There are 8 items today… Pension-funding overhaul could affect stock values | UK and European reporting times catch up with US | Firms Vest Early, Dodge Option Expense | FTSE 100 firms move toward performance-related pay | Antiquated voting ‘fails foreign investors’ in Asia | The Spring-loaded Options Trap | General Electric, the Immelt Way | German institutional investors increasingly interested in private equity
Pension-funding overhaul could affect stock values
It’s clear some companies are going to have to pump millions of dollars into their pension plans. But as an investor, it’s going to be difficult to know with certainty how the new pension requirements might erode the value of some of your stocks.
UK and European reporting times catch up with US
However, despite closing the gap on their US counterparts, the gap is still significant, with US companies signing off their audits an average of nine days early, coming in at an average of just 28 days.
Firms Vest Early, Dodge Option Expense
A whopping $8 billion in expenses will never appear on income statements as 900 companies race to beat stock-option accounting deadline.
FTSE 100 firms move toward performance-related pay
On average, 55 percent of CEO pay is now linked to performance, up from 46 percent in 2003. In the FTSE 250, 40 percent of CEO pay is performance-related and in the FTSE Small Cap the figure drops to just 30 percent.
Antiquated voting ‘fails foreign investors’ in Asia
The Asian Corporate Governance Association, whose members are among the world’s biggest investment groups, has found that shareholders have to overcome a host of obstacles to exercise their ownership rights at company meetings.
The Spring-loaded Options Trap
While investigators continue to focus on backdated options, companies may well be nervous about regulators’ interest in related practices known as spring-loading (timing grants to come ahead of good news) and bullet-dodging (offering them after bad news), both of which aim to capture presumed lows in stock prices for the options’ strike prices.
General Electric, the Immelt Way
I don’t consider myself an environmentalist. I’m a business leader who says this is a very important trend in the eyes of our customers and society and the government.
German institutional investors increasingly interested in private equity
Institutional investors are increasingly interested in investing in private equity, with capital allocations up 25 per cent in 2005 from 2003, according to a recent study conducted by Prof Dr Stefan Jugel from the Wiesbadener Private Equity Institut and supported by Greenpark Capital and Unigestion.
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