Arrears for two years – Newspaper Kommersant No. 198 (7399) dated 10/25/2022

The common joke about working for food, as it turned out, almost turned from humor to sarcasm for a rather long list of top managers of Russian state-owned companies.

Kommersant’s sources claim that the government, which for several years nurtured the idea of ​​limiting the remuneration of corporate executives (the last two years – within the framework of a special working group led by Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Grigorenko), put it into practice.

It was assumed that the ceiling for salaries, bonuses and other payments would be three times the amount of the salary of Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin, that is, about 30 million rubles. The total amount of restrictions on the market is not specified, but it is obvious that for each large state-owned company as a whole it will amount to several billion rubles, and more than a dozen people will fall under the restriction, taking into account subsidiaries.

Moreover, Kommersant’s interlocutors say that in addition to state-owned companies, banks fell under salary cuts, and the state did not stop at introducing a limit, but also decided to recalculate income for two years. That is, in fact, top managers can be left practically without salaries and remuneration for about a year. Such prospects, Kommersant’s sources assure, have caused “a wave of layoffs among the tops.” According to them, the resignations were recorded in Transneft and Russian Railways, “turnover began in banks.”

The companies themselves unofficially confirm information about the restrictions and recalculation of remuneration, but do not associate the dismissal of top managers with this.

So, in banks, decisions to leave leadership positions are “more often made due to imminent sanctions”, in the energy sector they talk about “already low incomes”, and in the oil and gas industry they complain that the tops still have nowhere to go.

Experts also confirm this idea, noting that the moment for the introduction of restrictions was generally well chosen. Thus, the head of the board of directors of the TopContact agency, Artur Shamilov, believes that in the current situation, top managers have nowhere to go, so the loss of personnel for companies and banks will be minimal.

He estimates the rotation due to the reward limit at around 10% for a year and a half. According to the expert, from the point of view of the consolidation effect in the country, this is a good step on the part of the government, which, moreover, will give way to young leaders. Oil and gas companies confirm that people from the regions who agree to lower salaries are increasingly being hired for leadership positions.

However, not everything is lost for the top management of state-owned enterprises and banks, because exceptions are expected by order of President Vladimir Putin, and, as the market suggests, there is always an opportunity to receive bonuses in other ways.