The head of the Jefferies Group was one of the better-paid chief executives on Wall Street in 2012, as the firm put a difficult period behind it.
Richard B. Handler, the chief executive of Jefferies, earned a total of $19 million for 2012, the firm said in a filing on Tuesday. That included a $5 million cash bonus and a $13 million long-term equity incentive award, on top of a $1 million base salary.
The board’s compensation committee was “unanimously impressed with our financial performance and Mr. Handler’s role in that performance,†Jefferies said in the filing. The board said that Mr. Handler was eligible for a bonus of $8.1 million but volunteered to take a smaller amount.
Jefferies reported profit of $71.6 million in the fourth quarter, an increase of 48 percent from a year earlier. It was the final independent earnings eport for the boutique investment bank, which is becoming part of the Leucadia National Corporation in a $3.6 billion deal. Mr. Handler is set to become Leucadia’s chief executive.
Mr. Handler’s pay package for 2012 was higher than that of Jamie Dimon, head of JPMorgan Chase, who earned $11.5 million, compared with $23 million a year earlier.
Mr. Handler got a significant raise from 2011, when he earned $14 million. That year, he declined to accept a bonus after a period in which investors feare! d for the firm’s health.
But those issues, which emerged in the wake of MF Global‘s collapse, appear to have largely receded. The firm’s shares rose more than 35 percent in 2012 and were virtually flat on Tuesday.
