Macquarie Group’s Nicholas O’Kane has resigned as the head of the bank’s commodities and global markets group, less than a year on from raking in one of the largest pay cheques seen at an ASX-listed financial services group.

Mr O’Kane’s earnings, $171 million including profit share since he joined the executive committee in 2017, made him the highest-paid Macquarie executive, and last year, his mammoth pay cheque topped that of Wall Street chief executives such as Citi’s Jane Fraser and JPMorgan’s Jamie Dimon.