Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Technology Stocks : Intel Corporation (INTC) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Don Lloyd who wrote (174570)	5/14/2003 11:21:56 AM
From: GVTucker	Respond to of 186894

In spite of the straw man arguments made that the opponents of expensing claim a zero cost of option compensation, the fact is that the real cost of a proper (not existing) option expensing plan would fully and completely appear in dilution. That is not a fact, that is an opinion, and an opinion that I, the FASB, and many others (including the vast majority of those in the accounting profession) disagree with. Unions perceive the option expensing question as a backdoor way of influencing, and hopefully looting or destroying, companies whose management, employees and shareholders would never accept union influence voluntarily. Please provide some evidence of this.

To: Don Lloyd who wrote (174570)	5/14/2003 11:24:13 AM
From: hueyone	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 186894

It only requires that one notice the fact that most of the shareholder vote proposals on option expensing are sponsored by union pension funds to realize that the options expensing question is not really about accuracy, but about power. So expensing options is a union driven conspiracy to gain power? I don't think so. Take a look at some of the groups who have submitted letters to the FASB in favor of expensing stock options on the income statements: Gregory M. Smith, Director – Operations/Compliance & Fund Accounting, Investment Company Institute---a national association including 8,938 mutual funds, 535 closed-end investment companies and 6 sponsors of unit investment trusts; its mutual funds members have assets of about $6.539 trillion, accounting for approximately 95% of total industry assets, and 90.2 million individual shareholders, 1/31/03 letter to the FASB: The Institute urges the Board to move forward with a reconsideration of Statement No. 123 as soon as practicable. We continue to believe that accounting standards should (1) require the issuers to treat the fair value of stock options granted to employees to be recognized as expense in the income statement and (2) ensure uniformity in how stock options are valued for this purpose. Sarah A. B. Teslik, Executive Director, Council of Institutional Investors---an association of more than 130 corporate, public and union pension funds with more than $3 trillion in pension assets, 1/21/03 Letter to the FASB: The Council supports the principles outlined in the IASB’s exposure draft, and we urge the Financial Accounting Standards Board to propose and approve similar rules. The IASB proposal is in line with the Council policy on the issue, which states that since stock options granted to employees, directors and non-employees are compensation and have a cost, companies should include these costs as an expense on their reported income statements and disclose their valuation assumptions. From FASB Chairman Herz's Statement to a Business Roundtable/Senate meeting on 5/8/03: Most commentators that were users of financial statements, including individual investors, pension funds, mutual funds, creditors, and financial analysts, were generally supportive of mandatory expense recognition of all stock-basedcompensation. fasb.org Regards, Huey