WaMu moolah: CEO Alan Fishman may make $19 million for 17 days' work
As Congress argues over limits on executive pay, the New York Times reports that the chief executive of Washington Mutual, who was on the job just 17 days, is eligible for $19.1 million in compensation.
For short-time CEO Alan H. Fishman -- named to run the failing bank less than three weeks ago -- that would work out to $1.12 million per day (assuming he worked weekends). If he worked eight-hour days, it works out to $140,000 per hour.
Here's the kicker: Fishman didn't even broker the deal to find a buyer when WaMu failed and was seized by the government; the federal government reportedly arranged the purchase by JPMorgan Chase & Co., and closed the deal while Fishman was in midair, flying from New York to Seattle.
The New York Times on Fishman's potential compensation:
Mr. Fishman, who has been on the job for less than three weeks, is eligible for $11.6 million in cash severance and will get to keep his $7.5 million signing bonus, according to an analysis by James F. Reda and Associates. WaMu was not immediately available for comment.
--Peter Viles
Your thoughts? Comments? E-mail story tips to Peter Viles, or follow L.A. Land on Twitter.
Photo credit: Los Angeles Times
Where do I sign up!???????
Posted by: Rick | September 27, 2008 at 04:04 PM
this is totally criminal. corporate America has been exposed as a scheme of thriving on investor money, not profits. party is over.
Posted by: hoover | September 27, 2008 at 08:33 PM
this is totally criminal. corporate America has been exposed as a scheme of thriving on investor money, not profits. party is over.
Posted by: hoover | September 27, 2008 at 08:34 PM
Unbelievable! Why not give the money back to the stockholders who got burned by the company's irresponsibility?
Posted by: SJ | September 28, 2008 at 09:00 AM
I'm genuinely curious about this: what are the legal obstacles to not paying CEOs such as this? Is it that such payments are required by their contracts? If that is the case, would the government have the power, as part of the takeover, to void the CEO exit payoffs portions of their contracts? Can a legal expert calmly elucidate this for us?
Posted by: curious | September 28, 2008 at 05:16 PM
and we wonder why our economy is in distress...it's sad.
Posted by: vic | September 29, 2008 at 03:53 PM
RogerRamjet asks; "Why is it when I travel in Europe, I never see people standing at road crossing asking for, 'Well (sic) work for food.'"
Ummm, ... because they learned long ago how to control their borders???
This WaMU thing is an unlucky occurrence. Surely with an employment contract that must run 20 pages and cover issues that are well beyond the comprehension of the Wal-Mart crowd his deal was being negotiated long before the bank was deemed a failure by the Fed.
Coincidence? Surely. Unfortunate? Absolutely! Corrupt? Nowhere other than your conspiratorially bent, sensationalist mind.
Posted by: Midwestern Transplant | September 30, 2008 at 01:39 PM
So much for the good old capitalist work ethic.
Posted by: Jon Koppenhoefer | September 30, 2008 at 02:49 PM