The bonus prospects this year have brought despair to the staff of many leading banks. According to a study, the expecting payouts are less than the previous year.

The bonus prospects this year have brought despair to the staff of many leading banks. According to a study, the expecting payouts are less than the previous year.

A survey of 20 of the big City banks has found 55% of the staff expecting smaller payouts. Employees at the Bank of America and Merrill Lynch appeared to be pessimistic, with only 7.1% and 7.7% of the respondents respectively hoping for a bigger payout.

According to a research conducted by a financial website hereisthecity, the staff at WestLB also seemed to be pessimistic, where only 5.4% of respondents hoping for a bigger payout than last year in comparison to the 63.7% respondents who were getting ready for less payout.

The credit crunch that is getting the global markets in its grip is being led onto some severe belt-tightening, along with redundancies that have been announced already. With the times getting hard, the primary weapon for the investment banks is cutting bonuses, this accounts for a huge proportion of the total expenses.

City workers have provided record performances this year in the field of mergers, equities, fund management and acquisitions; this explains the employees' expectations of receiving good payouts.

Following the survey, among the most optimistic were the staff at Goldman Sachs, with 27.1% of the employees expecting a bigger payout this year. However, a small 2.4% thought that they would be receiving a smaller payout. Among the others who are opposed to the pessimistic viewpoint are the employees of banks, like ABN Amro, Nomura and Dresdner Kleinwort.

The Centre for Economics and Business Research has foretold that there would be a 20% drop in the payouts from £8.8 billion to about £7 billion.