Filed under: Apple Corporate, Apple Financial, Bad Apple, Apple
Stock Options continue to haunt Apple
With the Macworld keynote still on the horizon, the last thing Apple needs is a few more lawsuits and federal investigations. The San Francisco Chronicle reports that Apple faces a new shareholder lawsuit along with twin investigations by the San Francisco's US Attorney's office and by the Securities and Exchange Commission. Apple's internal investigation, led by movie star, former Veep and all around green guy Al Gore, cleared Steve Jobs and his executive team. Apparently the lawsuit names about a dozen complaints including backdating stock options and "spring loading", where options are granted in advance of releasing news likely to drive up prices. The bottom line is that this controversy looks like it will be around for a while longer. Is there a "there" there? It's hard to tell. We're not lawyers and this whole thing looks like it rests on lots of technicalities.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
dunk said 10:06AM on 1-04-2007
i'm still scratching my head over this one... apple is one of 160 companies under investigation; others include microsoft and cnet. apple is one of the few companies that voluntarily underwent an internal audit.
yet, it's only the apple investigation that keeps making the news. last week it seemed little more than a fund manager ploy to drop the stock price before macworld, but the constant barrage seems like overkill, even for those underhanded twits.
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Guy said 11:25AM on 1-04-2007
I don't know why Apple keeps making the news, but of the other 160 investigations maybe only a handful have a lot of validity, and of those handful Apple is the only well known company. Also Apple may be one of the only companies CEOs who recieved benefit of these options. I am not familiar with these other companies issues, but I don't think Steve Ballmer or Bill Gates recieved stock options. I understand Steve Jobs didn't make money on these options, but he still took them knowing they were backdated, that is like an athlete getting caught using steroids 5 years ago and then saying well it doesn't count since I didn't play that season. Also Al Gore isn't the most honest, or atleast correct source when it comes to issues that he has a personal interest in. He was quoted saying..."the President said the charges are untrue and I believe him."(in regards to the Monica Lewinski scandal) which we all know were true and it turns out Gore was wrong. Also when running for office he said he was the "initiator" of the internet, antother false truth. When you are on the board of directors you aren't the most un-biased person. My guess is there will be some slaps on the wrist and fines, but in the end Apple and Steve Jobs will survive basically unscathed.
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Bill I said 11:26AM on 1-04-2007
@ #1
If what you say is true, and I'm assuming you didn't make that up, I think the fact that Apple remains the public face for this type of "scandal" is nothing short of a testament to their squeaky clean image.
If they weren't seen at this paragon of how to run a business, I don't think you'd see such an upheaval. However, as it stands, Apple is seen as a "golden boy" of tech companies (and companies in general), and for that reason, this is news.
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JB said 11:36AM on 1-04-2007
Screw the audit... how'd you get the dollar bill to do that?
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Alex Abate said 11:44AM on 1-04-2007
What do the people suing Apple want for Steve to step down? What do you think will happen to the value of Apple stock if Steve should leave Apple? What will hurt Apple more this stupid options scandal or the departure of Steve Jobs?
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Matt V said 12:08PM on 1-04-2007
It's like with Martha Stewart. The Feds want to make an example of someone, and Apple is too big a target to pass on. Also, they did falsify documents as part of their backdating scheme so the SEC will at least get a big fine out of Apple.
I'm not a fan of Al Gore but I hope for his sake that the SEC doesn't find anything the internal investigation missed.
The shareholder lawsuits are only about making money for the law firms involved.
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Vineet said 9:16PM on 1-04-2007
Hey! That's the same picture I used for my financial exploration post at http://tkoneqd.blogspot.com/2006/12/abcs-of-financial-exploration.html
That's just freaky.
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Andrew said 10:10AM on 1-05-2007
I'm really disappointed with you guys. How come you haven't managed to shoehorn in the headline "APPLE SHIFTS OPTIONS"?
Keep up the good work ;)
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