SWEDEN. Who should receive the profit? Here is an idea: Those who bring it.

The biggest banks in Sweden have in 2012 together earned 67 000 million SEK, approximately 7 800 million euro. Over 50 percent of these, or 39 000 million SEK, is dividend pay-out to their shareholders. Swedbank is the most extraordinary example with a dividend pay-out of 75 percent: Up some 50 percent from last year.

The question is, how much of this enormous amount of money is invested back into the organisation and to the people who actually have made these profits possible; the employees.

Developments indicate that the banks’ in Sweden are rather doing the opposite: following the cost efficiency trend by laying off employees and putting pressure on wages for large groups of the remaining staff.