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Technology Stocks : America On-Line: will it survive ...? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: The Duke who wrote (8455)	3/4/1998 1:22:00 PM
From: Keith J	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 13594

The vesting refers to the schedule as to when the person is entitled to the option, in this case. Most people are familiar with vesting schedules in company retirement plans, the concept is similar. What happens in the stock option case is that the company will grant an option to an employee, but the option is not currently exercisable - even if it "in-the-money". Disney is notorious for granting huge stock options to management. For instance, AOL may grant options to Case, but they may not be exercisable until 2002. So, it's true he's holding these options, but he couldn't convert these to the stock currently if he wanted to. In fact, he couldn't do so for 4 years. So, in relation to what his current, exercisable holdings are, Case's sale is a higher percentage. KJ

To: The Duke who wrote (8455)	3/4/1998 1:46:00 PM
From: Paul Merriwether	Respond to of 13594

<<Can someone explain the difference between vested and unvested options? Are these just options that wear a three piece suit????>> When technology companies grant stock options, they are not immediately exercisable, but rather the beneficiary has to wait till they get vested. The idea is to retain talent over a longish period(say 3-10 years). e.g. companyA can give employeeP 100000 shares over a period of 5 years with 20% vested every year. After 1 year of the award, he could sell 20000 shares. If steve case has already sold 39.6 % of his vested+unvested options, that is B.A.D. news(imho). _Possibly_ means that he has already sold _all_ he could and has to wait for getting the rest of his options to get vested. I don't know if its public info. how many of his vested options he has sold(but I would be interested).