Free Republic

With the nation in the middle of what is being regularly reported as the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression, a new poll found that 74 percent of America's top business leaders fear "an Obama presidency would be disastrous for the country." [snip] Despite the answer, our supposedly impartial press seem totally disinterested in Chief Executive magazine's just-released survey which found some CEOs worried that if implemented "[Obama's] programs would bankrupt the country within three years" Chief Executive magazine’s most recent polling of 751 CEOs shows that . . . McCain is the preferred choice for CEOs. According to...

RONALD MCDONALD TAKES A WRONG TURN by Judie Brown Some years ago a very holy priest explained that once the door was opened to contraception, all manner of sexual sins would flood the culture. His name was Father John Hardon, SJ, and I cannot tell you how much I miss his wise and courageous guidance. In one of the many articles he wrote on this subject, he said: The spectacle of broken families, broken homes, divorce and annulments, abortion and the mania of homosexuality—all of this has its roots in the acceptance of contraception on a wide scale in what...

If a recent poll found that almost 75 percent of America's top business leaders felt that a McCain presidency would be disastrous for the nation, with some even stating that his proposals if enacted would bankrupt the country in three years, do you think media would have reported it? Probably every hour on the hour until every American had heard about it, right? Well, on Wednesday, with the nation in the middle of what is being regularly portrayed as the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression, Chief Executive magazine released its survey of 751 CEOs finding that 74 percent...

Are you capable of taking a perfectly good 158-year-old company and turning it into dust? You should be raking it in like Richard Fuld, Lehman Bros CEO. He took home nearly half-a-billion dollars in total compensation between 1993-2007. Last year, Fuld earned about $45M, according an executive pay research company. ........ roughly $17,000 an hour to obliterate a firm. If you’re willing to drive a company into the ground for less, apply by calling Lehman Brothers........ Fuld (who continues to lead Lehman since it entered bankruptcy proceedings) is the winner of my annual Michael Eisner Award for corporate rapacity and...

Network verifies reports Richard Fuld was attacked for financial institution's bankruptcy. It seems anxiety from the financial crisis is reaching new highs, but the tipping point for one individual came at the Lehman Brothers gym in the midst of the company’s collapse. While former Lehman CEO Richard Fuld was testifying before the House Oversight Committee Oct. 6, CNBC reported he had been punched in the face at the Lehman Brothers gym after it was announced the firm was going bankrupt. CNBC and Vanity Fair contributor Vicki Ward said Fuld was attacked at the gym on a Sunday following the bankruptcy....

The CEO of failed Washington Mutual Inc., on the job only a few weeks before the largest U.S. thrift was seized by the government and sold to JPMorgan Chase & Co., is entitled to more than $13 million in severance and bonus pay.

Alan Fishman could be eligible for a multi-million paycheck after only three weeks on the job ... if he decides to keep it. NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Washington Mutual Chief Executive Alan Fishman could walk away with more than $18 million in salary, bonuses and severance after less than three weeks on the job, according to the terms of his employment agreement.

Washington Mutual Inc.'s new CEO, Alan Fishman, will be eligible for at least $12.65 million or more in salary and bonuses next year, the company said Thursday in a securities filing. Fishman, who replaced Kerry Killinger as CEO on Monday, also received a $7.5 million signing bonus for joining the company, according to a regulatory filing made with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Under his employment agreement, Fishman will receive a base salary of $1 million, a target bonus of up to $3.65 million and a long-term incentive award starting in 2009 of at least $8 million. In addition, he...

Corporate India is in shock after a mob of workers bludgeoned to death the chief executive who sacked them from a factory in a suburb of Delhi. Lalit Kishore Choudhary, 47, the head of the Indian operations of Graziano Transmissioni, a manufacturer of car parts that has its headquarters in Italy, died of severe head wounds on Monday after being attacked by scores of laid-off employees, police said. The incident, in Greater Noida, followed a long-running dispute between the factory’s management and workers demanding better pay and permanent contracts. It is understood that Mr Choudhary, who was married with one...

This is absurd. This is comical. I'm watching the Drive-Bys here during the break. Do you know what the big topic on MSNBC right now is? Bush's speech tonight on the economy, nine o'clock. I'm not going to tell you what he's going to say, but I know what he's going to say. They brought in the big gun anchors at two o'clock in the afternoon to do a seven-hour pregame show on the president's nine o'clock speech. And you know what the big topic is? Executive pay. "He better make sure that he cuts executive pay." Rome is burning...

The chief executive of a company in Greater Noida, just outside Delhi, was on Monday beaten to death by a group of dismissed employees inside the office premises after a meeting called to resolve dispute between them and the management failed. L K Chaudhury, the CEO and managing director of Italian electronics company Gradiano, in Udyog Vihar, Greater Noida, was beaten to death by the agitating workers, senior superintendent of police (Noida) R K Chaturvedi said. Chaudhury was rushed to Kailash hospital where he was declared brought dead. About 34 people, all from the company's management, were injured in the...

Most important was corruption and mismanagement at the Federal National Mortgage Association (Fannie Mae) and the Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corp. (Freddie Mac), which together controlled 90 percent of the secondary mortgage market. Fannie and Freddie went broke because they bought billions of dollars worth of subprime mortgages, on which borrowers defaulted when the housing bubble popped. Fannie bought most of its bad mortgages from Countrywide Financial, whose CEO, Angelo Mozilo, gave sweetheart loans to senior executives of Fannie Mae. Fannie and Freddie cooked their books so senior executives would be paid millions of dollars in bonuses to which they...

How much will he make this year? Question/Comment: Last year Lehman Brothers' CEO Richard Fuld, Jr. made $71 million. Today his company collapsed. How much will he make this year? Paul Solman: I don't know about this year. You've covered last. In 2006, according to Forbes.com, he was the 5th highest-paid CEO in America: "Total Compensation $122.67 mil; 5-Year Compensation Total $375.81 mil."

An ill-timed -- for Obama -- profile of former Fannie Mae CEO Franklin Raines, forced out in an accounting mess a few years ago. The Style Section piece reports that he's recently been taking "calls from Barack Obama's presidential campaign seeking his advice on mortgage and housing policy matters."

" .. Dan Mudd, the CEO of Fannie Mae, is getting $9.3 million of severance for destroying his company. Richard Syron, the CEO of Freddie Mac, is getting $14.1 million .." "But the severance money comes right out of the pockets of taxpayers, who didn't agree to the severance deals and aren't ponying up to save the companies because they want to. Taxpayers are saving Fannie and Freddie because they have to--because Mudd and Syron were incompetent. 'Incompetent'? Is that too harsh? Absolutely not. Both men gambled big and lost bigger. The fact that they may not have appreciated how...

CHARLOTTE, N.C. -- More than $2 million -- that's what the United Way of the Central Carolinas has agreed to pay into the retirement plan of its chief executive officer. The payments are spelled out in tax returns known as the IRS form 990, filed annually by non-profit agencies like the United Way and available to the public. The returns show the local United Way agency has already paid more than $1 million into the employee benefit plan of CEO Gloria Pace King. Board members tell WCNC they've committed to pay more than $1 million more over the next three...

At a time when scores of companies are freezing pensions for their workers, some are quietly converting their pension plans into resources to finance their executives' retirement benefits and pay. In recent years, companies from Intel Corp. to CenturyTel Inc. collectively have moved hundreds of millions of dollars of obligations for executive benefits into rank-and-file pension plans. This lets companies capture tax breaks intended for pensions of regular workers and use them to pay for executives' supplemental benefits and compensation....

WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Sen. Barack Obama has been meeting secretly with heavy industry CEOs in Washington to discuss issues that he would face as president. On the campaign trail, Obama has been highly critical of corporate executives and promised them nothing but tougher regulation and higher taxes. But the unannounced, small evening sessions with them since he clinched the Democratic nomination have been non-confrontational and cordial. Obama scheduled the meetings without any hopes of winning the captains of industry over from Sen. John McCain, but to show them they would be able to do business with him in the White...

Jamie Dimon Goes Insane: "People Who Pass On Rumors Should Go To Jail"* Hilary Lewis | Jul 8, 2008 3:09 AM JP Morgan CEO Jamie Dimon is usually a font of wisdom, but if he actually means what he's quoted as saying on Charlie Rose, he has gone temporarily insane: Reuters: JP Morgan Chase & Co Chief Executive Jamie Dimon said U.S. regulators should investigate whether people betting on Bear Stearns' stock falling deliberately brought down the investment bank. "Where there is smoke, there's fire," Dimon said in an interview with Charlie Rose on PBS, televised on Monday. "I think...

In late March he gave a thoughtful if sometimes vague speech on the need for more financial-markets supervision, which was heavily influenced by advice from former Fed chairman Paul Volcker. He is frequently on the phone with billionaire CEO Warren Buffett ("one of my favorite people," says Obama, "he's just completely down-to-earth and as smart as they come"), a critic of the financial industry and of tax breaks for the rich who also happens to understand capital markets better than just about anyone. Obama calls on Apple's Steve Jobs to help him "think about how to be successful and nimble...

Last week’s Senate debate over Lieberman-Warner – the America’s Climate Security Act – brought to national attention an under-recognized yet rising threat to liberty and limited government: corporate America. Several of the largest corporations worked with environmental special interest groups and left-wing politicians to pass so-called “cap-and-trade” legislation to address global warming concerns. By pushing for the legislation, these companies hoped to get revenue in the form of government subsidies plus accolades from the media for taking measures to “save the planet.” Never mind the impact on the everyday citizen, who pays for it all with higher taxes and increased...

Facing a credibility crisis with investors, Lehman Brothers Holdings has replaced its president and chief financial officer, showing that the bloodletting on Wall Street is far from over. Lehman chief executive Richard Fuld, the longest-serving head of a major Wall Street firm, removed Joseph Gregory, a life-long friend, as his No2 and demoted Erin Callan, Lehman's finance chief and the highest-ranking woman on Wall Street. Ms Callan had taken over as chief financial officer only in December and quickly assumed a high-profile role, countering Lehman's critics by going on TV and eagerly engaging questions about the firm. But instead of...

RUSH: Now, a couple thoughts here. I meant to get into this yesterday, ladies and gentlemen, and events just superseded my intent. But I had a bunch of stories, and I talked about it on the margins yesterday, all these Drive-By Media stories, there was one Washington Post story mentioning Obama is black four or five times. There were three or four other Drive-By Media publications focusing on Obama's race and how what a great step this is for the United States of America, we've passed a major milestone. It just is so wonderful and so forth. Interestingly, there's a...

Energy: Exxon Mobil's CEO says his energy company's "corporate social responsibility" is to produce more energy. While Congress wants to tax oil profits, he wants to spend them to find more oil. What a concept.While some companies like British Petroleum run endless ads touting their capitulation to the global warming religion by saying they are "beyond" petroleum, Exxon Mobil has been refreshingly unapologetic about developing the resources beneath our feet and making money doing it. Speaking to reporters after the annual meeting of Exxon stockholders Wednesday, CEO Rex Tillerson shoved political correctness aside and insisted the science on climate change...

DALLAS -- Rex Tillerson, chairman and chief executive of Exxon Mobil Corp., the world's largest oil-and-gas company, came out swinging Wednesday against the environmental movement, arguing the science of climate change is far from settled and that his company views it as its "corporate social responsibility" to continue to supply the world with fossil fuels. Speaking to reporters after the annual meeting of shareholders, at which much-publicized proposals by the Rockefeller family calling for new investment in renewable energy received little support, Mr. Tillerson also said he expects little delay in the $8-billion Kearl oilsands project in Alberta, after a...

INDIANAPOLIS (Reuters) - Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama will push on Friday for passage of a bill to put the huge pay packages of some U.S. corporate executives under greater scrutiny. The Illinois senator has introduced "say-on-pay" legislation that would give investors more of a voice in setting executive compensation packages. "We've seen what happens when CEOs are paid for doing a job no matter how bad a job they're doing. We can't afford to postpone reform any longer," Obama said in prepared remarks for delivery later on Friday. "That's why Washington needs to act immediately to pass this legislation."...

When is a billion-dollar loss a bonanza? When the person suffering it is one of those greedy Wall Street types the MSM loves to hate. Check out how, in opening this morning's show, Today cast the situation of Bear Stearns Chairman James Cayne: MATT LAUER: Payday! His company imploded and thousands of stockholders went bust, but the Chairman of Bear Stearns cashes in and gets $61 million dollars. Will there be a backlash? Watching the intro, I assumed the Chairman, despite Bears' fall, had received some kind of bonus or golden handshake. But it wasn't until Maria Bartiromo came on...

WASHINGTON - Lawmakers confronted corporate executives Friday about how they managed to take home hundreds of millions of dollars in compensation while their companies were taking a financial nosedive from the subprime mortgage crisis. "It seems that CEOs hit the lottery when their companies collapse," House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Henry Waxman, D-Calif., said at the opening of the hearing. "Any reasonable relation between their compensation and the interests of their shareholders appears to have broken down." Appearing before the panel were Angelo Mozilo of Countrywide Financial Corp., the nation's largest mortgage lender; Stanley O'Neal, formerly of Merrill...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The fat compensation packages of three U.S. CEOs whose companies are being hammered by the widening mortgage crisis came under harsh criticism on Friday at a congressional hearing on executive pay. In the last two quarters of 2007 alone, the three executives' firms lost more than $20 billion on investments in subprime and other risky mortgages, said the House of Representatives Oversight and Government Operations Committee. Yet the three took home fortunes in 2007 -- $120 million for Countrywide Financial Corp CEO Angelo Mozilo; a $161 million retirement package for ex-Merrill Lynch CEO Stanley O'Neal; and $39.5...

Conservatives and party regulars were not happy about the selection of Carly Fiorina to head the Republican National Committee’s “Victory 2008” campaign raising funds for the presidential election. She was one of the nation’s most visible CEOs before she was fired by Hewlett-Packard in 2005 for not generating enough profits. Federal Election Commission records show Fiorina contributed nothing to the Republican Party the last eight years. Her only political giving was to Sen. John McCain’s presidential campaign—$2,100 in 2006 and $2,300 in 2007. Fiorina was at McCain’s side when he campaigned in the critical Michigan and Florida races. Fiorina has...

Goldman Sachs Group Inc (NYSE:GS - News) said on Friday its Chairman and Chief Executive Lloyd Blankfein was awarded about $53.97 million of compensation in its 2007 fiscal year, when the Wall Street bank largely skirted subprime mortgage losses that plagued many rivals. Blankfein also realized $45.76 million from the vesting of stock, bringing his compensation and other awards to about $100 million, according to Goldman's proxy filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. The compensation amount reflects a methodology used by many executive pay consultants. It differs from Goldman's calculation of Blankfein's "approved 2007 compensation" of $68.5 million,...

Jury Finds 5 Former Insurance Executives Guilty of Scheme to Manipulate Financial Statements HARTFORD, Conn. (AP) -- Five former insurance company executives were found guilty Monday of a scheme to manipulate the financial statements of the world's largest insurance company, American International Group Inc.

Outgoing eBay CEO Meg Whitman isn't retiring to life on the golf course. The L.A. Times reports today that Whitman may run for governor of California. "Whitman has talked with top Republicans about the possibility of a run for California governor in 2010, according to three operatives who have had discussions with her. Whitman is said to be asking detailed questions about the logistics of a run and the effect she could have as governor, according to the sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to reveal the conversations." Whitman said this week that she'll...

Current and former CEOs of three major U.S. financial institutions deeply involved in the widening subprime mortgage crisis were asked on Monday by a Congressional committee to testify at a hearing next month on their massive pay and severance packages. A House of Representatives panel invited Countrywide Financial Corp (CFC.N: Quote, Profile, Research) CEO Angelo Mozilo, former Citigroup Inc (C.N: Quote, Profile, Research) CEO Charles Prince and former Merrill Lynch & Co Inc (MER.N: Quote, Profile, Research) CEO Stanley O'Neal to appear and answer questions on February 7. House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Henry Waxman, a 17-term California...

Lasting Impression: Does The Face Of A CEO Determine A Successful Company? ScienceDaily (Jan. 14, 2008) — It certainly takes more than a pretty face to run a leading national corporation. But according to a recent Tufts University study, the performance levels of America’s top companies could be related to the first impressions made by their chief executive officers (CEOs). Using photographs of the highest and lowest ranked Fortune 1000 companies’ CEOs, psychologists Nicholas Rule and Nalini Ambady quizzed ordinary college students to determine which of the pictured faces were characteristic of a leader. Without knowledge of the pictured individuals’...

Lavish Payout, Perks for Failed Mortgage CEO His Severance Package Includes Jet Use, Country Club Dues and a Hefty Payout By DANIEL ARNALL ABC NEWS Business Unit Jan. 11, 2008 — Angelo Mozilo, the co-founder and public face of troubled mortgage giant Countrywide, is eligible for tens if not hundreds of millions in compensation and perks on the sale of the company to Bank of America. During calendar 2006, the latest period available for review in Securities and Exchange Commission filings, Mozilo took home $48.1 million in compensation. An early analysis of SEC filings by the Los Angeles Times suggests...

Starbucks Corp. said Chairman Howard Schultz will take over as chief executive, replacing Jim Donald. Mr. Schultz, who grew the company from a small Seattle bean seller into the world's largest coffee chain, plans to slow number of new stores built in the U.S. and close struggling locations, improve the customer experience inside stores here, streamline management and accelerate Starbucks expansion overseas, the company said. "We must address the challenges we face and we know what has to be done," Mr. Schultz said in a statement. Put simply, we are recommitting ourselves to what has made Starbucks and the Starbucks...

>As the year comes to a close, it’s time to announce the FiveWorst CEOs of 2007. The CEOs shared a common theme: they allowed the liberalagenda embodied by Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) to drive businessdecisions.  All of the “winners� are actively seeking federal regulationto address global warming despite the fact they failed to evaluate the economiccost of regulation – higher energy prices, slower economic growth and anincrease in job loss – on consumers and future earnings.  In addition, the CEOs also failed toanticipate the unintended consequences of promoting global warming fears ontheir businesses. The desire for regulation is an outgrowth...

Business Leaders Feel Pretty Good About Economy's Prospects Despite Housing, Credit Woes WASHINGTON (AP) -- The country's top corporate executives foresee pretty good business prospects even as the economy gets squeezed by a housing collapse, a credit crunch, Wall Street turmoil and high energy prices. A survey by the Business Roundtable, released Tuesday, showed that most executives expect sales, capital investment and hiring to remain at current levels or even improve in the coming months. While the economy's problems have caused consumer confidence to tank, the survey's results suggest that corporate executives' assessment is that the business climate remains generally...

Will Congress Sell Out the American People at "U.S." multinational CEOs' Request? William R. Hawkins Tuesday, November 20, 2007 On November 14, the CEOs of 105 major transnational corporations sent a letter organized by the U.S.-China Business Council to the Democratic and Republican leaders of both houses of Congress. The letter argued against enacting any legislation “targeting the U.S.-China trading relationship.” These corporations are heavily involved financially in this ‘relationship,” helping China rise to become the next great rival to the United States. They provide Beijing with capital and technology, and place the orders that keep Chinese factories open while...

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Citigroup Inc , the largest bank in the United States, said on Thursday that its former Chairman and Chief Executive, Charles Prince, will take home roughly $40 million as he retires from the company. The package is less than a quarter of what former Merrill Lynch Chief Executive Stan O'Neal was awarded when he was ousted from the investment bank last week. The terms of Prince's retirement include the vesting of options estimated to be worth $1.28 million, the vesting of deferred stock estimated to be worth $16.05 million and the vesting of restricted shares worth...

NEW YORK (Reuters) - They may be a small minority in corporate boardrooms, but women directors typically earn more than men, a new U.S. study has found. Female directors in corporate America earned median compensation of $120,000, based on the most recently available pay data, compared with $104,375 for male board members, research group The Corporate Library said in its annual director pay report on Wednesday. At the same time, the study said, women in corporate boardrooms are outnumbered eight to one. "This makes being a director one of the few jobs in the U.S. economy where the pay differential...

AP Black CEOs: a Tiny Group Shrinks More Monday November 5, 5:53 pm ET By Ellen Simon, AP Business Writer Life at the Top Gets Lonelier for Black CEOs Who Remain After O'Neal, Parsons Departures NEW YORK (AP) -- It's getting lonelier at the top for black CEOs. Only four blacks will be left running Fortune 500 companies after Stan O'Neal's abrupt retirement from the top spot at Merrill Lynch & Co. last week and Time Warner Inc. Dick Parsons' announcement Monday that he will retire at the end of the year. That leaves Aylwin Lewis at Sears Holding Corp.,...

Charles Prince, the beleaguered chief executive of Citigroup Inc., is planning to resign at a board meeting on Sunday, according to people familiar with the situation. The move caps a four-year tenure as CEO for Mr. Prince, a longtime lawyer who took over the reins from Sanford Weill, who built Citigroup into a financial colossus. Just a few weeks ago, board members including Robert Rubin, the influential chairman of Citigroup's executive committee, expressed support for Mr. Prince and said that his job wasn't in jeopardy. "I think Chuck's going to be here for a lot of years," Mr. Rubin said...

If someone wants to bash corporations and the "excesses" of raw capitalism, there's no easier target nowadays than CEO pay. Recently critics were in a tizzy over a report claiming that CEOs make 364 times what the average worker earns. For example, in this MSN article Michael Brush declares: In recognition of the just-completed Labor Day weekend, I'd like to offer a salute to American workers, who the United Nations just reported are second only to Norway's laborers when it comes to productivity. And now, a bit of bad news for those same workers: You're not getting credit for that...

BMW CEO Norbert Reithofer is not happy. In a case which proves that nothing is immune to the sleight of hand of Chinese manufacturers and their ability and willingness to clone any product on earth, BMW has been forced to threaten legal action over a cheap knock-off version of their popular X5 SUV. The Chinese-made SUV which ironically enough is called CEO is almost identical in appearance to BMW’s X5…especially from the rear. “We have already taken steps against the marketing of the CEO (SUV) in Europe. Should this car be presented at the IAA, we will look into taking...

Manmohan Singh, the Indian Prime Minister, has stunned business leaders by telling them to pay themselves less, limit their profits, eschew lavish weddings and shun “wasteful” Western lifestyles. Mr Singh warned an audience including some of India’s richest tycoons that they could face severe social unrest if they did not curb their spending and do more to bridge the country’s yawning income gap. “In a country with extreme poverty, industry needs to be moderate in the emolument levels its adopts,” he told the opening of the annual conference of the Confederation of Indian Industry on Thursday. “Rising income and wealth...

NEW YORK (Reuters) - American chief executive officers saw their total direct compensation -- an executive pay measure including salary, bonus and incentive shares -- rise 8.9 percent in 2006, a private study showed on Monday. The study by consulting company Mercer found that CEOs' pay was linked more to performance than in recent years, driven in part by strong corporate results and shareholders returns. The median total direct compensation for executives at the 350 companies surveyed -- total direct compensation plus benefits and perquisites -- rose to $6.5 million, according to Mercer's study. Net income at the companies surveyed...

Following are highlights from a speech about global warming and the coal industry delivered by Robert E. Murray, chairman, president and CEO of Cleveland-based Murray Energy Corp. to the New York Coal Trade Association in New York City last Friday. Most participants in the coal industry are very threatened and troubled by the so-called "global warming," or carbon emission constraint, measures that have been introduced into the Congress that will ration the use of coal, with much worse adverse consequences to our American citizens than those that I have already experienced in my lifetime as a result of enactment of...

In the sports world, history makes a distinction between average coaches and legendary coaches. There are some coaches, like John Wooden or Bill Parcells, who seem to win regardless of the all the perceived negatives that surround them. Despite not always having the best talent, or the access to the most money, or the best situation, they find a way to put up winning and even championship seasons. These legendary men stand in contrast to other coaches who, despite having a tremendous amount of positive resources, can't seem to put together a consistent contender. Oftentimes, these average coaches have a...