option

RIM execs to pay $74 million for options backdating

The co-chief executives of Research in Motion and two other executives will pay more than $74.5 million ($92 million Canadian) to settle a stock options-backdating case, under an agreement approved on Thursday by Canada's securities commission.

Co-Chief Executives Jim Balsillie and Mike Lazaridis, Chief Financial Officer Dennis Kavelman, and Finance Director Angelo Loberto have agreed to contribute $31 million to RIM for the benefit they received from the incorrectly priced stock options granted to all employees from 1996 to 2006. They will also pay $36.4 million to defray costs incurred by the company in the investigation and $… Read more

RIM executives settle option backdating case

Research in Motion's co-CEOs might have dodged what could have been one of Canada's largest penalties ever imposed with a settlement agreement announced Wednesday.

RIM announced that the company as well as "certain of its officers and directors" (which we know to be CEOs Jim Balsillie and Mike Lazardis) has settled with the Ontario Securities Commission over an investigation into stock option backdating at RIM over the last decade. The OSC still has to approve the settlement at a hearing scheduled for tomorrow.

The amount of the settlement was not disclosed; it's up to the … Read more

Google delays stock option exchange program

Googlers who want to revalue their underwater stock options will have to wait until Tuesday for the voluntary employee option exchange program to launch, Google said in a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission on Thursday that did not explain why.

The program--which allows allow employees to exchange all or some of their existing stock options for the same number of new options--was scheduled to launch Thursday and end on March 3. Employees were notified of the change in an e-mail sent Wednesday by Laszlo Bock, vice president of People Operations at Google, and which was included … Read more

RIM co-CEOs could face $100 million penalty

Research In Motion's co-CEOs could be facing a hefty fine for their involvement in yet another stock options-backdating scandal.

The Globe and Mail reports that the Ontario Securities Commission--the Province of Ontario's SEC--is considering imposing fines of up to C$100 million ($79 million) on RIM's Jim Balsillie and Mike Lazardis as punishment for allowing stock options backdating to occur on their watch. Balsille would have to pay the majority of the fine, according to the report, which, if it reachs $100 million, would be a record for Canada.

Like many technology companies over the last decade, … Read more

Ex-McAfee lawyer acquitted in stock options backdating trial

The former general counsel of computer security firm McAfee was acquitted on Friday of fraud charges relating to alleged stock options backdating.

Kent Roberts, indicted in February 2007, was found not guilty on two of three felony counts of fraud in San Francisco federal court. The jury, following a two-week trial, was hung on a third count of falsifying accounting records. A mistrial was declared and Roberts could be retried on that count.

Roberts was the first general counsel at a U.S. corporation to be criminally tried for alleged stock options backdating violations, his lawyer's office said.

"… Read more

Apple settles backdating lawsuit for $14 million

Apple executives have settled a shareholder lawsuit filed over its stock-option backdating practices for $14 million.

The executives themselves, including CEO Steve Jobs, won't actually have to cough up the cash: that's why they have insurance, according to the Associated Press. And the money actually goes to the corporation, not the shareholders themselves, because this was a "derivative" lawsuit that sought compensation on behalf of the company. Attempts by shareholders to sue on their own behalf have been stymied by the fact that Apple's stock has actually risen since the backdating was revealed in late … Read more

Former Apple lawyer settles options case with SEC

Former Apple general counsel Nancy Heinen has settled with the SEC over charges that she improperly backdated stock options at the company.

The SEC filed a lawsuit against Heinen last year charging her with cherry-picking grant dates for stock option awards to Apple executives--including CEO Steve Jobs--and falsifying paperwork in order to cover up the selection of the favorable dates. Stock option backdating is legal if properly disclosed, but dozens of companies--including CNET Networks--in the earlier part of this decade failed to do so, and executives at other companies have gone to prison as a result.

Heinen will pay $2.… Read more

Report: No charges in Apple backdating probe

The U.S. Justice Department has ended its two-year criminal probe of backdated stock options at Apple and has decided not to file charges against current and former executives, including CEO Steve Jobs, according to a report Thursday in The Wall Street Journal.

Apple and the Justice Department declined to comment, but attorneys for two subjects of the probe told the newspaper that they had been notified that the investigation had concluded

"We were always confident that after a full and fair review of the facts, there could be no other outcome," Cris Arguedas, a lawyer for former … Read more

Okay, okay, I'll get an iPhone 3G!

My very first meaningful blog post here (after an introduction), from June 23, 2007, was titled "Why I'm not getting an iPhone".

Let me review my reasons at the time:

The original iPhone couldn't really do any more for me than my Palm Treo 650. The iPhone couldn't be used to connect my laptop to the Internet. No voice-memo support. No 3G networking. Not enough storage capacity. No native apps from third-party developers. No high-res screen.

Okay, what's changed?

Well, the iPhone 3G still… Read more