Disaster appears to strike before bonus day at VTB Capital

It’s not clear whether this applies equally to VTB Capital in Moscow, but it certainly applies in London and seems likely to be a cause of consternation among people who were expecting to receive their 2011 bonus in full this year.

One day before 2011 bonuses are announced, the Wall Street Journal says today that VTB Capital is planning a new deferral programme.

Under this programme, VTB’s bankers will receive a proportion of their 2011 bonuses in shares, deferred over three years. If they leave, those shares will be clawed back.

RenCap has long paid in deferred stock, but headhunters say deferred bonuses are unusual elsewhere in Russian banking, both in Moscow and elsewhere.

“If you join a Russian bank in London, it’s been quite usual to get all your bonus at once,” says Taru Oksman Ison at search firm Riverhouse Partners. “Deferrals have been unusual.”

“There are no regulations governing deferred bonuses in Russia,” says Olga Selivanova-Schoff, a partner at Heidrick & Struggles. “Unless you work for a foreign bank, it has been quite common to get all your bonus paid in one year.”

This could be about to change. Now that VTB is deferring bonuses over a three year period, Troika-Sberbank may follow. That will only leave small houses like Otkritie if you want your bonus paid all at once.