It had been a bumper year for the INI Group1, 2014 had produced record profits, which quite naturally went hand in hand with hugely generous rewards for its directors and staff. The same went for the bank’s property funds which were riding on all time highs in London’s prime and super-prime property markets. Never had the capital seen such a boom as commercial and residential property developments sprouted like mushrooms along the banks of the Thames.
The New Year celebrations continued as the bank’s heads: Michael Fitzwilliams, Sergei Tarasov and Pat Kennedy were showered with rewards. Shareholders saw a rise in dividends and share prices rose with the stock market. Hedge fund managers like Tom Barton hit the jackpot. Young up-and-coming faces like Liam Clancy pocketed mind bogglingly bonuses.
All in all INI, in spite of the problems brewing in Moscow, had never had it so good. In its short existence it had become a shinning star among the one hundred and fifty banks in the City’s financial cosmos, which included the five large retail banks, private banks, investment banks or trusts of different kinds, as well as small Punjabi, Turkish or Chinese banks. Beyond those there were many more structures present, but which were incorporated outside the European Economic area, and authorized, or not, to accept deposits.
To the masses of ordinary commuters that poured into Liverpool Street, Fenchurch Street and London Bridge railway stations every morning on the way to their desks in the City’s vast financial machine, the men who ruled over them were gods, all but invisible, that is apart from photos in brochures and company magazines, and the rewards bestowed on them were fit for gods, akin to the treasures of heaven.
Those at the summit, the Fitzwilliams’ and Tarasovs, counted their gains in tens of millions, paid for by speculative investment in property, commodities, the rise and fall of markets, Forex dealings, gold, and of course the management of wealth funds designed to further enrich the already fabulously rich individuals who controlled the companies that pumped oil, mined gold, diamonds, copper, iron ore, bauxite and other minerals, or failing that pumped their respective countries and fellow citizens for all they were worth.
London
In the pantheon of winners stood Tom Barton, who banked over ten million a year, a prodigious sum of money, guaranteed by the terms of his generous earnings related contract as head of the very successful Europa Property Fund. Even junior managers such as Liam Clancy, the young protégé of Pat Kennedy, pocketed a cool half a million pounds a year.