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NAB Chief takes $2.1m pay cut

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By Eliot Hastie
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3 minute read

National Australia Bank’s chief executive has taken a $2.1 million pay cut ahead of his appearance at round seven of the royal commission.

Round seven of the commission starts today with chief executive Andrew Thorburn set to face the commission at some point over the next two weeks. 

The NAB 2018 Annual Financial Report showed that Mr Thorburn took a $2.1 million pay cut in the year to September 2018.

The chief executive still made more than his major bank peers with a salary of $4.3 million but that was down from $6.4 million in the prior corresponding period.

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The report indicated that the NAB board considered Mr Thorburn to have performed well in the challenging environment but cited royal commission factors as the reason Mr Thorburn was not rewarded at the top of the bonus range.

“The group CEO has accepted accountability for NAB’s failure to fix mistakes quickly, remediate customers promptly and set things right,” it read.

The report said that the breaches of policy in the office of Mr Thorburn had impacted NAB’s reputation but had since been resolved.

“These failures have impacted NAB’s reputation. These matters have been resolved and closed to the board’s satisfaction,” it read.

The board awarded Mr Thorburn 45 per cent of his bonuses as it considered the positives of Mr Thorburn’s performance which included leading the transformation of the bank and developing a customer-centered culture.

The commission impacted the rest of the bonuses for NAB executives as bonuses were reduced by $114 million.

After the latest report, chief technology officer of NAB Patrick Wright is now the highest earning executive with a pay packet of $4.4 million.

Other banks executives have also taken a hit to their pay packages with CBA's chief executive Matt Comyn lossing $653,000 in 2018, Westpac's chief executive Brian Hartzer took a nine per cent cut from $5.5 million to $4.9 million and ANZ's chief executive forfeiting close to $1 million in 2018.