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 Options
Backdating
Just
when it seemed safe to close the book on the scandals of
the pre–Sarbanes-Oxley, pre–Internet bubble
era, the stock options backdating fiasco that came to light
in 2006 is a reminder that the history of the period is
still being written. While the legality of stock options
backdating will ultimately be decided case by case in the
courts, dozens of companies are currently under investigation.
Internal investigations may be initiated by a company’s
board of a directors through a special committee. Full
Story
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Connecting the Dots
Over the past year, this column has addressed two major
public policy issues that may seem, at first, to have little
to do with one another. One issue—the estate tax (covered
in September 2006)—is the on-again, off-again tax
imposed on the estates of high-net-worth taxpayers after
death. The other—Social Security (covered in February
2007)—is the rapidly depleting trust fund originally
intended to spare hard-working Americans from living out
their golden years in poverty. Full
Story
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 Ethics
of Options Repricing and Backdating
Just
when it seemed that America’s corporate scandals had
tapered off and public trust in executives was beginning
to rebound, the media revealed two techniques that corporations
were using to enhance management pay packages: the repricing
and the backdating of stock options. Stock options have
been used as a means of paying top-level employees since
approximately 1957; they became extremely popular in the
early 1980s for employees in the high-tech start-up companies
of Silicon Valley. Full
Story
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