In the last week, it has been reported that Standard Chartered has launched “accountability reviews” to discover whether bonuses can be recovered from any employees found to be responsible for breaches of compliance and risk-management rules.
Apparently some bonuses have already been clawed back by the bank and it stated that it would do so again for “clear-cut cases of malfeasance” or “gross negligence”. The bank appears to be going for reduction of awards that haven’t yet vested (malus) before seeking to recover awards that have already been paid out (true claw-back).
So it appears that claw-back, long argued for by various investors, is beginning to bite (or perhaps that should be grab?).