Nedbank CEO Mike Brown. File: Simphiwe Mbokazi/ Independent Newspapers
Mike Brown, who departs as Nedbank’s CEO next month, saw his executive pay increase 6.3% to R46.42 million in total for the financial year to December 31, 2023 after all the bank’s announced targets were met during the year, the annual report showed.
His guaranteed pay increased 5% to R10.41m, the short-term incentive award at face value increased by 8% to R18.28m, while the long-term incentive award was worth R18m at face value, up from R17m the previous year.
The executive at the bank to receive one of the biggest pay increases last year was Dr Terence Sibiya, group managing executive: Nedbank Africa Regions. His total remuneration increased 16.5% to R24.09m.
Dr Sibiya’s division performed particularly well last year, with the annual report noting “Excellent performance from SADC operations with HE (headline earnings) up 80% to R662m.”
Brown, who took over as CEO from Tom Boardman in 2010, said in the report: “We met all of the 2023 targets that we announced as our post-Covid-recovery targets in March 2021, being DHEPS above 2 565 cents, ROE above 15%, and cost to income below 54% ... Our focus now shifts to our medium- and long-term targets and, in particular, ongoing improvements in ROE to meet our 17% target in 2025.”
The bank, which has over R1.3 trillion of assets and some 7.3 million active clients, announced the appointment of Jason Quinn as CEO-designate in November last year. Quinn starts his employment at Nedbank next month and becomes CE at the annual meeting scheduled for May 31, 2024.
The remuneration voting outcome for the Remuneration Policy and Implementation Report fell just below the 75% level on the implementation vote in the 2023 annual meeting, which was attributable to the position of one large shareholder who did not vote in favour of the Implementation Report in the year (2022) following their vote against the Remuneration Policy in 2021.
It voted against the 2021 policy because not all the long-term incentive (LTI) awards were 100% performance-based in the particular year. LTI awards from 2023 are all 100% performance-based.
Brown said in the annual report that no findings were made against Nedbank in the Zondo Commission reports, but it was recommended that some transactions involving Nedbank and Acsa and Transnet, where Regiments had acted as appointed financial advisers to Acsa and Transnet, be subject to further investigation.
He said Nedbank continued to co-operate fully with various further enquiries and investigations on these transactions and nothing had come to Nedbank’s attention that would change its view that there was no evidence of any wrongdoing, collusion or corruption by Nedbank or any of its employees and that, if these transactions were tainted by corruption on the part of Regiments, their clients or employees, Nedbank was unaware of this at the time of the transactions.
“Our fees and returns were market-related and all legal documentation and authorisations for the transactions are in place. Given this position, we will strongly defend any litigation that may be brought against us.”
BUSINESS REPORT