Most bankers in London are miserable about the size of their bonuses — but Goldman staff are the most annoyed

Daniel Goodman / Business Insider

LONDON — Bankers working in London were largely dissatisfied with the size of their bonuses at the start of 2017, according to newly released data from salary-benchmarking site Emolument.

The latest survey of finance workers’ bonuses, released on Friday, showed that even at firms where staff were proportionally pretty content with their bonuses less than 30% said they were “happy” with the amount of extra money they received.

Surveying over 1,600 bankers across London, Emolument found that only 16% of those working at Goldman Sachs described themselves as “happy” with their bonus in 2017, with Citigroup and BNP Paribas staffers close behind on 19% satisfaction.

The happiest bankers were at JPMorgan and RBS, although just 28% and 27% respectively described themselves as happy with their lot.

German giant Deutsche Bank was the bank where the highest number of staff were actively “unhappy,” with their bonuses, with 61% saying so. Credit Suisse and BNP Paribas were the only other firms with over 50% actual dissatisfaction.

The chart below shows Emolument’s complete findings:

Emolument

In the same survey, Emolument found that junior bankers in London who work for British-headquartered banks earned bonuses this year of just one-quarter what those working for American institutions in the UK earned this year.

Emolument found that analysts — the most junior full-time front office position — working for British lenders picked up an average bonus of £5,000 to top up their £50,000 salary. That compares to a £20,000 bonus and a £58,000 salary for workers at the likes Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan, and Morgan Stanley.