Jefferies has more top bankers in London, but it's paying them less
American bank Jefferies might be contemplating a potential acquisition by SMBC, its Japanese partner, but there’s one group of people within the bank that are probably concerned about other things: its most senior British bankers.
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Pillar 3 disclosures for Jefferies International Limited, the American bank’s main London subsidiary, offered some insight. It details compensation for the firm’s material risk takers (MRTs), a regulatory invention that refers to employees whose “professional activities have a material impact on the risk profile of the firm,” as well as all those that earn over £660k. With those thresholds, it essentially covers all managing directors in and investment bank, and vast swathes of its sales & trading professionals.
For the year ending 30 November 2025, Jefferies paid its MRTs an average of £1.3m ($1.7m). Of this, £617k ($820k) came from fixed compensation (salaries), and £696k ($926k) came from variable compensation (bonuses).
This was a decline on the amount it paid in the year before that. For the year ending 30 November 2024, Jefferies’ MRTs earned an average of £743k ($988k) in fixed compensation, £753k ($1m) in variable compensation, and £1.5m ($2m) in total compensation. That means pay is down 17% and 8% for fixed and variable compensation, and 12% down overall.
At the very least, Jefferies paid better than it did in 2023. For the year ending 30 November 2023, its average fixed compensation to MRTs was £715k ($951k), and its average variable compensation was £270k ($360k). Total compensation was therefore £985k ($1.3m).
Jefferies had 54 MRTs in its London office as of November 2025, including its senior management team. It had 47 in 2024 (and 2023). Unlike other banks, Jefferies does not disclose how many of its MRTs are specifically involved in investment banking. This might be related to the bank’s size.
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