After 9/11, firms rushed to give top execs millions in options

[still_one]

http://www.rawstory.com/news/2006/WSJ_After_911_as_stocks_sank_0715.html

[DoYouEverWonder]

1. That's why they all love BushCo

They stuff their pockets while they dance on our graves.

[still_one]

2. I guess what amazes me is the ruthlessness of it all

[DoYouEverWonder]

5. Not to mention

the level of greed.

Who needs 10 houses that you never live in?

[Jackpine Radical]

3. Raw Story links to this WSJ story:

Ninety-one companies that didn't regularly grant stock options in September did so in the first two weeks of trading after the terror attack. Their grants were concentrated around Sept. 21, when the market reached its post-attack low. They were worth about $325 million when granted, based on a standard method of valuing stock options.

The 91 companies included such corporate icons as Home Depot Inc., Black & Decker Corp. and UnitedHealth Group Inc. It included two companies directly touched by the tragedy. Merrill Lynch & Co., across the street from the Twin Towers, lost three employees. On Sept. 24, Merrill granted its president options to buy more than 750,000 shares, at a price 15% below the pre-attack level. At Teradyne Inc. in Boston, an employee delayed a business trip until Sept. 11 to attend a son's soccer game and died on American Flight 11. Teradyne that month gave its CEO more than 600,000 options at a price enabling him to buy stock at 24% below its pre-attack level.

There's nothing illegal about granting options after the market plunges. But acting so quickly after a national tragedy drove down stocks shows the eagerness of some companies to increase their executives' potential wealth. These grants also offer important new fodder for an already fractious debate over what constitutes the proper use of options in executive compensation.

Note that the Journal isn't upset over the ripoff, just over the blatancy of the ripoff.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB115292514221107632.html

[itzamirakul]

4. That's where you should check what Rudy Giuliani got after the

attack.

He was the poor-as-a-church-mouse unpopular mayor up to the moment of the attack.

After the attack, he suddenly has come out as a multi-millionaire. The money is evidently from friends of the Giuliani "family."

I understand he not only has his million dollar security industry but also owns a bank of some kind...not the kind evidently that one goes to for daily personal business but something special...

I heard that Mexico recently paid him $5 million for some consulting work...yeah, I guess he took Bernie Kerick with him...

Edit for typo

[havocmom]

6. Deep Throat's advice is still good. If you wanna know who might

be involved with something... Follow the money