RBS investment chief Hourican nets £4.8m in options sell-off
JOHN Hourican, the head of RBS investment banking division, yesterday pocketed £4.8m after selling shares in the state-backed bank.
Hourican, who heads its global banking and markets (GBM) division which has had to slash thousands of jobs, sold 17.6m shares at a price of around 27p per share, after exercising lucrative share options, a regulatory filing revealed.
The share options were granted to Hourican in 2009 as part of his bonus award.
Hourican, who was paid around £7.5m in 2011, faced pressure to give up some of his bonus award earlier this year after both RBS chief executive Stephen Hester and chairman Philip Hampton gave up their bonuses following a public outcry over the planned payments.
RBS has cut around 34,000 jobs since the 2008 crisis, and its GBM division has sold off or shut down much of its equities operations in order to focus more on its stronger fixed income and foreign exchange businesses.