German energy companies "Uniper" and "Sivie" awarded millions of dollars in bonuses to some traders for the year 2022, totaling around 26 billion euros (28.6 billion dollars) in the form of share buybacks and loans to "Uniper" and "Sivie," after suffering unprecedented losses due to purchasing natural gas shipments at record prices to compensate for the supply that had stopped coming from Russia, which was Germany's largest gas supplier before the invasion of Ukraine. The companies agreed to impose a ceiling on the salaries of board members as part of the rescue packages, but the cap on bonuses did not apply to all employees.
Sources indicated that "200 traders with Sivie in London received bonuses amounting to hundreds of millions of dollars, and mid-level traders received between 5 to 7 million dollars each."
Sivie stated that "the performance of the employees justifies the bonus for their contribution in securing supply." In comments made via email, they added that "this keeps Sivie competitive in the human resources market to be able to purchase gas and hydrogen for the German market in the future."
Uniper also confirmed that it paid bonuses to trading employees for 2022 but at a lower level compared to the previous year. The company stated: "The competition among traders in the energy market is fierce. Therefore, not paying bonuses is not suitable."
