Archive for the 'Business' Category

Netflix 2007 Annual Report

Sunday, April 20th, 2008

The red envelopeNetflix is one of the few annual reports I bother to read as an investor. Last year’s has some interesting bits.

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CEO Pay - Cash vs Stock

Sunday, April 20th, 2008

Mark Cuban makes an interesting argument in My 2 Cents on CEO Pay: pay CEOs entirely in cash, making their salaries just as transparent and and subject to cash-crunch cuts as regular employees’. As an employee and shareholder, I’m all for more transparency and efficiency throughout the ranks.

It also prompted me to look at how much of Icon’s executive compensation is cash and stock. The Exectuive Compensation section under our last SEC filing reveals 4-5% share compensation for the chairman and CEO, and 18% for the CFO. Those numbers seem low, but they’re probably options priced at one half to one quarter of the stock’s current value (based on those same executives’ currently outstanding options).

Curiously, we peons have no company-endorsed way to buy stock, even with our own money. I picked some up anyway, but I guess I’ll have to keep climbing the corporate ladder to get in on the options game.

My Second Dollar

Friday, February 1st, 2008

Gazebo on Claytor LakeI sold another photo print today! It’s the first to come through my Gallery2 & PayPal ordering system. There’s a certain thrill to seeing a PayPal receipt in your inbox that represents income for your own business. The photo is actually an older one from a park near my brother’s home in Blacksburg, Virginia.