Hague bank under fire over large bonuses

Hague business bank NIBC offered its three top executives each a bonus of over a million euros if they stay at the bank for four years after it's IPO. The bonus is intended to guarantee the stability and continuity of the bank. Union FNV is furious, NOS reports.

Bonuses for the executives is customary in the event of an IPO, as a reward for a successful move to the capital market, according to the broadcaster. CEO Paul de Wilt will get a bonus of 1.5 million euros. And the CFO and CRO, Herman van Dijkhuizen and Reinout van Riel, will each receive 1.1 million euros. The bonuses will be fully paid out in shares in annual installments.

Union FNV is furious about these high retention bonuses. "You have to wonder under which stone the NIBC-top has been living the past few days", director Gerard van Hees said to NOS. "It reinforces the image that bankers are only concerned with their own salaries and not with customers or employees."

Bankers' salaries and bonuses are a sensitive topic in the Netherlands. Recently ING reversed a decision to raise CEO Ralph Hamers' salary by a million euros after an uproar from politics and the public.

NIBC is an investment bank for financial services and business finance, but also entered the consumer market a few years ago with residential mortgages and savings products. It was the first bank to ask for state aid in 2008 when the financial crisis hit. The state guaranteed a billion euros in loans because the bank could no longer get the money on the capital markets. NIBC repaid that money in two installments, one in 2011 and the second in 2014.

Approximately a third of NIBC's shares will be sold in this IPO. The bank hopes to raise 450 million euros.