Financial Times cuts pay for top managers and editors by 10 percent

The Financial Times is cutting salaries for the top 80 managers and editors by 10 percent for the remainder of this year, while board pay will be cut by 20 percent.

Mark Di Stefano and Alex Barker of the FT report, “John Ridding, chief executive of the Financial Times, told staff in an email that the FT, which has 1.1m paying readers, had achieved ‘record levels of reader engagement and subscriber growth in recent weeks’. But he said the ‘exceptional performance’ could not offset ‘the sudden and severe revenue shocks’ to other parts of the FT group.

The ‘sizeable but easily lifted’ reductions to fixed costs would help the FT avoid redundancies, Mr Ridding said, adding that the group’s Japanese owner Nikkei had agreed ‘to protect all jobs this year’.

“Salaries for the top 80 managers and editors will be reduced by 10 per cent for the remainder of this year, while board pay will be cut by 20 per cent. The 2020 annual bonus scheme will also be suspended.

“The FT will also temporarily halve its pension contributions, matching staff payments into retirement plans rather than its usual practice of double-matching. Roughly 20 employees, all of whom are non-editorial staff who work outside the newsroom, will be put on paid leave.”

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