Top Executives of Acquired Companies Stand to Get Huge Payouts

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

By SCOTT THURM
Eugene Isenberg, the former Nabors Industries Ltd. chief executive, isn't the only CEO looking at a gilded exit.

At least three other chief executives are in line for payouts of more than $50 million from "golden parachutes" opened by pending acquisitions, according to a Wall Street Journal analysis of Securities and Exchange Commission filings. Topping the list: Sanjay Jha, CEO of Motorola Mobility Holdings Inc., who could receive $65.7 million as part of Google Inc.'s acquisition of the cellphone maker, according to Motorola's filings.


Four other CEOs could receive exit packages of $30 million or more from deals that are pending or were completed this year. In most cases, the CEOs must leave the acquiring company within one or two years to qualify for the payout.

None of the parachutes is as big as the package that Nabors is paying Mr. Isenberg, its CEO-turned-chairman. But the merger-related parachutes are bigger than most recent severance packages for CEOs being forced out of their jobs.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204394804577010000947986974.html

Meanwhile the rank and file employee is lucky to get unemployment.



:mad:

[aint_no_life_nowhere]

1. These guys must have discovered a cure for cancer, right?

Or they discovered the unified theory of physics? They must have done something extremely worthwhile to justify that kind of financial reward in our society, right?

[tyne]

3. Yelling it out!

The saddest part of this is:

His "severence" pay will not be taxed as income because the lawyers have found a way to call it something else. Furthermore, the income he receives each year (capital gains) will we taxed at that low low rate.

Hello OWS! This is what you're talking about...isn't it?

[Marazinia]

4. Don't we all wish the world worked that way

[DLnyc]

5. I guess those large payouts give them an huge incentive

to approve the buyout. Kind of the very definition of conflict of interest.

[Arctic Dave]

2. They should have put that money into updating their aging drilling fleet and support

facilities. Most of the Nabors rig in Alaska you need a tetnus shot just to look at them. Blue paint and rust is what is keeping them together at this point.