Aren’t August 2008 IMS Vytorin/Zetia Scrips Due Out. . . Now?

. . .And, wouldn’t it be perfect form, for the Kenilworth crowd, to bury them in the avalanche of uncertain financial news on Wall Street, today? Look for them after markets close, right here.

Just my (experience-based) hunch.

UPDATED: 09.20.08 @ 8 AM EDT

Check the comments to this post — a thoughtful poster points out that Schering actually dumped a deceptively-huge raise for Dr. Koestler (head science guy) into a Friday night Form 8-K.

My reaction? — we’ll see the August IMS Vytorin/Zetia data Form 8-K on Monday or Tuesday, then — but consider the other cha-cha underway, here:

What strikes me about this Friday night Form 8-K is not just that the board is paying Dr. Koestler more, but how the board chose to disclose (or partially-disclose) it:

The Form 8-K recites that Koestler “only” recieved a 5 percent base salary “bump“. That may be (facially) factually accurate, but then it means he received an undisclosed earlier raise.

How so?

Well, the most recent Schering proxy (at page 34) indicates that his base — for all of 2007 — was $726,250 (before bonus, stock awards, SARs, options and long-term payouts) — NOT the $823,000 recited in the Form 8-K.

The 8-K pegs his new base salary at $864,000 — thus, actually, he garnered an increase of exactly 16 percent — over his 2007 base salary.

So, for me, it is not just that the Chairman of the Compensation Committee of the Board (Hans Becherer — pictured at right) dumped it into a Friday night disclosure (on Schering “layoff press release day“, no less!), it is also that Schering’s board, via Hans Becherer — a named defendant in Cain v. Hassan (which alleges he breached his fiduciary duties in approving excessive compensation for Mr. Hassan in May of 2008, and others, among many other matters) — apparently played “hide and seek” with where the 2008 currency converter pegs “30 pieces of silver“, these days.

When at least 1,000 salespeople lose their jobs, and the rest are lucky ot be able to stay — with no increase, mind you — Koestler walks off with nearly a million a year — up one-sixth from last year — and that is BEFORE stock, and options and bonus.

Sheesh.

Aren’t August 2008 IMS Vytorin/Zetia Scrips Due Out. . . Now?

. . .And, wouldn’t it be perfect form, for the Kenilworth crowd, to bury them in the avalanche of uncertain financial news on Wall Street, today? Look for them after markets close, right here.

Just my (experience-based) hunch.

UPDATED: 09.20.08 @ 8 AM EDT

Check the comments to this post — a thoughtful poster points out that Schering actually dumped a deceptively-huge raise for Dr. Koestler (head science guy) into a Friday night Form 8-K.

My reaction? — we’ll see the August IMS Vytorin/Zetia data Form 8-K on Monday or Tuesday, then — but consider the other cha-cha underway, here:

What strikes me about this Friday night Form 8-K is not just that the board is paying Dr. Koestler more, but how the board chose to disclose (or partially-disclose) it:

The Form 8-K recites that Koestler “only” recieved a 5 percent base salary “bump“. That may be (facially) factually accurate, but then it means he received an undisclosed earlier raise.

How so?

Well, the most recent Schering proxy (at page 34) indicates that his base — for all of 2007 — was $726,250 (before bonus, stock awards, SARs, options and long-term payouts) — NOT the $823,000 recited in the Form 8-K.

The 8-K pegs his new base salary at $864,000 — thus, actually, he garnered an increase of exactly 16 percent — over his 2007 base salary.

So, for me, it is not just that the Chairman of the Compensation Committee of the Board (Hans Becherer — pictured at right) dumped it into a Friday night disclosure (on Schering “layoff press release day“, no less!), it is also that Schering’s board, via Hans Becherer — a named defendant in Cain v. Hassan (which alleges he breached his fiduciary duties in approving excessive compensation for Mr. Hassan in May of 2008, and others, among many other matters) — apparently played “hide and seek” with where the 2008 currency converter pegs “30 pieces of silver“, these days.

When at least 1,000 salespeople lose their jobs, and the rest are lucky ot be able to stay — with no increase, mind you — Koestler walks off with nearly a million a year — up one-sixth from last year — and that is BEFORE stock, and options and bonus.

Sheesh.

Off-Topic: Wall Street — Analytics of Considering the Proposed RTC-like Suggestions

Okay, a lil’ refresher, here — for this is off-topic, afterall: if you saw this, and this later one, of mine, over the weekend past — please do consider this comment/addendum (given subsesquently unfolding events) and scratch your head for any consistent message — from last night’s news that an RTC-like solution may well win the day, here:

. . . .“What we are working on now is an approach to deal with systemic risks and stresses in our capital markets,” said Henry M. Paulson Jr., the Treasury secretary. “And we talked about a comprehensive approach that would require legislation to deal with the illiquid assets on financial institutions’ balance sheets,” he added.

One model for the proposal could be the Resolution Trust Corporation, which bought up and eventually sold hundreds of billions of dollars’ worth of real estate in the 1990s from failed savings-and-loan companies. In this case, however, the government is expected to take over only distressed assets, not entire institutions. And it is not clear that a new agency would be created to manage and dispose of the assets, or whether the Federal Reserve or Treasury Department would do so. . . .

Object Lesson: No one is driving this bus. [Or said another way -- perhaps, more darkly -- pure Presidential Election Year politics just may be.]

Act accordingly.

Off-Topic: Wall Street — Analytics of Considering the Proposed RTC-like Suggestions

Okay, a lil’ refresher, here — for this is off-topic, afterall: if you saw this, and this later one, of mine, over the weekend past — please do consider this comment/addendum (given subsesquently unfolding events) and scratch your head for any consistent message — from last night’s news that an RTC-like solution may well win the day, here:

. . . .“What we are working on now is an approach to deal with systemic risks and stresses in our capital markets,” said Henry M. Paulson Jr., the Treasury secretary. “And we talked about a comprehensive approach that would require legislation to deal with the illiquid assets on financial institutions’ balance sheets,” he added.

One model for the proposal could be the Resolution Trust Corporation, which bought up and eventually sold hundreds of billions of dollars’ worth of real estate in the 1990s from failed savings-and-loan companies. In this case, however, the government is expected to take over only distressed assets, not entire institutions. And it is not clear that a new agency would be created to manage and dispose of the assets, or whether the Federal Reserve or Treasury Department would do so. . . .

Object Lesson: No one is driving this bus. [Or said another way -- perhaps, more darkly -- pure Presidential Election Year politics just may be.]

Act accordingly.