CEO Compensation and Performance of Commercial Banks

Much attention has recently been directed toward the relationship between the performance of firms and compensation received by their respective CEOs. We assess this relationship for commercial banks, as regulatory and other industry‐specific conditions can cause the performance‐compensation linkage in the banking industry to differ from that of industrial firms. We find that the accumulated human capital of CEOs and the bank size are positively related to the total compensation (including salary, bonus, and stock options) levels of bank CEOs. We also find a positive significant relationship between bank accounting performance proxies and CEO compensation level for all time horizons. Finally, we find a positive significant relationship between market‐based performance proxy and bank compensation.