Big Payday at Man Group

After the downfall of Refco, Man acquired the assets and customer accounts of the futures brokerage late last year. Man Group took a charge of $70 million related to the cost of integrating Refco, but it hopes to make money from the operation going forward.

If the Man executives are among the best-paid money managers in the city of London, their compensation packages pale in comparison with what some of top U.S. hedge fund bosses made last year.

James Simons, founder of the quantitative hedge fund Renaissance Technologies, made $1.5 billion, according to Institutional Investor, leading the list of the top 25 money-earners in the U.S. hedge fund universe last year. His $5.3 billion flagship Medallion fund returned 29.5%, net of fees.

He was followed by oilman T. Boone Pickens, who made $1.4 billion last year, largely from returns on his two energy-focused hedge funds -- 650% on the BP Capital Commodity Fund and 89% on the BP Capital Energy Equity Fund. The rankings were published by Institutional Investor's magazine Alpha.