The European Union's banking watchdog will toughen up its guidelines on bankers' pay after a study uncovered wide variations in how lenders apply the rules across the 28-country bloc and how class="mandelbrot_refrag"> banks are avoiding the bonus cap. The European Banking Authority (EBA) did not say how it will toughen the rules but this is likely to include tighter supervision and more detail in how the rules should be applied. After the 2007-09 financial crisis sparked public anger over bonuses at class="mandelbrot_refrag"> banks that taxpayers had to rescue, the EU introduced curbs on the pay of top bankers earning a million euros or more. The current rules mean that 40-60 percent of a bonus must be deferred over 3-5 years, with the possibility to claw back the cash if problems like misconduct are later discovered. The curbs were toughened so that bonuses handed out from early next year can be no higher than fixed salary, or twice tha