Europe’s richest central bankers – and Ireland isn’t among them

Mario Draghi may be first among equals in the European Central Bank's Governing Council, but he certainly isn't the best paid.

The central bank governors of Belgium, Italy and Germany make more than the ECB president's annual €386,000, data compiled by Bloomberg show. Belgium's Jan Smets took the crown with about €480,000, almost six times as much as bottom-of-the-list Vitas Vasiliauskas of Lithuania.

Ireland's Philip Lane makes €250,000, putting him about mid-way in the league table of twenty countries.

There's little obvious pattern to governors' pay – Belgium's economy is barely one eighth the size of neighboring Germany's, yet Smets earns 10 per cent more than Bundesbank President Jens Weidmann. Cyprus, one of the region's smallest economies, pays its central-bank chief more than does Spain, the fourth-biggest.

Wealthiest nations

Luxembourg, one of the wealthiest nations in the currency bloc for GDP per head, ranks relatively low down the list. Gaston Reinesch received €181,000 in 2015.

The story is similarly divergent outside the euro area. While Bank of England Governor Mark Carney earns £480,000 (€562,000) plus housing benefits, his counterpart at the US Federal Reserve, Janet Yellen, made $199,700 (€188, 000) last year. Thomas Jordan's salary at the Swiss National Bank was 876,500 francs (€817,000) – and he also gets an annual train pass.

Still, central bankers’ pay checks pale in comparison with those of the banking executives whose businesses they oversee. Deutsche Bank chief executive officer John Cryan – who gave up his 2015 bonus – made €1.9 million last year, while his counterpart at BNP Paribas SA, Jean-Laurent Bonnafe, received a compensation package of about €3.5 million.

Bloomberg