If options are "underwater" at the time of acquisition, it can be part of the deal that acquiring company does not need to honor those, and they are basically d

If options are "underwater" at the time of acquisition, it can be part of the deal that acquiring company does not need to honor those, and they are basically deleted. That happened to me, when options at a public company were acquired by another public company. All the vested but underwater options were simply deleted. When share price rose at the acquiring company my options would have been worth $600,000+. Oh well... ;(