Morgan Stanley compensation ratio to fall

At first blush, Morgan Stanley's (MS) compensation-to-revenue ratio looks shockingly high. At Goldman Sachs (GS), compensation accounted for 36 percent of its $45.17 billion in 2009 revenue, the lowest annual ratio ever for the company. At JPMorgan (JPM), the bank set aside 33 percent of its investment banking revenues for compensation. Bank of America's (BAC) ratio was about 20 percent. But at Morgan Stanley, the compensation to revenue ratio was a whopping 62 percent for 2009. You would have to think the bank will lower that.

According to Reuters, CEO James Gorman has noted that the bank has expanded via the Morgan Stanley Smith Barney joint venture and that the bank has beefed up its investment management unit, and reshuffled the leaders of its institutional securities group. For whatever reason, those divisions had higher compensation ratios. Gorman says he expects the ratio to trend lower between 2010 and 2012.

For more:
- here's an article

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