Bank of America Corp's investment banking chief Thomas Montag was the company's highest paid executive in 2009, after the company assumed his contract as part of its acquisition of Merrill Lynch, according to the company's proxy filing on Friday.

The bulk of the former Merrill Lynch executive's compensation comes from a $29.31 million restricted stock award, according to the proxy. Montag is currently president of Bank of America's global banking and markets.

Montag received $586,539 in base pay, and $30,423 in all other compensation, according to the proxy. Montag was the only executive to use a car and driver, which cost $25,000 in 2009.

Montag's large stock award came from an initial contract he agreed to with Merrill Lynch when he joined the firm in May 2008 from Goldman Sachs, months before the bank's purchase of Merrill Lynch was negotiated, according to the proxy statement.

The restricted stock payout for that contract totaled $20 million.

But for Montag and other senior executives, pay czar Kenneth Feinberg's influence on the bank's practices is evident.

The latest proxy shows new 2009 pay practices tied to the $45 billion in government aid the bank received during the financial crisis. The aid was repaid in December 2009.

The bulk of the compensation for other executives was paid with so-called salary stock awards, the main form of 2009 executive compensation and restricted stock for the bank, mandated by Feinberg.

Unlike regular restricted share awards or stock options which vest in annual or multi-year chunks, the stock salary awards will be awarded monthly over the next 36 months.

But instead of receiving shares, executives receive monthly cash installments. The cash payments are computed by valuing the salary stock shares against Bank of America's stock price at the end of each month.

If the value of the bank's stock rises, the monthly payouts would increase. If the stock sinks, so would the value of the payments.

Under the program, former Chief Financial Officer Joe Price received $5.25 million in salary stock awards. Former Chief Risk Officer Greg Curl received $9.3 million in salary stock awards.

Montag also was granted $9.3 million in salary stock shares.

Former consumer bank chief, now CEO, Brian Moynihan was granted $5.2 million in such stock.

Moynihan, who succeeded Lewis on January 1., received $6.5 million in total compensation last year when he was consumer bank chief, according to the filing.

The award structure is the result of guidelines released by U.S. pay czar Kenneth Feinberg, and was previously announced in December by the bank. The payments began in January 2010.

No BofA executives received annual cash bonuses for 2009, according to the filing.

Former Chief Executive Kenneth Lewis, who stepped down on December 31, received no pay or bonus in 2009, which was announced last fall after talks with Feinberg.

Lewis' total compensation was $4.2 million which came almost entirely from an increase in the value of a company pension plan.

(Reporting by Joe Rauch; editing by Carol Bishopric)

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