4 ms·

Her compensation was directly tied to company performance. 96% of her compensation was in ownership share in the company. That ownership share is worth $117M be

Her compensation was directly tied to company performance. 96% of her compensation was in ownership share in the company. That ownership share is worth $117M because the stock went from $15 to $39 per share while she was the CEO. If the company had tanked instead, her compensation would be less. Considering the outlook for Yahoo!'s core business was so bleak at the time she was hired, who's to say this wasn't one of the better outcomes for the board that hired her? Yahoo! returning to its glory days as a tech giant was pretty unlikely.

overcast 10y ago
The stock prices are directly related to the awesome performance of Alibaba, and lesser Yahoo Japan, both of which they own stakes. Both which were investments prior to Mayer starting. Reading the article, without those two calculated in, the company is actually down $2.4 billion. Paying her salary for two years AFTER she leaves, including her health insurance, AND office space for her to find a new job. Is completely ludicrous.
- dangrossman 10y ago
  Why is it ludicrous? Would someone have managed to better preserve the value of those investments than her? Would someone capable of doing that have been willing to take on the job for lesser compensation? Yes, the company is down $2.4 billion because the core Yahoo! business was spending $400MM/quarter more than it was taking in -- on the backs of those investments. After 4 years of trying to turn that around, they sold off that money pit for $5B cash, which is more than that $2.4 billion the company is down. Sounds like a pretty good outcome for YHOO's board and owners. Dealing with that board and owners, attempting to maximize the shareholder return on those investments you mentioned, was as large a part of her job as trying to maximize the return from the bleeding tech business. She spent much of late 2014 and early 2015 trying to spin off the investments into a separate company to minimize tax liability, ensuring Yahoo!'s shareholders get as much value as possible if Yahoo! eventually sells some of those shares for cash. You can't write off her stewardship of the value of the BABA and YJP holdings, and their contribution to YHOO, just because they were initially purchased before she took the job.
  - jazzyk 10y ago
    This case shows how simplistic it is to measure an executive's success by stock price alone. Instead of competitiveness and productivity seeking, we get pump and dump: - pump the stock price up (workforce reductions, stock buybacks, mergers and acquisitions) - cash out - let the company crash and burn. Rinse and repeat.
    - nkassis 10y ago
      It's like the business equivalent of forest fires. How dead wood/companies and sick companies/trees get cleared off to make room for new younger ones.

overcast 10y ago

The stock prices are directly related to the awesome performance of Alibaba, and lesser Yahoo Japan, both of which they own stakes. Both which were investments prior to Mayer starting. Reading the article, without those two calculated in, the company is actually down $2.4 billion. Paying her salary for two years AFTER she leaves, including her health insurance, AND office space for her to find a new job. Is completely ludicrous.

dangrossman 10y ago
Why is it ludicrous? Would someone have managed to better preserve the value of those investments than her? Would someone capable of doing that have been willing to take on the job for lesser compensation? Yes, the company is down $2.4 billion because the core Yahoo! business was spending $400MM/quarter more than it was taking in -- on the backs of those investments. After 4 years of trying to turn that around, they sold off that money pit for $5B cash, which is more than that $2.4 billion the company is down. Sounds like a pretty good outcome for YHOO's board and owners. Dealing with that board and owners, attempting to maximize the shareholder return on those investments you mentioned, was as large a part of her job as trying to maximize the return from the bleeding tech business. She spent much of late 2014 and early 2015 trying to spin off the investments into a separate company to minimize tax liability, ensuring Yahoo!'s shareholders get as much value as possible if Yahoo! eventually sells some of those shares for cash. You can't write off her stewardship of the value of the BABA and YJP holdings, and their contribution to YHOO, just because they were initially purchased before she took the job.
- jazzyk 10y ago
  This case shows how simplistic it is to measure an executive's success by stock price alone. Instead of competitiveness and productivity seeking, we get pump and dump: - pump the stock price up (workforce reductions, stock buybacks, mergers and acquisitions) - cash out - let the company crash and burn. Rinse and repeat.
  - nkassis 10y ago
    It's like the business equivalent of forest fires. How dead wood/companies and sick companies/trees get cleared off to make room for new younger ones.