By Taryn Cooper, at 12:48 pm on March 26th, 2009
So Morgan Stanley released their proxy statement and in turn their compensation numbers for the previous fiscal year. Not surprisingly, Chairman and CEO John Mack took a hair cut from 2007 to 2008 – but not as large as say a Ken Lewis who took an over 50% cut in salary/bonus to this fiscal year. Mack took a nearly 25% hit on his overall comp, but not in salary, which stayed put at $800K.
The issue is with his “Other Compensation” column which according to the footnote includes insurance, travel, security detail, corporate cars and other incidentals. But get this – as I reading the note, I noticed that he plans on paying for his own personal use of the corporate jet. Well, how thoughtful!
What a great guy – according to the filing, this amount was in the $400K-region! My question is – is this solely personal use (for a dude making $800K and to spend half of his salary on personal travel alone – how does he get any work done?) or is the reflective value the $8,667 footnote on aggregate incremental costs of using the corporate jet.
On one hand, you gotta like a guy who is going to pay for his personal use of the jet (rightfully so), especially when the Big Three Auto CEOs took a lot of heat looking for a handout while riding down in their jets. But what is unclear to me (and perhaps someone with a better understanding of footnote language) is what exactly is he paying to travel?
By Robert Perrego, at 12:22 pm on March 26th, 2009
Bob Pisani on CNBC just interviewed Anthony Rochte, senior managing director at State Street Global Advisors and head of ETF’s and Anthony stated that over 38% of all equities traded are ETF’s.
Barclay’s recently put their iShares business out for the bid. I would expect a lot of interest. Many of these ETF’s have derivatives like futures and options in their ‘fund’ to try to have them perform as ‘double’ or ‘triple’ movers – that is, when telecoms go up 3% the Double Long ETF is structured such that it moves up 6%. Managing and re-balancing these ETF’s generates a lot of steady commission income.
Uh yeah – could I have three of those double long financials, two golds, a high yield bond and some TIPs on the side?
Wow!
By Robert Perrego, at 10:43 am on March 26th, 2009
China is proposing a new world reserve currency as they are holding almost $2 Trillion U.S. dollars and really, really, really do not want Obama to run huge deficits and keep printing money like he has been and as he plans on doing to pay for all his social programs. This injection of new dollars into the monetary system makes each existing dollar worth less – and makes China’s $2 Trillion nest egg worth a whole lot less.
I thought a large central government, centralized governmental economic planning, welfare and redistribution of wealth programs were what socialism and communism and Marxism and what all those evil ‘isms’s were all about. You remember; ‘From those that have to those that need’ and ‘Spreading the wealth around’.
Seems communist China does not want us to be more like them now. A good indicator communism doesn’t pay – and it also doesn’t pay off debts.
Ask China.
By Taryn Cooper, at 3:56 pm on March 25th, 2009
Sleep isn’t even recession-proof as two stories appeared today, with Dial-a-Mattress filing Chapter 7 (and looking for a buyer, possibly in Sleepy’s) and reports that Select Comfort may become insolvent within a few days.
I guess even sleep has become somewhat of a luxury these days, presumably people are waiting longer to buy mattresses, holding onto old mattresses or not splurging on the luxury types (which Select Comfort would be filed under).
I guess the executives of mattress manufacturers are not feeling the heat. Sealy Corp released their proxy filing this week and their executives have not taken a hair cut as one might expect. Current Chairman and CEO Lawrence Rogers made $1.1 million, up from $800K last fiscal year.
On a side note, I bought a Serta Perfect Sleeper 10 years ago from Dial-a-Mattress and was happy with both results — I was looking forward to using them again, alas I am sad I will not be able to.
By Robert Perrego, at 3:40 pm on March 25th, 2009
Today saw seesaw trading with positive economic releases driving the market up and a poor Treasury auction driving it down. The Dow finished higher by 90 points at 7750 after falling as low as 7550 just one hour before the close. A massive run in financials sparked the half hour 200 point rebound. The days action and prize goes to the winner – The Bulls.
The S&P 500 finished up 7.63 @ 813.88 and the Nasdaq closed up 2.32 @ 1236.66.
The Gold New York Spot Price was up $8.40 an ounce at $934.50 as of 4:34 p.m. EST.
Analysts cited a weak government auction of Treasury bonds as the reason for the sell off which began at about 12:15 p.m.
The CME Group (NYSE: CME) once again showed volatility finishing up over 8% after falling a larger percentage yesterday. Possible reasons for all this movement could be their pending plans to become a clearing exchange for derivatives such as CDS’s.
April Brent Crude Oil closed down 95 cents at $43.98 a loss of 2.11%.
