Staff at Woodford Investment Management pocketed an average salary of £217,000 in the year to the end of March 2019, months before problems started to unravel that eventually led to the company's demise.
Accounts for Woodford Investment Management, filed at Companies House on January 6, showed Neil Woodford had doubled the number of investment staff in his firm between 2018 and 2019, while more than halving the number of sales staff.
By the end of the financial year the average number for investment management staff during 2019 stood at eight, alongside seven sales staff and 36 admin staff.
Collectively they earned a basic salary of £11m plus £1.6m in social security and £279,000 in other pension related costs, equating to an average salary of £217,000 (excluding social security).
This was down from the average of £231,000 paid in the year before when the company employed 4 investment management staff, 19 sales persons and 22 admin staff.
The accounts also showed Mr Woodford and the company chief executive Craig Newman, collected £13.8m in dividends from the firm in the year to the end of March. Neither Mr Woodford nor Mr Newman receive a salary from the firm.
WIM entered into trouble after its Equity Income fund was suspended in June following a period of heavy outflows.
The firm is currently in the process of being wound up, after being fired as manager of the Equity Income fund, and resigning as manager of the Income Focus fund and the Patient Capital investment trust last year.
Only a skeleton staff remain employed by the firm to assist with the winding up. A representative of the company said neither Mr Woodford nor Mr Newman received any income from the firm after the Equity Income fund was suspended in June.
Woodford Investment Management declined to comment on the salary figures.
The company posted a profit before tax of £18m for 2018/19, a sharp decrease on the £42m posted the year before.
david.thorpe@ft.com
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