alignment of interests

3630 days ago

The Sort of Director who does not get it, who wants only upside risk

I wanna tell you a story…it is a true story but not from the great Max Bygraves. It is from me and from a company meeting a while back and it is why I almost despair of some on public markets.

I shall not name the company but it is trying to raise a couple of million and for some reason I was at the presentation the other week. The two key men sounded pretty impressive and handled questions about strategy, assets and that sort of matter pretty well. I asked about pay and there was no troughing going on.

And so I asked how much cash they had invested in the company. Er…..

One fellow said he had vended in the odd asset – which did not exactly seem core going forward. The other said he had been granted options. “So to answer my question you have not actually stuck a penny of your own cash in have you?” Er, um, ah, but we could be earning far more elsewhere, blah, blah, blah.

I persisted. So how much are you putting into the placing then? I have options said one. The other said that if there are any shares left he might take a few.

As I explained that options were a one way bet it was clear that my questioning was not going down well. The look on their faces suggested that I had asked “how many time have you masturbated this week?” But that is not what I asked.

As The Sheriff of AIM, I merely tried to establish whether their interests were aligned 

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