by Calculated Risk on 12/06/2009 09:18:00 PM

From Lucian Bebchuk, Alma Cohen, and Holger Spamann in the Financial Times: Bankers had cashed in before the music stopped

According to the standard narrative, the meltdown of Bear Stearns and Lehman Brothers largely wiped out the wealth of their top executives. ... That standard narrative, however, turns out to be incorrect. ... our analysis ... shows the banks’ top five executives had cashed out such large amounts since the beginning of this decade that, even after the losses, their net pay-offs during this period were substantially positive.
excerpted with permission

It appears these executives were incentivized to gamble.

Mark Thoma has more excerpts Did Bank Executives Lose Enough to Learn their Lesson?