RE: Surprise!!!14 Aug 2014 10:47
ITK
Fully agree, this stinks.
Due to poor performance, their previous options were worthless. No bonus - Shock horror.
So we'll make it look good by having no salary of £0.5m for a year but replace it with unconditional options.
The 2,736,304 options will cost them £27,363.04 but if they manage to keep the SP at 20p they will be worth £547,260.80. So their £500,000 lost salary is replaced with £519,897.76 in shares, how convenient. Even if the SP languishes around the 20p mark and the company fails to perform they are still going to get paid.
Of course if the SP drops below 18.3p then in effect they will have a pay reduction but if they can get the SP rising from these depressed levels then they have a nice big pay rise.