MB Financial rejiggers CEO Feiger's pay to meet TARP rules

(Crain’s) — MB Financial Inc. CEO Mitchell Feiger will see his salary jump 58% to $1.1 million next year as the Chicago-based bank holding adjusts senior executives’ pay to reflect the inability to pay bonuses, a restriction the federal government imposes on lenders participating in the bailout program.

In addition, Chief Financial Officer Jill York will get a $156,000 raise to $450,000, the bank disclosed in a Securities and Exchange Commission filing late Monday.

The bank is trying to inject a performance-based component into the pay raises by making 60% of the increases in company stock. That stock vests immediately, but can’t be sold for at least two years under contracts with Mr. Feiger and Ms. York.

Mr. Feiger made $1.5 million in total compensation in 2008, receiving $629,000 in salary and no bonus. The rest was in options, stock awards, pension contributions and miscellaneous benefits, according to filings. Ms. York saw $675,953 in total 2008 compensation, $294,000 of that in salary and no bonus.

Through the first nine months of this year, $14-billion-asset MB Financial reported a net loss of $24 million, or 58 cents per share, on loan losses. But MB Financial’s capital position is secure, and it has been the most active acquirer locally of failed banks in lucrative deals with regulators.

Under the Troubled Asset Relief Program, in which the Treasury Department bought preferred shares from lenders, the participating banks aren’t allowed to pay bonuses to their highest-paid employees. Instead, any bonus payments must take the form of long-term restricted stock awards.

That’s provoked concerns among these banks’ leaders that they will be at a disadvantage in attracting and keeping talent compared with companies that didn’t get bailouts.