The bonuses paid to top ranked bankers at Dutch financial institutions last year were almost unaffected by the crisis, according to research by the central bank and quoted by the NRC.

Bankers who earned more than €1.5m a year got bonuses equal to over 300% of their salary in 2007 and 2008, the central bank said. Such big pay-outs conflict with an agreement on bonuses worked out between the bank and the financial services sector watchdog AFM.
But members of the board saw their bonuses go down sharply. Some 43% did not get any performance-related pay-out at all, the research, carried out at 27 institutions, showed.
A spokesman for the Dutch banking association NVB told the Financieele Dagblad the expected drop in the size of banking bonuses would begin to be felt this year.
He pointed out that Dutch bankers are paid well below those in other countries. In Britain, for example, the average top banking pay package amounted to €500,000, compared with €300,000 in the Netherlands and €375,000 worldwide.