The reward for failure

[Mickey Chaplan]

Sorry.  As a classicist, I will remind you of the Roman Cincinnatus, who was called from his plow to lead his people.  As a victorious general, he could have taken a position as political leader of the early republic, but after his victory, he returned to his plow and his field. 

I might also remind you of more recent history, of the general George Washington, who obviously had no interest in doing anything but serving his country against the wicked British, and later as first President.... and who returned to his fields after serving.

Was Hatoyama the Japanese Cincinnatus?  Not exactly.  Cincinnatus was, after all, a successful general.

Mickey

[Charlie Badenhop]

Figures don't lie, but liars figure!

How to word that for politicians?


Hatoyama said whatever he felt was necessary to get elected, I would think.

How about Kan?

I like some of the stuff he has said.......

[Tim eX]

Kan - like all politicians, better than Hatoyama and probably about as good as we're going to get sadly. The bureaucrats and politicos are killing this country, we need decisive leaders and genius advisers and we need then now.

T

[Tim K]

Now we know why corporate porkers worldwide scramble to get their snouts in the board trough.
Where most of the real world comes from, you FU and you get fired with 14 days salary, if you are lucky.
Does nobody in the corporate world know about taking responsibility for their company? It seems like directors today see it as a divine right to become a multi-millionaire on leaving their company whatever the situation they walk away from.

Well, his pension is just a contracted proportion of his salary. I think the really disgusting thing is how much all  CEOs get, but until shareholders see sense that is just the way it is. Actually, as I'm not a BP shareholder, I don't really care how BP shareholders choose to waste their money.
I don't think the big shareholders blame him for the disaster, as they know avoiding disasters in the Mexican Gulf is not in his job description. His main fault is that he was tempted into playing the US game instead of just staying in the background and allowing a more PR-savvy person to face the heat. What shareholders are really pissed off about is the open-ended financial commitment for damages that Hayward appears to have made (which, all things considered, makes him our friend, really).
I've been reading lots of reports saying that there is not nearly as much damage as has been predicted, as the warm waters of the Gulf breaks up oil quite quickly. Which means that drilling by all companies will be back to its unregulated, unchecked, normal within the year. Yahoo.

[Mickey Chaplan]

What TimK says implies that shareholders care who the CEO is.  Actually, most of the "shareholders" are pension funds, which vote as a bloc.  If the profits keep rolling in, such blocs are unlikely to have much to say about who the CEO is.  And the boards of directors are more often than not appointed by the CEO...

Mickey

[Robert Hancock]

TimK wrote:
I think the really disgusting thing is how much all  CEOs get, but until shareholders see sense that is just the way it is.

Yes, for me too. Basically no-one, no matter who they are or what they do, can actually "earn" what these board members get paid. And then to walk away with more in pension per YEAR than most of their rank and file workers can earn in a  LIFETIME, just adds obscenity to insult.

[Mickey Chaplan]

Since the CEO's salary is determined by the board of directors, and since the CEO appoints the board of directors....

Mickey

PS The whole system is obscene.  See my previous post.

[Tim K]

What TimK says implies that shareholders care who the CEO is.  Actually, most of the "shareholders" are pension funds, which vote as a bloc.  If the profits keep rolling in, such blocs are unlikely to have much to say about who the CEO is.  And the boards of directors are more often than not appointed by the CEO...

95% of the company is controlled by the 777 entities who each have more than a million shares.

The biggest shareholders are asset managers who manage the assets of all sorts of people, from people like me, via unit trusts, to entire countries ( Norway owns 1.8% of BP. and China, which, of course, manages its own assets, owns 1.1%. The UK sold its chunk long ago, but I suppose they must still own a few shares).
Blackrock, the US asset management company, owns nearly 6% of the company. They control all sorts of different kinds of funds, for all sorts of different kinds of people.
Whether the funds they control are 'pension' funds or not depends on the tax arrangements for that fund in individual countries. Different countries have different ideas of what a pension is. Either way, 'pension' funds are shareholdings just like any other kind of fund.

These organisations (probably far fewer than 777, but I can't find the statistics) control the company. I'm not sure of the precise mechanism of fixing the CEO's salary, but the overall effect should a bit like survival of the fittest: if the company appears to be wasting money, then these asset managers should simply sell up and go elsewhere. In reality, asset managers don't/can't do things like that, and in any case, as the CEOs of these asset managers are the most highly paid of all CEOs, they are hardly likely to rock the boat by protesting that CEOs are paid too much.

The only way out of this is for the asset managers themselves to be more transparent, and for fundholders to be more aware of the funds they are holding. An uphill path, but there are a lot of funds out there.

http://www.bp.com/extendedsectiongenericarticle.do?categoryId=9010453&contentId=7019612

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/energy/oilandgas/7802978/BP-its-10-biggest-shareholders.html

[Robert Hancock]

It seems that making false expenses claims is no longer theft and is only deserving of a severance package worth millions! Had he been a low level drone, he'd have been fired with no severance and thought himself lucky that the police had not been called.  But of course, he's the CEO and so deserving of millions—vomit. What has gone wrong with US business morality?

From Guardian

Mark Hurd, the man credited with saving Hewlett-Packard, was forced to step down as its chief executive yesterday after a sexual harassment inquiry unearthed false expenses claims designed to cover up a "close personal relationship" with a former contractor.

The giant IT company's shares have doubled in value during Hurd's five-year stewardship; news of his resignation sent them tumbling almost 10%. HP said it had learned about the relationship several weeks ago, when a woman who did marketing work for HP sent a letter accusing Hurd, 53, and the company of sexual harassment. An investigation found that Hurd had falsified expenses reports and other financial documents to conceal the relationship. The company concluded that its sexual harassment policy had not been violated but that its code of business conduct had been.

Hurd said the decision to go was a "painful" one but admitted the investigation had made it difficult for him to continue. "As the investigation progressed, I realised there were instances in which I did not live up to the standards and principles of trust, respect and integrity that I have espoused at HP," he said. "After a number of discussions with members of the board, I will move aside and the board will search for new leadership."

Hurd, who is married with two children, will get a $12.2m (£7.6m) severance payment and nearly 350,000 shares of HP stock, worth about $16m based on Friday's closing price. The company has also extended the deadline for exercising an option to buy up to 775,000 HP shares.

[Charlie Badenhop]

Yes Robert, I agree!

Separate issue:

The head of Apple's iPhone-iPod division is gone.

Not too much slippage room there!

[Tim eX]

10 million millionaires in the world (the ones that are known about)

Up 17% , assests up 19%

Net worth 39 trillion USD, 70% or so of world GDP

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/v/dnPatMfEMRM&amp;ap=%2526fmt%3D18&amp;rel=0" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/v/dnPatMfEMRM&amp;ap=%2526fmt%3D18&amp;rel=0</a>

World GDP ? 58 trillion (if I'm not mistaken)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_%28nominal%29

T