Wall Street bonuses hit a record $49.2 billion in 2025, up 9 percent, according to an annual estimate by New York State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli, who warned Mayor Zohran Mamdani that a strong financial sector is crucial for the Big Apple’s success.
DiNapoli, the Empire State’s bean counter-in-chief, said the average bonus was as much as $246,900 last year, a 6 percent increase from 2024 as industry profits jumped more than 30 percent to $65.1 billion, fueled by strong trading, underwriting, and asset-management fees.
“Wall Street saw strong performance for much of last year, despite all of the ongoing domestic and international upheavals,” DiNapoli said in a thinly veiled reference to the Trump administration’s trade policies and ongoing conflict in the Middle East.
The long-serving Dem official, in the job since 2007, said that gains for New York’s financiers are also good news for taxpayers because they help bankroll key public services.
“When Wall Street does well, it’s good for our state and city budgets, which are reliant on the industry’s significant tax contributions,” he said.
His comments come at a time when hard-left Mamdani is threatening to introduce a wealth tax or hike property rates to plug a $12 billion black hole in Gotham’s finances.
Gov. Kathy Hochul, who once called for New York’s uber-wealthy “to jump on a bus” for Florida, has also been forced into an embarrassing U-turn after she last week urged them to return and help fix its shrinking base.
The Post has previously reported how Texas and Florida are looking to tempt Wall Streeters away with the promise of lower taxes and a better standard of living.
“However, we are seeing slower job growth, and geopolitical conflicts have global repercussions that pose extraordinary risks for the short- and long-term outlook on the financial sector and for broader economic markets,” DiNapoli warned, while stressing that the Big Apple remains this country’s center of financial gravity.
His data shows that the city’s share of finance jobs nationwide stands at just shy of 18%, with 198,200 people directly employed in the sector, compared to a 30-year high of 201,500 the year before
DiNapoli said it is down from roughly one-third in 1990, but it is still higher than any other state.
“New York City remains the nation’s financial capital, although job growth has been faster in some other parts of the country,” his office (NB not him directly) said in a statement.
Pay in finance stayed exceptionally high. Average annual salary, including bonuses, rose 7.3 percent to $505,677 in 2024, the second-highest on record and nearly five times the average in the rest of the city’s private sector. Bonuses made up about 42 percent of wages.
Wall Street drove 20.2 percent of all economic activity in the city in 2024. It also delivered 19.4 percent of state tax collections in the state fiscal year 2024-25 and 8.4 percent of city tax revenue in the city fiscal year 2025.
The higher 2025 bonuses are projected to generate an extra $199 million in state income tax revenue and $91 million for the city compared with the previous year.
Those figures, however, may fall short of budget forecasts. The governor’s proposed budget assumed bonuses in the state’s broader finance and insurance sector would rise 25.9 percent in the state fiscal year 2025-26.
The city’s fiscal year 2026 financial plan projected a 15.1 percent increase in securities industry bonuses.
Each year, DiNapoli’s office estimates the bonuses paid to Wall Streeters from December through March. The estimate does not include bonuses paid to employees outside the city.
The 2025 estimate is based on income tax withholding data. It includes cash bonuses for work done in 2025, as well as previously delayed bonuses that workers have now cashed in. It excludes stock options and other deferred pay that are still to be taxed.
[Notigroup Newsroom in collaboration with other media outlets, with information from the following sources]
