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Morgan Stanley MDs: 199 new people earn $400k

As we reported earlier, one day after paying its bonuses, Morgan Stanley has promoted its managing directors (MDs). We don't have the full list yet - it's coming later, but let us know (using the email below) if you have it in the meantime.

As the chart below shows, at 199 people, this year's new MD list at Morgan Stanley is fairly special and the biggest since 2016 (at least). Morgan Stanley MDs are paid salaries alone of $400k each according to mandatory H1B visa data registration in the U.S.. Bonuses are many times larger still.

Who got lucky in this year's bonus class? While we don't have all the names, we do know that:

  • 33% of the new MDs are women (compared to 35% last year).
  • In the U.S., 10% of the class are Black, 6% are Hispanic, and 20% are Asian
  • In the U.S., the number of ethnically diverse MDs promoted is up 43% on 2021. 
  • 64% of MD promotes were in Americas, 23% in EMEA, 14% in Asia (last year, 65% of new MDs were based in the Americas, 18% were in EMEA ; 18% were in Asia).
  • Divisionally, 46% of the new MDs are in the Institutional Securities Group (the investment bank); 10% are in Investment Management; 14% are in wealth management and banks;  31% are infrastructure. Last year, 30% came from infrastructure and 48% came from institutional securities. 

Download our full salary and bonus survey here. 

Contact: sbutcher@efinancialcareers.com in the first instance. Whatsapp/Signal/Telegram also available (Telegram: @SarahButcher)

Bear with us if you leave a comment at the bottom of this article: all our comments are moderated by human beings. Sometimes these humans might be asleep, or away from their desks, so it may take a while for your comment to appear. Eventually it will – unless it’s offensive or libelous (in which case it won’t.

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AUTHORSarah Butcher Global Editor
  • Ci
    CitizenOfACorruptNation
    14 January 2022

    "...according to mandatory H1B visa data registration in the U.S..."

    You'll have to account for the fact that H-1B salaries tend to be lower than the market rate. An employer survey conducted by the GAO (GAO, 2003) found that some employers readily admitted to paying H-1B foreign workers less than comparable Americans, but noted that they were nevertheless paying the legally required wage (i.e., the "prevailing wage"), thereby illustrating that the latter is indeed below the market wage.

    The GAO found that, "some employers said that they hired H-1B workers in part because these workers would often accept lower salaries than similarly qualified U.S. workers; however, these employers said they never paid H-1B workers less than the required wage."[1]

    This jibes with a previous employer survey[2], commissioned by Congress, that found, "…H-1B workers in jobs requiring lower levels of IT skill received lower wages, less senior job titles, smaller signing bonuses, and smaller pay and compensation increases than would be typical for the work they actually did."

    So two employer surveys, one by the government and the other commissioned by the government, had employers actually admitting to underpaying their H-1B foreign workers. And the GAO shows that the employers admit that the prevailing wage, the legal wage floor for H-1Bs, is a joke. The data in the paper shows the underpayment statistically as well.

    [1] GAO-03-883, US General Accounting Office (Sept. 2003).
    H-1B Foreign Workers: Better Tracking Needed to Help Determine H-1B Program’s Effects on U.S. Workforce

    [2] National Research Council (2001).
    Building a Workforce for the Information Economy

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