Related Party Transactions - Poll

[billybobjovialdechicoutimi]

Just curious about this topic, so starting a poll here:

Question to all:

 

if a public company employs relatives, partners, spouses, etc. of its leadership (CEO, board members, etc.), beyond what threshold do you think related disclosures should be made to its shareholders (i.e. to YOU)?

 

a- if the combined amount paid to those folks exceeds $10,000,000

b- if the combined amount paid to those folks exceeds $1,000,000

c- if the combined amount paid to those folks exceeds $100,000

d- if the combined amount paid to those folks exceeds $10,000

e- no disclosures are required since the company's leadership should be implicitly trusted to do whatever is best for the company’s shareholders (and current US securities’ laws saying otherwise are just plain wrong)

Edited 19 hours ago by billybobjovialdechicoutimi
typo

[Gamecock-YT]

D, would even push for lower - My first job out of college was working as an accounts payable accountant. The amount of grift the CEO did by employing his wife to do tasks such as decorating the office, catering for events, the company even paid her commission for art work, and she paid herself a very handsome hourly rate for her services. Even had her own LLC to keep things appearing on the up and up.

 

My bosses were all powerless to do anything about it. Just run of the mill petty corporate theft. I did manage to get the CFO to draw the line on her accompanying the CEO on his business trips to Europe. He was even wanting us to pay for a couples weekend in Venice that had nothing to do with any company business or was anywhere close to where the business meetings were taking place. And we also managed to ding him for trying to have the company pay for her round trip business class ticket as well. Plus the corporate policy was he, himself, was only allowed to take Premium economy given the length of flight. 

 

Needless to say I wasn't very popular with him after that. 

Edited 19 hours ago by Gamecock-YT

[LC]

Agree with above. All should be disclosed.

 

Will it? Unlikely.

[Paarslaars]

2 hours ago, Gamecock-YT said:

D, would even push for lower - My first job out of college was working as an accounts payable accountant. The amount of grift the CEO did by employing his wife to do tasks such as decorating the office, catering for events, the company even paid her commission for art work, and she paid herself a very handsome hourly rate for her services. Even had her own LLC to keep things appearing on the up and up.

 

My bosses were all powerless to do anything about it. Just run of the mill petty corporate theft. I did manage to get the CFO to draw the line on her accompanying the CEO on his business trips to Europe. He was even wanting us to pay for a couples weekend in Venice that had nothing to do with any company business or was anywhere close to where the business meetings were taking place. And we also managed to ding him for trying to have the company pay for her round trip business class ticket as well. Plus the corporate policy was he, himself, was only allowed to take Premium economy given the length of flight. 

 

Needless to say I wasn't very popular with him after that. 

I am assuming the CEO owned the company? If not, contacting majority shareholders would do the trick here. If it is, well he's just stealing from himself so...

[Spekulatius]

4 minutes ago, Paarslaars said:

I am assuming the CEO owned the company? If not, contacting majority shareholders would do the trick here. If it is, well he's just stealing from himself so...

Sounds like a clear ethics violation. Most public companies have an anonymous number for that. As a regular employee, you can and generally will fired for much less than that.

 

As for disclosure, I think the answer is <$10k or <$100k. Below that, it’s a matter of corporate policies which should apply to everyone, including CEO‘s.

[Gamecock-YT]

36 minutes ago, Paarslaars said:

I am assuming the CEO owned the company? If not, contacting majority shareholders would do the trick here. If it is, well he's just stealing from himself so...

 

Was owned by 2 private equity companies as I recall. Easy to say in theory, but when you're an entry level employee just trying to get some experience on the resume before heading to greener pastures you try to keep your head down.

 

Also forgot we had the CEOs son on the payroll as a sales associate for Australia. He made far and above what the other sales people for the company did. Plus got the same sales commission that the rest of the team did. He also brought in the least amount of business for the company. We paid him a monthly wire and he'd kick and scream if it wasn't paid ahead of time if pay day was over the weekend. 

Edited 16 hours ago by Gamecock-YT

[bizaro86]

1 hour ago, Gamecock-YT said:

 

Was owned by 2 private equity companies as I recall. Easy to say in theory, but when you're an entry level employee just trying to get some experience on the resume before heading to greener pastures you try to keep your head down.

 

Also forgot we had the CEOs son on the payroll as a sales associate for Australia. He made far and above what the other sales people for the company did. Plus got the same sales commission that the rest of the team did. He also brought in the least amount of business for the company. We paid him a monthly wire and he'd kick and scream if it wasn't paid ahead of time if pay day was over the weekend. 

 

I think the optimal play there (if it had been publicly owned) would have been SEC whistleblower. Pays out a portion of fines.

[nsx5200]

I haven't looked into it because I haven't had the need, but IMHO, I would look at the policies at Berkshire corporate office, and Munger, Tolles & Olson LLP as a starting point.  They've put in the work to have the 'correct' policies in place, so unless you can find flaws in their policies, you should just adopt them.

[Ver]

D, ideally lower. The fraud and cheating will usually start small but if they get away with it, they are likely to scale up, so it must be dissuaded from the start.

 

I have a friend who ran a private midsize tech company. His cofounder, who oversaw the financial side of the business, hired his secret mistress as an office manager and when they got larger, the controller. Over several years she embezzled many hundreds of thousands, possibly more than a million, including using corporate cards for family vacations and such.  The cofounder couldn't do anything because the mistress was blackmailing him, and my friend had no idea until they had an outside audit done. In the end she basically got a slap on the wrist.