Business Channel 2006-12-29&31

One company getting tough on its former CEO, Ali Velshi here Minding Your Business. Good morning, Ali.

Good morning, John. I used to love er..looking into the catalogues of this company, going through the store of Sharper Image. It was founded a long time ago, a guy named Richard Thalheimer founded it in 1977. And until last September, he was the company's CEO. Now, Richard Thalheimer had a deal that he signed in 2002 that said when he retired¹, he would get a retirement² package that came to no less than 5 million dollars. Turns out that his retirement package is gonna be less than 5 million dollars, because the company is cutting more than 3 million dollars out of it, saying that the options that he got which he did very well on more than offset³ the actual package he was going to get. Now the company is not saying whether anything to do with those options was wrong, however, it is investigating its options granting practices for discrepancies⁴. In these days, John, discrepancy⁵ tends to mean backdating but the company isn't commenting on that. We're getting all of that from an SEC filing.

Over at Friendly's ice cream, here's an interesting story there's been shareholder⁶ who's been piling up on shares. He has got more than a million shares now. A guy named Sardar Biglari, he's from Texas. He had been very critical of the company's management saying that it's got poor corporate⁷ governance, poor operations, poor stock performance and a weak stock price, and he'd been wanting a seat on the board for the last few months. Well, they gave him one last month on the condition that he doesn't solicit⁸ votes for things that the board doesn't agree with. Now I should tell you this is where board problems start. The idea is that if you wanna come on this board, you can't complain or do anything about the things that you don't like. So good on this...



SEC abbr.
Securities and Exchange Commission
证券交易委员会

1 retired   

adj.隐退的，退休的，退役的

参考例句：

• The old man retired to the country for rest.这位老人下乡休息去了。
• Many retired people take up gardening as a hobby.许多退休的人都以从事园艺为嗜好。

2 retirement   

n.退休，退职

参考例句：

• She wanted to enjoy her retirement without being beset by financial worries.她想享受退休生活而不必为金钱担忧。
• I have to put everything away for my retirement.我必须把一切都积蓄起来以便退休后用。

3 offset   

n.分支，补偿；v.抵消，补偿

参考例句：

• Their wage increases would be offset by higher prices.他们增加的工资会被物价上涨所抵消。
• He put up his prices to offset the increased cost of materials.他提高了售价以补偿材料成本的增加。

4 discrepancies   

n.差异，不符合（之处），不一致（之处）( discrepancy的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• wide discrepancies in prices quoted for the work 这项工作的报价出入很大
• When both versions of the story were collated,major discrepancies were found. 在将这个故事的两个版本对照后，找出了主要的不符之处。 来自《简明英汉词典》

5 discrepancy   

n.不同；不符；差异；矛盾

参考例句：

• The discrepancy in their ages seemed not to matter.他们之间年龄的差异似乎没有多大关系。
• There was a discrepancy in the two reports of the accident.关于那次事故的两则报道有不一致之处。

6 shareholder   

n.股东，股票持有人

参考例句：

• The account department have prepare a financial statement for the shareholder.财务部为股东准备了一份财务报表。
• A shareholder may transfer his shares in accordance with the law.股东持有的股份可以依法转让。

7 corporate   

adj.共同的，全体的；公司的，企业的

参考例句：

• This is our corporate responsibility.这是我们共同的责任。
• His corporate's life will be as short as a rabbit's tail.他的公司的寿命是兔子尾巴长不了。

8 solicit   

vi.勾引；乞求；vt.请求，乞求；招揽(生意)

参考例句：

• Beggars are not allowed to solicit in public places.乞丐不得在公共场所乞讨。
• We should often solicit opinions from the masses.我们应该经常征求群众意见。