year to $12.7 billion. However, the bank’s return on tangible common stocks, an important measure of profitability, was only 7%, with its 2026 target from 10% to 11%, lagging behind its peers such as JPMorgan.
