Mastercard to link all employee bonuses to ESG goals

(Reuters) - Payment processor Mastercard Inc will link all employee bonuses to environmental, social and corporate-governance (ESG)initiatives, expanding an earlier program which was limited to its senior executives, Chief Executive Michael Miebach said on Tuesday.

The move will help Mastercard achieve its goals of cutting carbon usage, improving financial inclusion and gender pay parity. Mastercard in November accelerated its net zero timeline by a decade, to 2040 from 2050.

"We're tying compensation to emissions, financial inclusion and the gender pay gap because we have a substantial impact in these areas and because they closely align with our vision," Miebach wrote in a note on the company's website.

Against a backdrop of growing public and political concerns about climate change and economic inequality, companies are under increasing pressure to show they are taking greater responsibility for how they run operations and generate their profits.

Last March, Mastercard said it would link compensations for executive vice presidents and above to ESG initiatives.

(Reporting by Arunima Kumar in Bengaluru; Editing by Krishna Chandra Eluri)