At Bank of America, some equities traders would quite like bigger bonuses

It was Bank of America bonus day on Monday. Some of the bank's London equities EMEA equities professionals have since reached the conclusion that it was a poor start to the week.

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Bank of America declined to comment for this article, but multiple equities professionals at the bank in EMEA said they were hoping for big bonuses and their hopes were not met. 

It's possible that we spoke only to poor performers with unreasonable opinions of their own talents. Our pre-Christmas bonus expectations survey found that BofA people across all business areas were expecting bonuses to increase by an average of 60%. If so, they were destined for disappointment.

Nonetheless, the BofA equities traders and salespeople we spoke to today, insist their hopes were not unreasonable. "We smashed it last year," says one. "In EMEA we hit our budget for equities in September." This has not been verified by the bank.

Bank of America's global equities revenues rose by 23% in the last quarter of 2025 and by 16% during the year as a whole. This was good, but not great compared to the 33% and 28% full-year equities revenue increases at JPMorgan and Morgan Stanley respectively.

BofA's equities insiders say they were not, in fact, expecting a 60% increase in their bonuses and would have been happy with just 10-20%. Instead, many seem to have received increases substantially below this, with some middle and back office staff being zeroed. One EMEA quant said the average increase seemed to have been 2%.

Part of the problem appears to have been the unequal geographical distribution of revenues. US equities traders are thought to have done badly in the fourth quarter. Multiple insiders said European bonuses had been diverted to pay the US after the US subsidized EMEA bonuses in previous years.

Within equities, some areas did better than others from the bonus round. Structured products professionals and equity derivatives traders are thought to have been paid relatively well. Cash equities professionals are thought to have been paid badly.

Equity researchers at the bank have also been voicing complaints. One said the research bonus pool appeared to have increased only by single digits in percentage terms and considered analysts under-compensated relative to workload. Even researchers covering "broader energy and energy infrastructure, clean energy and the energy transition, defense and aerospace, healthcare services," had been paid poorly, he claimed.

A London research headhunter confirmed he's had "a lot of incoming" from BofA equity analysts interested in new roles. However, he also said it was unsurprising that pay was poor given low IPOs in Europe last year. "I don't think they understand the dynamics of research," he observed.

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