Comments on: Company-Wide Stock Bonus Vesting Next Week

By: thomas

thomas — Mon, 09 Mar 2009 06:19:37 +0000

I don’t even want to talk about stock awards with companies. Mine changed and it’s really screwing me out of total shares. I’ve lost half of what I should be getting.

By: megscole64

megscole64 — Sun, 08 Mar 2009 02:20:59 +0000

I feel your pain. When I started my company they were doing a “stock” program (not real stock…we’re a private company) where employees got an amount of points based on their performance. They gave out ‘points’ for a few years and then stopped it. They started vesting after 5 years. At the high point I think the value for me was somewhere around $30,000. I opted to not take the payout … I’ve always thought I’d be with this company until I retire in 30 years (it’s that kind of company…LOTS of associates there after 25-30 years).

The value today?

$0.

That’s right. Absolutely zero. It has nothing to do with the company’s “value” (not monetary value) but with the market and our loss of assets.

They had implemented a mandatory buyback process starting in 07 – requiring at least 11% of our “stock” to be paid back in a bonus. They suspended it this year. Thankfully.

I’ll be happy if the value goes back to $5 a point…that’s what it was when I first started getting them awarded.

It’s not really like I’ve “lost” anything. After all I never had the money in hand. And it was a bonus. It’s not tied to my compensation or anything. But I really did enjoy those first few years of extra bonus during the year (the highest I got was over $1000).

I know it’ll all turn around someday but it sure is painful right now.

By: seekinglemonade

seekinglemonade — Sat, 07 Mar 2009 00:37:38 +0000

Take it from me, take the money and run.
Exercise your options and sell immediately. Since undoubtedly these are “non-qual”-type options, you will be taxed at the end of the year as regular income. You’ll need to save a good chuck of it to pay taxes. That’s why you need to sell now. If the stock goes down between the time you exercise and the time you sell, you are liable for the taxes on the exercise price, even if you hadnt even sold yet.
Of course you could take a risk and do nothing for a while. Or even more risky is to exercise but not sell.

Talk to some professionals.

By: F2O

F2O — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 18:41:43 +0000

“The value of a share of my company’s stock has declined 90% from the high. To reclaim that high, the price would need to increase by 818%. That would be 5% a year for 30 years or 3% a year for 75 years. It’s probably safe to say it will be a long time before we see last year’s prices again, if ever.”

Ugh, you just wrecked my weekend. I was fooling myself into believing that it would come back eventually.

By: The Weakonomist

The Weakonomist — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 14:04:45 +0000

That is painful to read. I’d say the company should issue new incentives at the lower price, but because of the economy there are very few people dumb enough to jump ship and chase another job.

Flexo is an exception of course, because the income is already there.

Major burn though.

By: Eric

Eric — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 13:54:48 +0000

Ouch. :(