JPMorgan CEO Pay Surges 1,500% to $20.8 Million

After piloting the No. 2 U.S. bank through the financial crisis relatively unscathed, JPMorgan Chase & Co. (NYSE:JPM) Chief Executive Officer Jamie Dimon is now being extremely well rewarded.

Dimon's total compensation jumped nearly 1,500 percent to $20.8 million in 2010 from $1.3 million a year earlier, based on the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission's compensation formula, a regulatory filing showed.

Dimon did even better in terms of the value of money and shares actually received: his salary, bonus and stock and options from grants made largely in previous years that were actually exercised in 2010 were worth around $42 million.

By way of comparison, real median U.S. household income was just $49,777 in 2009, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.

Large pay packages for bankers who oversaw transactions that brought the world economy to the brink of collapse in 2008 have become a flash point for investors.

Anger has eased, but banker pay remains a sensitive issue, especially toward lenders that took taxpayer bailout money.

Many analysts view JPMorgan as the healthiest of the largest U.S. commercial banks, having skirted the worst of the credit losses that hurt many rivals including Bank of America Corp. (NYSE:BAC) and Citigroup Inc (NYSE:C).

They credit the 55-year-old Dimon, who became chief executive on Dec. 31, 2005, for having enabled JPMorgan to quickly repay its $25 billion of bailout money.

JPMorgan is also one of the first big banks to raise its dividend after passing a second Federal Reserve "stress" test.

However, Dimon has criticized regulatory reforms by the Obama administration, saying they could crimp growth.

In his annual shareholder letter posted on the bank's website, Dimon said JPMorgan could earn $22 billion to $24 billion in a "more normal" environment, up from $17.4 billion in 2010. He said profit has fallen short because mortgage losses have been "extraordinarily high," at $4 billion a year and that such losses will remain "elevated" for a while.

THREE YEARS TO SELL HOME

Dimon's 2010 salary remained at $1 million. He was also awarded a $5 million bonus, nearly $8 million in stock awards and $6.2 million in option awards, according to the SEC's compensation formula.

His 2010 compensation also included $579,624 worth of perks, including $421,458 of "moving expenses," $95,293 to use company aircraft and $45,730 for personal automobile use. Most of the rest went towards home security.

Like many Americans who have had trouble selling their homes, Dimon did too. The moving expenses relate to the sale in 2010 of Dimon's Chicago-area home, in which he had lived while heading Bank One Corp that was sold to JPMorgan in 2004.

Dimon put the home up for sale in 2007 when his family moved to New York.

Dimon's total compensation in 2010 fell short of the $35.8 million he was awarded in 2008, according to the SEC formula.

Goldman Sachs Group Inc (NYSE:GS) Chief Executive Lloyd Blankfein saw compensation jump to $14.1 million in 2010 from $1 million, another regulatory filing shows.

Other bank CEOs had lower compensation in 2010. Wells Fargo & Co's (NYSE:WFC) John Stumpf saw compensation fall to $19 million from $21.3 million. Bank of America's Brian Moynihan saw compensation fall 70 percent to about $1.9 million, although in early 2011 he got a $9.1 million bonus.

Citigroup CEO Vikram Pandit's compensation was $1 in 2010, but his salary alone has risen to $1.75 million in 2011.

JPMorgan shares closed down 0.5 percent at $47.40 on the New York Stock Exchange on Thursday.