Special Inspector General for the Troubled Asset Relief Program (SIGTARP), Report Number 14-001, September 24, 2014.  Treasury Significantly Loosened Executive Pay Limits Resulting in Excessive Pay for Top 25 Employees at GM and Ally (GMAC)  When the Companies Were Not Repaying TARP in Full and Taxpayers Were Suffering Billions of Dollars in Losses.

“Overall, SIGTARP found Treasury significantly loosened executive pay limits, resulting in excessive pay for Top 25 employees at GM and Ally while the companies were not repaying TARP in full and taxpayers were suffering billions of dollars in losses. Treasury also made limited progress implementing recommendations previously made by SIGTARP. These we re designed to promote good Government practices, improve transparency, consistency, and accountability and ultimately protect taxpayers from subsidizing excessive compensation at TARP companies. In 2013, OSM continued awarding excessive pay raises and on ly put back a minimal amount of long – term restricted stock as part of pay packages and eliminated it altogether again in 2014 from pay packages . In June 2013, OSM created for the first time a written policy and procedures. However, OSM’s policy merely re cites TARP legislation and the TARP Standards for Compensation and Corporate Governance; Interim Final Rule (“IFR,” or “Treasury’s Rule”), both in existence prior to the establishment of OSM, leaving OSM as an office of Treasury that operates without forma l written policies developed by that office. SIGTARP found that Treasury still lacks robust policies, procedures, or criteria to ensure that OSM’s guidelines are met. Both GM and Ally stood out from the other five companies previously under OSM’s jurisdiction. At the time OSM set pay for the Top 25 employees at GM and Ally inApril 2013, SIGTARP found that pay set by Treasury for Ally’s and GM’s top employees did not reflect that those companies were not repaying TARP in full after four years, resulting in billions of dollars in taxpayer losses. Moreover, at the time of Treasury’s pay determinations, it was public knowledge that the companies were not repaying TARP in full and Treasury had already suffered an $8.2 billion loss in GM, and Ally had made no repayments of the principal TARP investment. While Ally was under a March 2013 failed stress test, taxpayers suffered a loss of $845 million when Treasury sold Ally common stock in the market. While SIGTARP was conducting this evaluation, Treasury sold its remaining TARP shares of GM in the market to arrive at a total loss to taxpayers of $11.159 billion, and sold some additional Ally common stock in the market to
arrive at total losses of $1.8 billion.”