Goldman bumps up 2023 pay for top three executives

NEW YORK (Reuters) -The pay of Goldman Sachs' top three executives jumped by an average of nearly 24% in 2023, the Wall Street investment banking company disclosed in a filing on Friday, even as its profit fell last year.

The compensation committee determined the pay based on factors such as decisive leadership that recognized the need to simplify the firm's strategy and a series of actions that narrowed the focus of the firm.

Since 2022, CEO David Solomon has significantly scaled back Goldman's consumer ambitions by selling assets such as financial technology lender GreenSky at a loss. He also shut down unsecured lending.

Last year Solomon earned $31 million, 24% higher than the previous year. President John Waldron earned $30 million, an increase of nearly 28% over the prior year, and CFO Denis Coleman earned $20 million, up 18% from the previous year.

The bank's profit fell 24% to $8.52 billion in 2023.

Compensation for top executives had fallen in 2022 after a sharp decline in dealmaking and losses on consumer banking.

The compensation for Goldman's top directors also went up in 2023.

The highest paid was Peter Oppenheimer, who received $565,683 in 2023, compared with $515,461 in 2022, the statement said.

(Reporting by Niket Nishant in Bengaluru and Saeed Azhar in New YorkEditing by Anil D'Silva and Matthew Lewis)