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Senators Introduce Option Expense Limit Bill
The bill would
head off Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB)
rules that would require companies to consider all employee
stock options as an expense. The FASB voted earlier this
year to draft new rules requiring companies to consider
employee stock options as an expense, and is expected to
put them in place next year (See
FASB: Option Expensing
Begins in 2005
).
A bipartisan group of Senate backers told a news conference
that their measure would allow companies to continue to
attract skilled employees with stock options while also
dealing with investor and shareholder concerns about
executive compensation, according to an Associated Press
report.
“I think we’ve put together a bill that will solve a lot of
problems … a bill that I think will continue the kind of
business advances that we’ve had in this country,” said
Senator Mike Enzi, (R-Wyoming)
He was accompanied by Senators Barbara Boxer
(D-California), Harry Reid (D-Nevada), John Ensign (R-
Nevada) and George Allen (R-Virginia).
Stock options give employees the chance to buy company
stock at a fixed cost, known as the exercise price. Options
become valuable as a stock rises above the exercise price.
Thousands of businesses nationwide embrace options as an
inexpensive way to motivate workers – particularly tech
companies in Silicon Valley.
Measuring Options’ Value
Though many large companies have voluntarily begun
counting options as an expense, many high-tech companies
have not, insisting that expensing stock options is a bad
idea in part because there is no precise way to determine
their value before they are actually exercised.
Proponents of mandatory expensing of stock options argue
they are a form of compensation that carry a cost that
needs to be recognized on company books.
Private equity groups such as the National Venture
Capital Association praised the latest bill, saying
it “aims to preserve broad-based employee stock option
plans and addresses the serious economic implications of
stock option expensing.”
Corporate governance organizations, however, weren’t so
happy. They argued that because the legislation addressed
only the top five executives, it would do little to
reveal how much stock options are actually costing a
company and diluting shareholder return.
“By limiting it to the top five they really do ignore the
bulk of the cost to almost every company,” said Patrick
McGurn, a special counsel for Institutional Shareholder
Services, which advises on corporate governance issues.
“If you wanted to rename this act it would be the ‘pander
to tech companies that fill my campaign coffers’ act.”
The bill would prevent any such standards from taking
hold until an economic impact study was conducted.