April 10, 2006
I just read today's April 10 Wall Street Journal story about how "furious" media companies are about the prospect of having to disclose the compensation of their three highest-paid executives in addition to that of corporate officers.
I have never seen so much meretricious nonsense in a single business story. Salaries are "trade secrets"? What trade secrets? Everyone in the industry seems to know what everyone else is paid, so why shouldn't stockholders?
Personally, I would never buy any of these stocks because I think most of these businesses are run by dingalings who simply roll the dice with other people's money. If they don't want to disclose things like executive compensation, fine. Just don't try to pass yourselves off as public companies. Everyone needs to play by the same rules, and you can't have it both ways, i.e., access to equity markets while withholding information.