Bonus time on Wall Street 💸

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Bonus time on Wall Street 💸

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Tuesday thought: I don't want to work on Wall Street but I would give my right arm to be invited to a big bank's holiday party in like, 1990 or so... Anyway, let's get into it.

By Allison Morrow

💉 'NO VAX REQUIRED'

Companies are throwing all kinds of perks at potential hires these days — higher wages, sign-on bonuses, unlimited vacation time and flexible scheduling. It's great news for workers.

But even with the perks, employers are struggling to fill positions, my colleague Alicia Wallace writes. Desperate, some managers are hoisting a three-word flag into the raging storm of American political discourse: "No vaccine required."

That phrase is popping up in job listings, sometimes emphatically in all caps and accompanied by exclamation marks, to appeal to people who might be turned off by vaccine requirements.

HIGH-RISK GAMBLE

For some business owners, it's philosophical; for others, it's desperation. Either way, it seems to be working.

For one business, Primal Life Organics in Akron, Ohio, adding "*NO VACCINE REQUIRED*" goosed its applications from single digits to 30 or 40, its CEO Trina Felber told Alicia. The "no vaccine required" amendment did come with a caveat: Any company policy related to the virus or vaccine could be altered "should the environment, mandates, or virus existence [change]."

And change they may: The Biden administration has proposed a series of federal regulations that compel private businesses with more than 100 employees to be fully vaccinated or, in some cases, undergo regular testing for Covid-19. The mandate was set to go into effect January 4, but it came under immediate legal challenge from Republican-led states and later by some liberal-leaning unions.

Regardless of whether the mandate goes through, offering a vaccine exemption is a considerable — potentially deadly — gamble, several economists and legal experts say.

"My suspicion is that these employers are probably facing hiring challenges, and they're throwing everything at the wall to try to get the workers they need," said AnnElizabeth Konkel, an economist at the Indeed Hiring Lab. "That's a very short-term bet with long-term consequences."

Generally speaking, mandating vaccines in the workplace is legal as is not requiring vaccines, one expert told Alicia. But not requiring them runs a higher risk of Covid-19 outbreaks and potential workers' compensation claims if they can show they were infected on the job. Read her full story here.

#️⃣ NUMBER OF THE DAY

$147 billion

Regular Nightcap readers by now may be sick of reading Rivian this, Rivian that, but stick with me real quick: Rivian, a company with $0 in revenue, is now the third most valuable carmaker in the world. The electric truck maker has been public for all of one week, but its share price has more than doubled in that time, valuing Rivian at around $147 billion — just ahead of Volkswagen ($139 billion), and in third place behind Toyota ($306 billion) and Tesla ($1 trillion). Shares surged 15% on Tuesday to $172 a share.

💰 BONUS TIME

Here comes one of those headlines that often makes me think, huh, maybe I should have gone into finance...

It is a fleeting feeling, always — I'm quite content watching the circus from outside the tent, thank you very much – but anytime I hear about six-figure bonuses I can't help but wonder…

Anyway, those who can hack it on Wall Street are in for a treat this year, with bonuses going up some 20%.

Why? The stock market is booming, unicorn startups are going public and companies are merging at a record clip, my colleague Paul R. La Monica writes.

Because of all that activity, investment banking advisers and equity traders are both expected to see 20% to 25% jumps in their bonuses compared with 2020, while stock underwriters could get bonus increases of 30% to 35%, according to Johnson Associates, a compensation consulting firm.

Let's talk turkey: Although the firm didn't provide data for exactly how big those payouts will be, we can make an educated guess. Employees at top Wall Street firms often generate six-figure bonuses on top of large salaries, especially in boom years like this one, Paul explains. At Goldman Sachs, for example, total compensation, which includes salary and bonuses, worked out to an average of $336,581 per employee during the first nine months of the year.

WHAT ELSE IS GOING ON?

🚫 More than 100 Activision Blizzard employees staged a walkout Tuesday, calling on the video game company's CEO to resign after a Wall Street Journal investigation said that the top executive knew for years about sexual-misconduct allegations.

🛍️ US retail sales rose 1.7% in October compared with the previous month — more than economists expected, and the biggest jump since March, when government stimulus fueled consumer spending.

🔗 The supply chain crisis isn't slowing down Walmart, which reported strong sales growth in its most recent quarter. The company also raised its annual sales and profit growth, a signal that it's expecting a strong holiday shopping stretch.

🍕 The Papa Johns brand got a makeover, dropping the word "pizza" and its singular possessive noun — it is now "Papa Johns" rather than "Papa John's." (Yeah, that'll totally make everyone forget about the former CEO's very public use of a racist slur three years ago...)

🐦 TWEET OF THE DAY

Abbott and Costello themselves could not have written a more perfect comedic dialogue. Click the image below to watch on Twitter. It's worth it, I promise.