The former CIO of the National Australia Bank is suing the bank for $A15 million (NZ$19 million), for unpaid share options and for compensation for leaving a higher-paying job in the UK.
Ian Crouch, who joined the NAB in 2002 from AT Kearney in London, was stood down in 2004 after former NAB CEO Frank Cicutto (who hired Crouch), was forced out of his job following a foreign exchange trading scandal and a write-down of Homeside, NAB’s mortgage business in the US.
Crouch claims Cicutto should have warned him that the Homeside was turning sour and in effect might lead to regime change.
He alleges that he insisted to Cicutto and the recruitment firm that helped hire him, Egon Zhender, that he would only take up the NAB role if it was for at least six years.
Crouch’s Australian Federal Court writ states “As a result of the Homeside and ISI matters, there was a risk that Cicutto would resign, or be forced to resign, or be dismissed from his position”.
(ISI was a failed IT project at the bank).
Crouch earned more than $A5 million in his two years at the NAB.
- Australian Financial Review