The NYSE is the midst of a shake-up

Carl McCall, NYSE lead director and head of the compensation committee, said he was stepping down.

Mr McCall, who initially defended the $140m salary of ex-chief executive Richard Grasso, said he was leaving in order to clear the air.

His departure has been accompanied by reports that the NYSE's new chief executive wants to carry out a more sweeping review than first thought.

Bigger shake-up?

Mr McCall said he was going so that John Reed, the NYSE's new interim chief executive, could "move forward without being encumbered by the past".

He said he wanted Mr Reed to be "free to do whatever is necessary to restore the integrity of the NYSE".

According to a report in the Wall Street Journal, Mr Reed is scrapping a special board committee's report on what lessons the Grasso scandal holds for how the exchange is run.

Mr McCall was leading that review.

The newspaper reports that Mr Reed wants a much wider review of corporate governance at the NYSE, and its role as a regulator.

He is also known to want the reduce the size of the NYSE's board, which currently has 27 members.

Mr McCall's resignation has been generally praised as an honourable act.

"It's a good thing, and it was the right thing to do," said Sarah Treslik, executive director of the Council of Institutional Investors.

"There needs to be turnover on the board and McCall, even though he did help Grasso resign in the last couple of days, had been a strong supporter of his, and particularly of his pay, for a long enough period of time that as long as he stayed it was an issue," she said.

Mr Reed was chairman and co-chief executive of the investment bank Citigroup before his retirement in 2000.