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Roula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.
City workers anticipate a doubly lucrative bonus season this spring, as payouts are set to be boosted by new rules allowing senior staff faster access to more of their money.
The coming bonus round will be the first to reflect regulatory changes that cut the length of bank bonus deferral periods. These were introduced last October, relaxing rules introduced after the financial crisis.
This has added to a broader mood of optimism among City professionals working in the financial sector and beyond — but how might your own payout measure up?
For the fifth successive year, the Financial Times bonus survey is asking readers confidentially to share their bonus round expectations and whether they intend to invest, save or spend any cash they are awarded.
The anonymous survey takes less than three minutes to complete, and can be accessed via this link.
“Despite all the uncertainty around tariffs, 2025 turned out to be a fantastic one across most markets, although returns were quite concentrated,” said Jason Hollands, managing director of Evelyn Partners, noting the strong performance of big tech, banking and commodities stocks, which bodes well for payouts in those sectors.
While UK tax professionals and wealth managers have seen strong demand for financial advice services in the wake of two difficult Budgets, fund managers have had a tougher time as passives continue to outperform. “For the City’s ecosystems of investment bankers, lawyers and consultants, the weak state of the UK IPO market has been a headwind on lucrative fees,” Hollands added.
Bankers holding share awards deferred from previous bonuses are expected to be especially favourably positioned. “The biggest factor this year is a lot of deferred stock is now looking much healthier given the run up in bank share prices,” said Adam Walkom, co-founder of Permanent Wealth Partners. Shares in NatWest, Barclays and HSBC have all increased by 50 per cent or more over the past 12 months.
“As senior level bonuses tend to be made up of a lot of stock, there’s a lot of profit to potentially take, which is keeping financial advisers busy and will no doubt be good news for the pubs and bars of the City,” he added.
More readers may seek to maximise salary sacrifice on their pensions contributions before restrictions announced in November’s Budget kick in, as well as changes to limit the tax advantages of venture capital trusts (VCTs). With an extended squeeze on income tax thresholds, readers will also have a chance to tell us anonymously if they are considering relocating overseas to boost their pay prospects.
In last year’s poll of FT readers, more than half reported receiving a bigger or substantially bigger payout than the previous year, but complained they were having to work harder for their bonuses as a result of tax increases and altered performance metrics.
The results of the anonymous poll will be collated and published in the coming weeks. Please ensure your answer reaches us by the deadline of Sunday February 8, and direct any queries to our usual email address, money@ft.com.
