Which banking sector expects the biggest bonuses after 2025?

On average, the 2,000 financial services respondents to our Bonus Expectations survey expected their bonuses to increase by 50%. But that number obscures a lot of details - that bankers at DBS expect much higher bonuses than bankers at Barclays, for example. And there was also a big difference in our survey between how front-office, middle-office, and back-office professionals expected their bonus to change.

Click here to join the bubble by eFinancialCareers, our new anonymous community. ✍️

Although everyone who responded is hopeful of being paid more this year than last, employees in backs and middle-office functions of finance and operations were most optimistic. Finance includes audit and treasury services. These professionals expected their bonuses to almost double after 2025.

“I will get 150% [more],” announced one respondent to our survey – a Citigroup operations VP based in Asia. He also said he was confident in his job.

Not all were so optimistic, however. “It will be performance-based,” said a US-based JPMorgan operations VP, “which is completely unacceptable. The financial industry is not fair to middle management.” 

Research professionals in banks are least optimistic about coming bonuses, but still expect an increase of 38% compared to last year. “Management is glad the way the research department cut resources and aligned itself with the broader strategy,” said an HSBC associate in Asia. He expected a bonus increase of just 30%. “In the internal survey, the whole markets team, including research, has shown displeasure over pay and wellbeing,” he said. Despite that, he noted that the tone from management was “not so confident.”

Despite a strong year in M&A, investment bankers (professionals in M&A and capital markets) are more moderate in their bonus expectations than finance and operations professionals. Equity capital markets bankers are particularly optimistic and expect their bonuses to rise by an average of 67%. Others are less certain. “Single digit increase, if any,” said one M&A VP in London. He also said he was looking for a new job that could offer a higher bonus.

Have a confidential story, tip, or comment you’d like to share? Contact: +44 7537 182250 (SMS, WhatsApp or voicemail). Telegram: @SarahButcher. Signal: sarahbutcher.22  Click here to fill in our anonymous form, or email editortips@efinancialcareers.com. 

Bear with us if you leave a comment at the bottom of this article: comments are moderated intermittently by human beings. Sometimes these humans might be asleep, or away from their desks, so it may take a while for your comment to appear. You must take sole responsibility for comments you post on this site. We will take reasonable steps to weed out anything that we consider to be offensive or inappropriate.