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Technology Stocks : Qualcomm Incorporated (QCOM) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: hueyone who wrote (127188)	2/26/2003 12:40:35 AM
From: Maurice Winn	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 152472

Huey, as you've found, it isn't exactly difficult to get the data on stock options. You can read more on page 2, page 37, 38 and elsewhere on share issues as payment for employees, goods and services. qualcomm.com We capitalists wade through all those pages looking for things to worry about and to be hopeful about and to understand what's going on. You don't need to dig up their back yard to find information on stock options. QUALCOMM puts it right there on the very first page [which is page 2]. You do need to read the notes if you want the details. As you can probably figure out, at $30 billion market capitalization, a lot of QCOM shareholders aren't too worried about your concerns about CEOs. I prefer to have Irwin Jacobs and co continue with running the company their way, not your way. I'm okay without options being expensed, but don't mind if they choose to do that to allay the concerns of the latest trend fiends. My main concern about the accounts is that Price Waterhouse Coopers don't sign their statement in the annual report - they hand write Price Waterhouse Coopers as though it's a signature. Which conveys to me a lack of trustworthiness, tainting an otherwise exemplary company report. Which is funny because the independent accountants are supposed to enhance the credibility of the accounts. Why curb stock options? If employees prefer to be paid in stock options instead of money, it's no skin off my nose. As long as we pay the market rate for their talents and maximize the benefits they enjoy by working for QUALCOMM, that's all that matters. I don't mind paying them with an on-premises gymnasium, swimming pools, golf course, restaurants, cyberspace connections, cyberphones and whatever else the company can supply them which the company can buy more cheaply than they can buy themselves and which enhances working conditions, improves productivity and maintains a loyal corporate gang membership. Stock options are just another part of the reward system. No need to get tits in a tangle. Employees aren't serfs and we aren't running a Gulag. It's not an ascetic monastery either. My own preference as an employee was to be paid in cash - no gymnasium, pools and stuff. Once I've finished work, I want to get the heck out of their and into my own time. But not everyone is like that. Some like stock options, pension plans, pools, snooker, and a home away from home with social context. From what I can see, QUALCOMM does a pretty good job of providing a good working environment and reward system for a wide range of highly talented people. As a shareholder, I've done okay and would not want to be whining about the rewards employees have enjoyed. I think I've had a fair share. You grizzle about Irwin Jacobs' payments. To test your theory that he has been overpaid with stock options and money, what do you think would happen to the market capitalization of QCOM if he announced tomorrow that he was quitting and going to work for Flarion? I think there would be more than a $1 billion drop in market value. What damage do you think would happen? Maybe you think the company would go up in value. Giggle. Mqurice